Developer builds open-source tool to track brand visibility in AI chatbot answers

A developer has created a Python-based tool, deployed as an Apify Actor, that measures whether AI answer engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and Google AI Overviews recommend a given brand in their responses. The tool accepts a brand name, competitor list, and buyer-intent prompts, then queries each engine multiple times to account for response variability. For every answer, it analyzes whether the brand was mentioned, how prominently, with what sentiment, and which external domains the AI cited as sources. That citation data is framed as the most actionable output, revealing which websites AI engines trust within a product category and where brands should seek coverage. The project addresses the emerging discipline of Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), which focuses on influencing AI-generated answer lists rather than traditional search rankings.