AI visibility-tracking tools such as Profound and Peec AI monitor specific prompts and assign scores to measure how often a business appears in responses (Practical Ecommerce). However, these visibility scores are highly manipulated and depend entirely on the prompts themselves—for example, a response will include a business's name if the prompt contains it, resulting in a visibility score of 100% and elevating the overall average (Practical Ecommerce).
For commerce practitioners, more helpful metrics would reflect what consumers actually enter rather than cherry-picked prompts (Practical Ecommerce). A better approach is to analyze sites with citations across multiple generative AI platforms, focusing on user-generated content and social media platforms that impact AI answers, publications trusted by large language models, and competitors that are frequently cited (Practical Ecommerce). Visible citations that mention a brand by name should be the focus of genAI optimization, as they drive buying decisions, while invisible citations (links shown without naming the source) receive few clicks (Practical Ecommerce).