The platforms we track
| Platform | What it is |
|---|---|
| ChatGPT | OpenAI’s consumer answer engine, with browsing/search |
| Perplexity | Search-first answer engine with explicit citations |
| Gemini | Google’s standalone AI assistant |
| Claude | Anthropic’s assistant with web search |
| Grok | xAI’s assistant with live web and X (Twitter) access |
| Google AI Overviews (AIO) | The AI summary block that appears on Google Search results |
| Google AI Mode | Google’s conversational AI search experience, currently expanding in India |
Why these platforms
Two questions drive the selection: are real customers using this surface to ask product and category questions today? and can we measure brand presence in it reliably enough to feed your dashboard? When both answers are yes, the platform is in. ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Grok each reach distinct user bases asking the kinds of prompts where brand visibility matters — “best CRM for startups,” “skincare brands for oily skin,” “travel bags under 5,000.” Google’s AI surfaces — AIO appearing inside the world’s most-used search engine, and AI Mode rolling out to roughly 75 million users in India — sit on top of an existing search habit that brands cannot ignore.What “tracking a platform” actually means
For each tracked platform, Cited:- Submits every prompt in your prompt library to that platform’s answer engine.
- Captures the response and, where the platform exposes them, the cited sources.
- Parses the response for brand mentions, order of appearance, sentiment, and cited sources by domain and content type.
- Aggregates the parsed results into the metrics on your dashboard — mention rate, share of voice, average position, sentiment, and citation rate.
Platforms we do not currently track
Microsoft Copilot. Considered. Copilot’s search behavior overlaps substantially with ChatGPT (both lean on Microsoft’s index and OpenAI models), and its standalone consumer adoption in our core markets is lower than the platforms above. Tracking may resume if Copilot’s behavior diverges meaningfully. Traditional search-engine results (ten blue links). Out of scope. Cited measures answer engines, not classical search rankings. Traditional SEO tools cover that surface well. Verticalized AI surfaces (e.g., shopping assistants, agent surfaces). Forward-looking; not yet tracked. Standards for agentic surfaces — including the emerging Universal Commerce Protocol — are still forming. We expect to add coverage as these surfaces stabilize.Related concepts
- How ChatGPT search works — the most widely used platform
- How Perplexity ranks sources — the most citation-explicit platform
- Refresh cadence — when and how often prompts run
Frequently asked questions
Why not track even more platforms?
Why not track even more platforms?
Each additional platform has to clear the same two bars: meaningful real-world adoption, and reliable measurement. The current set covers the vast majority of answer-engine traffic for product and category questions. New platforms are evaluated as they gain meaningful adoption.
Will the underlying models change over time?
Will the underlying models change over time?
Yes. Providers deprecate and update models regularly. When an underlying model changes, Cited validates the replacement against historical data before switching over, so your dashboard trends remain comparable.