Methodology
How the Primacy Score is measured.
A score only means something if it is measured the same way every time. A number you cannot trace back to a method is an opinion. A number with a published, repeatable method behind it is a measurement.
So here is exactly how the Primacy Score is produced. Nothing here is proprietary mystery. The rigor is the point.
What the Score answers
Three questions at the center, six components underneath.
When someone asks an AI tool for a recommendation in your category, three things can happen. Your brand shows up, or not. It is backed by a source, or mentioned in passing. It is the actual recommendation, or just one name in a crowd. The Primacy Score measures all three, across the AI tools people actually use, and combines them into one number you can track and compare.
Presence
Do you appear at all when buyers ask?
Citation
When you appear, is a source attached, the kind of backing that makes an AI tool trust and repeat your name?
Prominence
Are you the recommendation, or just present in the background?
Underneath those questions, the Score is built from six measured components. The first three are the pillars above; the other three capture the context that decides whether your presence is actually winning you business.
- 01Presence RateHow often you appear in relevant answers.
- 02Citation RateHow often, when you appear, a source is attached.
- 03ProminenceWhether you are recommended, listed, or passed over.
- 04Competitive Share of VoiceHow much of the recommendation space you hold versus named rivals.
- 05SentimentHow favorably you are described when you come up.
- 06Engine BreadthHow evenly you show up across AI tools, rather than carrying one and missing the rest.
Your live report shows all six, plus the exact weights, so you can see what is driving the headline.
How we measure it
A standard, not a screenshot.
UP TO
60
buyer questions on every Baseline, across awareness, consideration, decision, and trust. A typical brand runs 54 to 58, set and locked with you at setup.
THE CORE
6
AI tools, none hidden: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews, and Perplexity. Shown per tool, unweighted.
SAMPLED
10
samples per question on a certified Baseline, five on ongoing cycles, three on a Primacy Snapshot. Depth is always disclosed. A single benchmark can produce well over two thousand individual responses.
Real buyer questions
We ask the questions a real buyer asks.
Every benchmark uses a set of up to 60 buyer questions, included on every Baseline (a Primacy Snapshot runs a focused 30-question set built the same way). They span the full path a buyer travels, from early awareness (how do I choose between motor types), through consideration (who makes custom servo motors for medical devices), to decision and trust (most reliable brand, is this company reliable). A typical mid-complexity brand runs between 54 and 58 questions. The exact set is chosen and locked with you during setup, so the test does not drift between cycles. Need more coverage for extra products, regions, or audiences? Expansion packs add questions on top.
Many times, not once
We ask many times, not once.
A single check is a lucky screenshot. AI tools give different answers to the same question depending on the moment, so one look tells you almost nothing. We ask each question multiple times and average the results. A baseline runs ten samples per question; ongoing cycles run five; a Primacy Snapshot runs three. That repetition is what turns noisy behavior into a number you can rely on, and more samples means a tighter number. Only the full ten-sample benchmark produces a certified Primacy Score. A Snapshot reports its score with a stated confidence range and is never presented as, or compared against, a certified Score. Depth is a disclosed part of every result, never a hidden difference between tiers.
Every major tool, none hidden
We test every major AI tool, and we hide none of them.
The Score covers the six tools buyers use most: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews, and Perplexity. Your report shows your result on each one, unweighted, so a strong showing on one tool can never quietly cover for a weak one. The headline Score is a blended number that gives more weight to the tools more people actually use, so it reflects real-world reach rather than treating a tiny tool the same as a dominant one.
Add-ons reported, never blended
Additional tools are reported, never blended.
Copilot Search and Grok are available as add-ons on any Baseline. When you include them, they appear beside your Score as separate numbers. They are never folded into the headline, so your Score stays comparable to every other Primacy Score, including your own from last cycle.
Comparability
What makes one Score comparable to another.
The method is versioned.
Every report is stamped with the methodology version, the scoring rubric version, and the question-set version. If we improve the method, the version number changes and you can see exactly what changed. Your old Scores stay readable against the method that produced them.
Bad news is surfaced, not averaged away.
Negative mentions, the moments an AI tool raises a real concern about you, are pulled out and shown on their own, never blended into the Score. A genuine reputation problem should never be hidden by good results elsewhere. You see the exact wording and which tool said it.
The contested ground is scored separately.
Alongside the headline, we report a Protected-Core Score: your standing on only the questions where you and named competitors are fighting for the same recommendation, with easy wins stripped out. It tells you whether you are winning where it is actually hard to win.
The Score is tied to outcomes.
Visibility is only worth measuring if it moves the business. Reports track AI-referred website sessions, conversions from those sessions, and AI crawler activity, cycle over cycle, so you can see whether a rising Score is reaching your site and your pipeline.
Honest about its edges
What the Primacy Score is not.
- A measurement, not a guarantee. It describes how AI tools answer today, and that behavior shifts as the tools change.
- A point-in-time reading with normal variation. That is exactly why we sample many times and publish cycles, so you read the trend, not a single twitch.
- Not a replacement for your search tools. Use a platform like Semrush or Ahrefs for day-to-day search operations. Use Primacy for the one question those tools cannot answer cleanly: does AI actually recommend us, and if not, why.
- Not a single number to be read alone. The headline points you in a direction. The six components and the per-tool breakdown tell you what to do about it.
In short
Same buyer questions. Asked many times. Across every major AI tool. Surfaced fairly, scored against named competitors, tied to real traffic, and stamped with a version, so it holds up over time and against anyone else's Score.
That is what a standard requires. That is how we measure it.