Understanding your scores
What visibility scores mean and how they're calculated
Visibility score
Your visibility score is a composite metric showing how often your brand appears in AI search responses. It combines two sub-metrics:
Citation rate
The percentage of monitored prompts where your brand is cited with a source link. A citation means the AI platform linked directly to your website.
Mention rate
The percentage of monitored prompts where your brand name appears in the response text, even without a direct link.
Citation rate is generally more valuable than mention rate. It drives actual traffic to your site.
How scores are calculated
Heading checks each of your monitored prompts across the tracked AI platforms (ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overview). For each check:
- The prompt is sent to the AI platform
- The response is analyzed for your brand name and domain
- Citations (source links) and mentions (brand name in text) are recorded
- On paid plans, scores are aggregated daily into a time series
On a free property, scores come from a single point-in-time snapshot. The report shows "As of" its snapshot date, with no over-time trends. See Your free snapshot report.
Reading your dashboard
- Trend arrows (↑↓) show change vs. the previous period (paid properties only; free snapshots have no previous period)
- Green indicates improvement, red indicates decline
- Platform breakdown shows which AI platforms cite you most
What's next?
For agencies managing multiple clients, see the multi-client management guide.