GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) tools have multiplied fast. I've been testing them for the past few months trying to figure out which ones are actually worth your time vs. which ones are just dashboards with vibes.
Here's what I found.
What I Was Testing For
I wanted to know: does your brand show up when someone asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google AI a question in your category? And more importantly — what can you do about it when you don't?
The tools that answer both questions are genuinely useful. The ones that only answer the first are basically expensive anxiety machines.
Amplitude AI Visibility — Surprisingly the Best Starting Point
I wasn't expecting much here. Amplitude is known for product analytics, not SEO. But their AI Visibility tool is legitimately good — and it's free for up to 500 prompts with no account required.
You get a Visibility Score, prompt-level breakdowns, source analysis (what content is ChatGPT actually citing when someone asks about your category), and competitive rankings. The feature that stands out is the page recommendations — you can paste in a URL, and it tells you specifically what to change to improve your AI visibility.
For most teams, this is where you should start. It's free, it's fast, and it gives you enough to actually act on.
→ amplitude.com/ai-visibility
Profound — Powerful, But Priced for Enterprise
Profound has the most comprehensive AI engine coverage I've seen — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, Grok, Claude, and more. The competitive intelligence features are solid.
The problem: the pricing makes it inaccessible for most teams. The $99/month plan is ChatGPT-only and single-user. The plan you actually want starts at $399/month. Enterprise tiers go to $2,000-5,000+/month.
If your company has dedicated budget and headcount for GEO, it's worth evaluating. Otherwise, the math is hard to justify — especially when Amplitude's free tier covers the core diagnostic use case.
SE Ranking — Good If You're Already in the Ecosystem
SE Ranking bolted GEO capabilities onto their existing SEO platform. The advantage is integration — if your team already lives in SE Ranking, you don't need a separate tool. The disadvantage is that it feels like an add-on rather than a purpose-built GEO product.
AthenaHQ — For the Technical Side of the Problem
Built by people from Google Search and DeepMind. If your AI visibility problem is partly technical — AI crawlers can't access your content, your pages aren't structured well, structured data issues — AthenaHQ has better diagnostic depth than most tools.
It's not the right first tool for most teams, but it's worth knowing exists.
Writesonic — For Teams That Want to Create and Optimize Together
Writesonic combined their content generation tools with AI visibility monitoring. Useful if you want to see your visibility gaps and immediately create content to fill them in the same platform.
The Bottom Line
Start with Amplitude AI Visibility (free). Use it to establish a baseline and identify your top 10 priority prompts. Then decide if you need more — most teams find they don't for the first 6 months.
If you're later shopping for an enterprise tool, Profound is the strongest option but comes with enterprise pricing to match.
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