C3 & Meta: Beyond Performance
Content StrategySEO
Which are the best LLM visibility tracking tools?
This whitepaper covers an introduction to the emerging LLM visibility landscape, the growing role of AI search in organic performance, and how brands can begin measuring their presence across major LLMs. We also compare the leading AI search visibility tools on the market, outlining their key features, limitations, and where each tool is best suited.
Report Contents
Abstract
With GEO search the hot topic on everyone’s lips, and marketers looking at how to become more visible across AI search, it only makes sense that you can track visibility and performance across LLMs, if you’re going to invest time and money in it.
With that in mind, we’ve decided to test some of the core LLM trackers on the market, so you don’t have to!
In this guide, we’ve looked at:
- Ahrefs’ Brand Radar
- AccuLLM
- Sistrix
- HubSpot AEO Grader
- Trakkr.ai
- Arise
We’ve highlighted the features and drawbacks of each, to help you make an informed decision on which one is best for you. Of course, these products will constantly be changing, so we will continue to test, and add new trackers to the list as and when they come to market.
We’ve also delved into our own LLM tracking model that our innovation team have been working on, as well as tracking we have set up in GA4, to help understand traffic and conversions from these prompts.
So, read on to find out our pick of the best LLM trackers, to help inform your SEO and content strategy.
Ahrefs’ Brand Radar
Ahrefs has long-been a favourite keyword research and monitoring tool among SEOs and content marketers, and one that many of us at C3 have years’ experience using. So, when we got the chance to give its latest bolt-on, Brand Radar, a go, there was eager anticipation in the ranks of the Organic team.
1. Enter your URL
When you load up Brand Radar, you’re first met with an initial display box that prompts you to enter your URL, as well as a selection of competitors of your choice. However, you don’t need to enter any competitors to gauge your own performance across AIOs and LLMs – only if you want to directly compare.
Note: Make sure your URL is entered in the ‘URLs’ section, rather than ‘Name variations’. Data will pull either way, so it’ll not be immediately obvious you’ve done it wrong.
The easiest way to tell if you’ve correctly completed this step is to see if the top-level data at the next stage matches the top-level insights displayed on the ‘Site Explorer’ screen.
2. Explore the range of data
Once you’ve entered your domain, you’ll be presented with a breadth of data, from your ‘AI Share of Voice’ to the number of mentions (your brand is named but not necessarily linked to), citations (your brand is used as a direct source, and linked to), and impressions (the number of times your brand is displayed) you’re registering across AI Overviews, AI Mode, ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Copilot.
How is data displayed?
Within Ahrefs’ Brand Radar tool, data is displayed both numerically and visually, to help you understand current performance, as well as trends over time. If you’re monitoring performance vs competitors, each URL will be indicated on your selected line graph, for simple comparison.
3. Dive into the details
If you’re interested in diving deeper into the details, you’re able to click through to any given AI search platform (such as AI Mode) and explore the types of prompts that are eliciting citations, the corresponding estimated number of searches, and, helpfully, an example of a real response to each prompt.
This final addition is a useful feature, as it gives you an idea of the sort of content LLMs are returning, and where your brand fits into the conversation.
How are the prompts uncovered?
We often take for granted the depth of data available to us across Ahrefs’ more traditional suite of tools. But AI search is brand new space, so you’d be forgiven for taking a more investigative stance around where information is collected from. With this in mind, due diligence dictated we reach out to Ahrefs to get an official response:
“Prompts are initially identified using Ahrefs’ keyword and topic index (the same source used in Keywords Explorer). From here, we feed real user queries into each AI assistant (i.e. AI Mode, ChatGPT, etc). These prompts are based on live search data and trending intents; for example, ‘People also ask’ questions, topic clusters, and high-volume queries.”
So, to summarise, prompts are suggested at scale using Google search data. These are then fed into AI search platforms to determine responses, and which brands are earning citations, mentions, and impressions.
Overview of Ahrefs’ Brand Radar
Brand Radar is a comprehensive prompt analysis tool that allows you to monitor where your brand or website is appearing across a wide range of LLMs and AI search platforms.
It gives a good level of detail without becoming inaccessible – from the number of citations you’ve earned to the prompts you’re appearing for and the actual platform response for each prompt – so should be suitable for most SEOs. All in all, it certainly ranks among the top AI search visibility tools.
Ease of use: 4/5
Range of metrics: 5/5
Depth of detail: 4.5/5
AccuLLM
AccuRanker has been in the SEO reporting game for quite some time now, and anyone who uses their classic tool can enjoy real-time keyword tracking and rank monitoring. Which forms the foundations of the brand’s latest bolt-on software: AccuLLM.
Set up your brand for LLM tracking
Within AccuLLM, you’ll need to set up an area for each brand you’re interested in monitoring, so first-navigate to the ‘Brands’ area and ‘Add brand’. From here, you’ll be required to input the relevant URL, territory (i.e. UK, US, etc), and any relevant competitors you want to track performance against.
At this stage, you’ll also be asked to input the prompts you want to report on. Don’t worry if you don’t have a list to hand to begin with though, as the tool does offer some suggestions to kick you off! Once you’ve completed all the required fields, you’ll be taken to the main dashboard, where you can get stuck into the data…
Reviewing overall performance
With your brand properly set up for tracking, you’re now ready to start measuring performance across the major LLMs* (including ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode – or you can select ‘All’ to get a holistic view). The comparison period automates to ‘today vs yesterday’, but you’re able to customise this quite easily.
Metrics to review: visibility (the average visibility of all prompts i.e. how many AI search platforms has the prompt appeared on); sentiment (the average sentiment of all prompts i.e. 100 means your brand is referenced highly favourably); rank (the average ranking position of all prompts); mentions (the number of times your brand is mentioned across all prompts); and citations (the number of times your brand is cited within AI search across all prompts).
An example report can be seen below:
*Note: You may need to wait 24-48 hours for AccuLLM to pull through all historical information, for comparison, so just bear this in mind. If you’re wanting data for a new brand for a presentation, for instance, we’d suggest setting up the tracking at least a few days ahead of when you’ll need the information!
What else does the AccuLLM dashboard show you?
The AccuLLM dashboard is much more than just top-level, up-front figures, however; it also features a series of handy graphs that can be exported as either raw data or an image. These graphs indicate:
- Visibility over time, of both your own brand and the chosen competitors (across the prompt pack you’re tracking).
- Top winners and losers (the prompts that have improved/dropped in rank vs the comparison period). Here, you’re able to see the number of prompts that have risen/fallen, as well as the actual prompts and how they’re appearing within each AI search platform.
- The average rank for all prompts over the comparison period, for your own brand and competitors.
- Ranking distribution, and how your LLM rankings have developed over the comparison period.
Interestingly, within your brand dashboard, AccuLLM have also incorporated a feature that lets you view the domains that are most frequently cited for your prompts (irrespective of whether you included them in your competitor set or not) and the specific landing pages that are most frequently cited for across your prompt set (again, irrespective of whether they belong to URLs within your competitor set or not).
Reviewing performance at a prompt level
Understanding the overall performance of your prompt list is key to gauging general direction, but if you want to drill into the details, you’ll want to head on over to the ‘Prompts’ tab (just next to ‘Dashboard’). Here, you’ll be presented with your entire prompt list, each’s accompanying visibility, sentiment, and rank information, and the number of unique brands appearing for each prompt (and which are coming out on top).
Handily, you’re also able to check out a live view of the response to each prompt within all available LLMs, so you can get a steer for the type of follow-up ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google are giving users interested in your chosen topic.
Overview of AccuRanker’s AccuLLM
AccuRanker has really leant into its strengths with AccuLLM; taking inspiration from its successful approach to Google keyword tracking and applying this to LLM prompts.
If you’re interested in adopting this approach, and monitoring performance of a selection of prompts over time, this is likely the perfect tool for you – we’d perhaps even go out on a limb and say it’s among the best LLM rank trackers with this in mind. That said, if you’re more interested in getting a view of all the prompts you’re appearing for, you’ll perhaps be better served elsewhere.
Ease of use: 4/5
Range of metrics: 3.5/5
Depth of detail: 3/5
Sistrix
Another SEO stalwart tool, Sistrix, have created a ‘for chatbots’ section, which you can access by hovering under the Sistrix logo on-site (you’ll need to pay for this). With this new tool, there are two key features you can use: ‘search’ and ‘tracker’.
Search
The search section enables you to look at prompts on a keyword level. Simply type in your keyword (we used “green kitchens” as an example), and specify your language, and you’ll be shown a range of metrics, including brands that are the most visible across LLMs for prompts that incorporate your specified keyword, and a selection of prompts that people search for.
You can click into the prompts to see other information that’s included in response to the prompts. When we looked at the prompt for “green kitchen trends”, it uncovered things like forest green and olive tones; as well as biophilic designs, air purifiers, and natural textures, highlighting the interest in both colour and eco-friendly designs, which can help to inform content strategies.
Head back to the dashboard overview in the search section, and you can then click through to competitors, to see other prompts they appear in. However, when we did this, we could only see a small selection, suggesting it’s not as exhaustive as Ahrefs’ Brand Radar. We had a similar situation when trying out the ‘prompt gap’ too, where we input our brand and a couple of competitors. We were only shown three prompts, which, when we compare to Brand Radar, we can see there are more opportunities.
Tracker
In this section, you can monitor visibility of a brand over time, which is great for reporting. Input your brand’s URL, and you’ll be shown an AI visibility index, which highlights yours – and your competitors – visibility across LLM searches. If you want to find out more about your individual competitors, then click through and you’ll see their visibility scores against each LLM, as well as a selection of prompts they feature in (again, it doesn’t appear to be an exhaustive list).
There’s also an environment section on the dashboard, which highlights the words within prompts that your brand features most in; as well as the list of prompts you choose to track, including the AI models they appear in, and your position.
One thing we like is the sentiment analysis tool, which highlights how LLMs view your brand, compared to competitors, providing strengths and weaknesses. Some of the weaknesses you might be able to address in content, but can be taken for wider business context (e.g. for one brand, a weakness was the complication with pricing, so formatting prices out in a table might help to fix this).
Ease of use: 4/5
Range of metrics: 4/5
Depth of detail: 3/5
Hubspot’s AEO Grader
A free tool, start by inputting the name of your brand, the location you want to look at, the product or service you want to focus on, and the industry it operates in; and the AEO Grader will bring back a report.
Whilst it doesn’t go as in-depth as other tools, it’s a nice starting point if you want to see a snapshot of how LLMs perceive you, and how visible you are compared to competitors.
It scores you across OpenAI, Perplexity and Gemini on brand recognition, market score, presence quality, brand sentiment, and share of voice. To access the full report, you’ll need to input your email.
Once we’d done that, we were told that while our brand is seen as a niche on OpenAI and Gemini, we’re a leader on Perplexity; with more people discussing our brand on there – and more credible sources citing us on there – than anywhere else.
It also breaks down your competition, showing who you’re competing with, with the graph easily displayed, so it’s great for copying and pasting in decks.
You’re then told roughly how many mentions you’ve received (the number of times you’ve featured alone in discussion), and the number of comparison mentions (when you’ve been discussed alongside competitors). It’s not clear the time period for this, but given the discrepancies between results pulled from this and Ahrefs, we think it’s likely the total number of mentions.
Hubspot’s AEO grader then tells you what people commonly compare (pricing, durability, installation ease, and product range were a few pulled through), which can be helpful to feed into your content strategy.
Finally, you’re provided with an analysis summary that highlights your strengths, and growth areas. Whilst it doesn’t tell you specific prompts you’re featuring in, this is great for a free tool, and is useful if you want some top-level insight.
Ease of use: 5/5
Range of metrics: 3/5
Depth of detail: 3/5
Trakkr.ai
Trakkr.ai gives you some good top-level insights into LLM visibility – enter the brand you want to track, and you’ll have an easily digestible visibility and presence overview report across core LLMs, plus AI overviews.
Those two metrics are:
- Presence score: This shows how often your brand is mentioned by – or appears in – AI search tools
- Visibility score: This shows how prominently your brand appears when it’s mentioned – so, how high up you feature in the response, making you more visible
The free version is understandably quite basic. Once you’ve input your URL and it crawls your site, it’ll give you some prompt suggestions to choose from – you can opt for five in total, and the ones it showed us when we tested it out were all ‘Top 10…’.
However, if you opt for the paid version, you get access to the prompt research tool, which gives you much more varied options to pick from. Plus, they also show you who they deem to be ‘ranking number one’ (or the most visible) for those specific prompts, so you can get a good idea of who your competitors truly are.
The other feature you’ll have access to with the paid version, is the competitor insights tool, where you’re presented with a long list of brands which you can list as a core competitor set. While you’ll probably know who your core competitors are already, it can be helpful in identifying emerging brands to keep an eye on.
Finally, trakkr.ai also provides some Google audit tools, including a technical audit tool, that offers some suggestions on becoming more visible. Whilst these recommendations were relatively general (e.g. one of the recommendations it gave us was building out case studies to boost E-EAT), it’s a good foundation for digging deeper into GEO SEO.
Ease of use: 4/5
Range of metrics: 3.5/5
Depth of detail: 3/5
Arise: C3’s tool
Our innovation team are continuously creating new tools and intelligence that connects every service across C3, and one of these is Arise, our own LLM tracker. Start by inputting prompts for a client, grouping them into different types of content; and you can then see visibility across various LLMs including ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity for not just your client, but their competitors too (and who you view as your competitors may not be who you actually compete with directly on LLMs).
Taking these insights, with Arise, you can then see which brands are the most visible across LLM searches for identified topics, and track this over time, so you can measure the impact of your organic strategy.
With the team constantly updating and innovating, we expect this to become even more informative over time, enabling us to use this across our entire client base.
Pair this with the LLM tracking our data team has set up for clients within GA4, and you can monitor clicks to site from the different LLMs, drilling down into specific landing pages, and conversions. The conversation around organic traffic declining due to a rise in zero-click searches is ongoing; and whilst to some extent that’s true – especially for more informational queries where people can find their answers within AI overviews and LLMs (traffic that likely wouldn’t have converted anyway, with it still being in the awareness phase); having tracking set up within GA4 means you can accurately measure another channel that sees clicks and conversions, directly as a result of your SEO.
This continues to be an exciting time in the evolving organic space, with a shift in the way people are searching. While LLM traffic is still small, it’s going to continue to grow, and so having tools in place where you can monitor not just visibility of yourself and competitors, but track traffic and conversions to site, will help you to better understand the success of your own organic strategy; which in turn, will help you feel more empowered to have informed conversations with your seniors.
If you’d like to have a chat around creating an SEO strategy that will help to drive your organic presence line across traditional and AI search, then get in touch with us today!
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