Research question: is there one AI ranking to win, or five separate ones, and does winning each one matter equally?
The hub establishes the headline: the engines barely agree, and they send wildly different amounts of traffic. This page goes further. Which engines agree with which, which are hardest to get named on, and the uncomfortable overlap that decides strategy: the two hardest engines to win are the two that send the most clients.
For each question, every engine returns a list of firms. To measure agreement between two engines, we compared their lists for the same question and calculated the overlap: of all the distinct firms either engine named, what share did both name. A score of 100% would mean the two engines named exactly the same firms. A score of 0% would mean they shared no firm at all.
We did this for all ten engine pairs across every question, then averaged. We also counted, for each engine, how many of the 30 study firms it named at least once, which measures how hard that engine is to get named on at all.
One honest wrinkle. Engines differ in how many firms they list per answer. Most named eight to ten firms per answer. Gemini named far more, about 24, so it appears more “generous” and easier to show up on. We account for this below rather than letting it distort the strategy: naming a firm in a list of 24 is a weaker signal than naming it in a list of 8.
The hub shows that 82% of named firms appear on only one engine. Here is why: no two engines are close to aligned. Ranked from the most-alike pair to the least, the overlap never rises above 16%, and ChatGPT sits at the bottom of nearly every pairing, meaning it is the engine that most goes its own way.
Put two numbers side by side and the strategy writes itself: how hard each engine is to get named on, and how much traffic it actually sends. They run in opposite directions. Claude and Perplexity named the most firms and are the easiest to appear on, but send the least traffic. ChatGPT and Google are the strictest, and send by far the most.
| Engine | Firms named /30 | Firms per answer | Referral traffic | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | 12 | 8.4 | ~75% | Hardest and highest value. Win this first. |
| Google (Gemini + AI Overviews) | 19 | 23.6 | ~12% | Second only to ChatGPT for traffic; names many firms per answer, so appearing means less. |
| Perplexity | 18 | 10.2 | ~7% | Winnable, but a smaller slice of traffic. |
| Claude | 20 | 8.9 | ~3% | Easiest to appear on, least traffic sent. |
Because the engines disagree so completely, it is easy to look strong on Claude or Perplexity, where firms show up readily, and conclude you are winning AI, while being invisible on ChatGPT and Google, where three of every four AI-referred visitors actually come from. It is the old Bing problem in a new form: a number-one ranking is worth only as much as the traffic behind it. A single blended “AI score” hides this completely, which is why any honest measurement has to report each engine on its own.
Because agreement between engines tops out near 16%, a blended AI score is misleading. Track ChatGPT, Google AI, Gemini, Perplexity and Claude as five distinct scoreboards, and never assume a win on one implies anything about another.
They are the strictest to get named on and they carry the overwhelming majority of the traffic and reach. Effort spent becoming the answer here returns far more than the same effort on a lower-traffic engine.
Appearing on Claude or Perplexity is real, but weigh it against the traffic it actually sends. Do not let a strong showing on a minor engine create false confidence about your overall position.
Gemini names roughly 24 firms per answer, so being one of them is a weaker signal than being one of ChatGPT’s eight. Treat a Gemini mention as a lower bar cleared, not as proof you have won.
Our audit measures every firm engine by engine, so you see exactly where you appear on ChatGPT and Google, not just a single blended score. Run your firm’s audit and see the five scoreboards.
See your firm’s results