🔍 AI Citation Monitor — Brand Visibility in AI Search

Track whether your brand appears in AI model responses. Sends queries to LLM APIs, detects brand mentions, checks if your website is cited, benchmarks against competitors, and analyzes sentiment.

📋 Table of Contents

• What is this?
• How to use
• Input
• Output
• JSON output example
• How much does it cost?
• Use cases
• Integrations
• Is it legal?
• Troubleshooting
• FAQ
• Tech stack
• Feedback & issues

🤔 What is this?

AI models are becoming primary discovery channels. If your brand isn't mentioned in AI responses, you're invisible to a growing segment of users who skip Google and go straight to AI tools.

This Actor:

1. Sends queries to AI language models using natural questions your customers ask
2. Detects brand mentions — checks if your brand name appears in AI responses
3. Checks website mentions — verifies if your website URL or domain is referenced
4. Tracks competitors — checks if competitor brands are mentioned alongside yours
5. Analyzes sentiment — positive, neutral, or negative context around your brand mention
6. Scores — mention rate, average position, per-competitor comparison

🚀 How to use

Step 1: Enter your brand

Provide your brand name exactly as it would appear in AI responses (e.g., "Acme Corp", not "acmecorp").

Step 2: Enter your website URL

Used to detect if your site is mentioned as a source in AI responses.

Step 3: Add queries

Enter search queries your customers would ask AI tools. These should be natural questions:

• "best electrician in Austin"
• "who offers ADA compliance scanning"
• "alternatives to [competitor product]"

Step 4: Add competitors (optional)

Enter competitor brand names to track alongside yours.

Step 5: Run

Click Start. Results appear in dataset + key-value store.

📥 Input

Field	Type	Default	Description
brand	string	required	Your brand name
website	string	—	Your website URL (for source mention check)
keywords	array	required	Search queries to send to AI models
competitors	array	—	Competitor brand names to track

📤 Output

Field	Type	Description
totalQueries	integer	Total queries sent
totalMentions	integer	Times brand was mentioned
mentionRate	number	Percentage of queries where brand was mentioned
avgPosition	number	Average position of brand mention in response (1-10)
websiteMentionRate	number	Percentage where your website was mentioned
positiveSentimentRate	number	Percentage of mentions with positive sentiment
competitorResults	array	Per-competitor: mention rate + avg position
results	array	Per-query: brandMentioned, websiteMentioned, sentiment, excerpt, recommendations

📄 JSON output example

{
  "brand": "Example Brand",
  "website": "https://example.com",
  "scannedAt": "2026-07-04T04:30:00.000Z",
  "totalQueries": 6,
  "totalMentions": 2,
  "mentionRate": 33.3,
  "avgPosition": 4.5,
  "websiteMentionRate": 16.7,
  "positiveSentimentRate": 50.0,
  "competitorResults": [
    { "name": "Competitor A", "mentionRate": 50.0, "avgPosition": 3.0 },
    { "name": "Competitor B", "mentionRate": 16.7, "avgPosition": 7.0 }
  ],
  "results": [
    {
      "query": "best alternatives to X",
      "brandMentioned": true,
      "brandContext": "...Example Brand is a solid choice for...",
      "brandPosition": 4,
      "websiteMentioned": true,
      "competitorMentions": [
        { "name": "Competitor A", "mentioned": true, "position": 2 },
        { "name": "Competitor B", "mentioned": false, "position": 0 }
      ],
      "responseLength": 2840,
      "responseExcerpt": "When looking for alternatives to X, several options stand out...",
      "sentiment": "positive",
      "categories": ["alternatives", "recommendation"],
      "recommendations": [],
      "timestamp": "2026-07-04T04:30:15.000Z"
    }
  ]
}

💰 How much does it cost?

$0.50 per query. No subscription. Pay only for results returned.

Cost examples

Use case	Queries	Cost
Quick check	3	$1.50
Standard monitor	5	$2.50
Monthly tracking	10	$5.00/mo
Agency (5 brands × 10 queries)	50	$25.00

🎯 Use cases

• AEO monitoring — Track AI search visibility over time (like rank tracking for AI)
• Competitive intelligence — See which competitors AI models recommend
• Content optimization — Identify queries where your brand isn't mentioned → create content targeting those queries
• Agency reporting — Add AI visibility metrics to monthly SEO reports
• Brand monitoring — Detect when AI models start/stop mentioning your brand
• Pre-launch research — Check if competitors have AI visibility before entering a market

🔗 Integrations

Chain with llms.txt Generator

If your mention rate is low, use our llms.txt Generator to improve AI discoverability. Then re-run citation monitoring to measure improvement.

Automation

• Zapier — Monthly AI citation report → email to marketing team
• Make — Schedule weekly checks → Slack alert if mention rate drops
• Custom — Apify webhooks for automated reporting

⚖️ Is it legal?

Yes. This Actor sends queries to AI language model APIs and analyzes the responses. It does not scrape websites, bypass authentication, or violate Terms of Service. All queries are sent through official API channels.

🔧 Troubleshooting

Problem	Cause	Fix
0 mentions	Brand genuinely not in AI responses, or query too broad	Try more specific queries including your brand category
All queries fail	API connectivity issue	Check Actor logs for error messages. Retry in a few minutes
Competitor not tracked	Brand name mismatch	Ensure competitor names match exactly how they'd appear in text
Slow response	Many queries with long responses	Reduce query count or run in batches

❓ FAQ

🛠️ Tech stack

• Apify SDK — Platform integration, dataset, key-value store
• AI search APIs — Query processing and response generation

🔧 Companion Actors

Complete your AI visibility pipeline with these related tools:

Actor	What it does	Price
Website Health Check	9-in-1 audit: accessibility + security + SSL + broken links + SEO + performance	$3/URL
ADA Compliance Checker	Scan any website for WCAG accessibility violations	$2/scan
ADA Fix-It Report	Developer-ready remediation reports with code fixes + cost estimates	$5/page
llms.txt Generator	Generate llms.txt + check AI bot access. Boost AI search visibility	FREE

Recommended workflow

1. Health Check — Run broad 9-check audit first ($3/URL)
2. ADA Scanner — Deep-dive accessibility violations ($2/scan)
3. Fix-It Report — Generate developer-ready remediation plan ($5/page)
4. llms.txt Generator — Ensure AI search engines can find your site (FREE)
5. AI Citation Monitor (this Actor) — Track whether AI models mention your brand ($0.50/query)

💬 Feedback & issues

• Apify Console — Issues tab on this Actor's page
• Review — Rate on Store page