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Measure and improve your AI visibility with Searchestra

Searchestra shows how AI answer engines describe your category, who they recommend, who they cite, and where you stand, then turns it into a prioritized plan. This guide takes you from your first account to reading every metric and acting on it.

Welcome

Searchestra is a GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) platform. Instead of guessing how ChatGPT or Gemini talk about your brand, you get a measured, repeatable picture across nine engines, plus the competitors who dominate and the moves that close the gap.

One workspace per brand, with visibility, competitors, citations and actions.
A transparent method, a versioned, brand-neutral prompt set, so trends are comparable.
Honest data, we report only what we actually collect.

Good to know. Your first scan works even for a brand-new site. If AI engines don't mention you yet, your baseline is an honest 0%, and the action list tells you how to change that.

Create your account

Go to app.searchestra.com/register and sign up with your email.
Searchestra creates your workspace. If you signed up with a company email, we pre-fill your domain; with a personal email (like Gmail), you'll enter your real domain during onboarding.
You land in the app, ready to add your brand.

Onboarding & your first scan

Onboarding sets up everything the measurement needs, in a short wizard.

Enter your domain. Searchestra reads your site to learn your brand, category and typical topics.
Confirm your brand & competitors. Review the detected brand name, aliases and the competitors we found; edit anything.
Build the Prompt Universe. We generate a brand-neutral, IAB-aligned set of category prompts.
Run the first scan. Searchestra queries all nine engines and computes your visibility, competitors and actions.

Tip. Pick the right target country and language during onboarding, the models answer differently by market, and this keeps your baseline meaningful.

Run a scan

Open GEO → Overview and click Scan now. A scan collects fresh answers for your prompt set across all engines, then recomputes every metric. A progress bar shows how far along it is.

One scan at a time. Each project runs a single scan at once. If a scan is already running and you click again, Searchestra tells you it's already in progress rather than starting a second, duplicate run.

Large categories with many prompts and nine engines can take several minutes. You can leave the page, the scan keeps running and results appear when it finishes.

The 9 answer engines

Every scan collects the same set of engines, so results are comparable run to run:

ChatGPT · Claude · Gemini · Perplexity · Grok · DeepSeek · Meta AI
Google AI Overviews and Google AI Mode

If an engine or data provider is temporarily unavailable, Searchestra records that and narrows the affected metric for that run, it never invents a response to fill the gap.

Prompt Universe

The Prompt Universe is the set of category questions Searchestra asks the engines. It is brand-neutral (it doesn't lean on your own marketing), versioned and reproducible, so your visibility is measured against a stable, defensible baseline rather than a single lucky prompt.

It follows an IAB-aligned methodology and evolves in versions; pinning a version keeps historical comparisons honest.

GEO Overview

The Overview is your home screen. At a glance you see:

Answers collected, how many AI answers this period is based on.
Brand Presence / AI Visibility, the share of answers that mention you.
Competitor analysis, your position and share against the leaders.
Citations, how often your pages are cited, and your citation share.
IAB 4P panel, Presence, Prominence, Persuasion and Portrayal.

Metrics & the IAB 4P model

Searchestra reports on the industry-standard IAB 4P framework, plus supporting KPIs.

Metric	What it answers	How it's computed
Presence (AI Visibility)	Are you mentioned at all?	Answers that mention your brand ÷ total answers.
Prominence	How high do you land?	Average rank across answers that mention you, plus whether the answer links to you organically.
Persuasion	How are you spoken of?	Sentiment and recommendation strength when you're mentioned.
Portrayal	Are you represented accurately?	Checks for inaccurate or misleading claims about your brand.
Share of Voice	Your slice of the category	Your mentions ÷ all brand mentions in scope.
Citation Share	Your slice of sources	Your citations ÷ all citations in scope.

A real zero is a real result. If the engines don't mention you yet, Presence is 0%, and that's the honest baseline you improve from, not a bug.

Competitors

Searchestra detects the brands the models actually name in your category and ranks them into a leaderboard. You see who dominates, your position, and the exact gap in visibility, share of voice and citations. Add or remove competitors any time; the next scan reflects the change.

Citations & sources

When engines cite sources, Searchestra records which domains and pages they trust in your category. Use this to find where a link to you is missing, which third-party pages influence answers, and where earning a citation would move your numbers most.

Actions & playbooks

Every scan ends with a ranked action list, the content, claims and sources most likely to improve your visibility. Playbooks group related actions into a repeatable plan, so a team can work the gap systematically rather than guessing.

Our honesty principle

Searchestra never fabricates measurement data. If a provider fails, we say so and narrow the metric for that run. A number you see is a number we collected, which is what makes trends trustworthy enough to act on.

Plans & limits

Every plan covers all nine engines and includes unlimited team seats. Higher plans add more projects, more frequent scans, longer history and a deeper prompt universe. See pricing for the current tiers.

FAQ

Why is my visibility 0%?

Because, this period, the engines didn't mention your brand in the category prompts. It's an honest baseline, the action list shows how to earn mentions and citations.

How often should I scan?

AI answers drift, so a regular cadence (weekly or daily, by plan) makes trends meaningful. You can always run Scan now for an on-demand update.

Can I track more than one brand?

Yes. Each brand is a project; paid plans include multiple projects, each with its own scans, competitors and history.

Does clicking "Scan now" many times run many scans?

No. A project runs one scan at a time; extra clicks are told it's already in progress, so you never pay for duplicate runs.