How to Measure AEO Performance: Citations, Share of Voice, and AI Referrals

If you can't measure AEO, you can't sell it internally — and you definitely can't improve it. The good news is that the measurement stack in 2026 is finally usable. Three layers, weekly cadence, monthly report.

What does AEO measurement actually look like?

AEO measurement tracks three things: citation rate (how often your brand is named in AI answers for target prompts), share of voice (your citations vs competitors on the same prompts), and AI referral traffic (sessions in GA4 from chat.openai.com, perplexity.ai, gemini.google.com, copilot.microsoft.com). Together they tell you whether you're winning the prompts that matter.

Step 1: Build a prompt panel

List 20–30 prompts your buyers actually ask AI engines — "best [category] for [use case]", "[brand] vs [competitor]", "how to [outcome]". This is your standing benchmark. Re-run it every 1–2 weeks across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google AI Overviews.

Step 2: Log citations and share of voice

For each prompt, record which brands were cited, in what order, and with which URL. Tools like Profound, Otterly, AthenaHQ, and Peec.ai automate this; a Google Sheet works fine to start. The metric you care about is share of voice — your citations as a percentage of total brand mentions on your prompt panel.

Step 3: Track AI referral traffic in GA4

In GA4, filter Acquisition → Traffic acquisition by source containing chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, gemini.google.com, or copilot.microsoft.com. Watch sessions, engagement rate, and conversions. AI referral traffic typically converts 2–5× higher than organic search because the user already got pre-qualified by the AI.

What good looks like

Within 90 days of a serious AEO program — schema, entity work, citation-worthy content, llms.txt — expect 20–40% share of voice on your top 30 prompts and a clear, growing AI referral channel in GA4. The full playbook lives in the pillar: "What is AEO? How to Get Cited by ChatGPT in 2026."

Frequently Asked Questions

Which AEO tracking tool is best?

For most teams, Profound or Otterly cover ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and AI Overviews well. AthenaHQ is strong for B2B share-of-voice. A Google Sheet plus weekly manual checks is a fine starting point — don't let tool selection delay measurement.

How often should I re-run my prompt panel?

Weekly during active optimization, biweekly once you're stable. AI answers shift constantly — monthly is too slow to catch regressions.

Can I see AI referrals in Google Analytics?

Yes — GA4 captures referrals from chat.openai.com, perplexity.ai, gemini.google.com, and copilot.microsoft.com as standard referral sources. Build a custom segment to track them as a single AEO channel.