Interpreting your results

Data without interpretation is just numbers. Here's how to read your SimplyRank scan data and decide what to do.

Start with the right question

Don't open the dashboard with "how am I doing?" Open it with one of these:

Which prompts am I missing where I should be present?
Which competitor is gaining ground?
What's changed since last week?
Where is my sentiment weak, and why?

A specific question forces you to a specific answer. "How am I doing?" leads to vague half-conclusions.

Visibility — is it good or not?

There's no universal benchmark. It depends on:

Category breadth. If your category has 50+ vendors, no one is at 90% visibility. 30% might be excellent.
Prompt set. If you've intentionally added prompts where you're absent (gap-finding mode), low visibility is expected.
Brand age. A brand that's 1 year old won't have the same visibility as a 15-year-old incumbent. Track trend, not just absolute.

A useful frame: compare to your best competitor, not to 100%. If your top competitor is at 60% visibility and you're at 25%, that's a 35-point gap. You're not aiming to hit 100% — you're aiming to close that gap.

Position — when is it actionable?

A few rules of thumb:

Position ≤ 2.0 — You're top-of-mind. Defend the position by maintaining citations and content.
Position 2.0–3.0 — You're in the consideration set. Push to top-of-mind by improving the strongest signals (citations from authoritative sources).
Position 3.0–5.0 — You're acknowledged but easily missed. Most AI users only act on the top 2–3. Consider position improvement higher leverage than visibility expansion.
Position > 5.0 — Invisible in practice. Closer to "not mentioned" than "mentioned."

Sentiment — what counts as a problem?

A general guide:

70%+ positive — Healthy. Continue earning citations and reviews.
50–70% positive — Acceptable but worth investigating. What's holding back the rest?
< 50% positive — Investigation needed. Open the negative mentions, find the source, address it directly.

Watch for trend changes. Sentiment dropping from 75% to 60% over 4 weeks is a bigger story than a one-time absolute number. Something changed — find what.

When data feels surprising

"My visibility is much higher than I expected."

Possible explanations:

Your prompts may be too brand-specific (mentioning your category in a way only you fit).
Your category is small and AI defaults to a few names.
You've earned strong citations recently that you didn't realize were there.

Verify by adding more general prompts ("recommend a tool for X" without category-specific framing).

"My visibility dropped suddenly."

Possible explanations:

A scan didn't complete fully — check Scans page for partial coverage.
You changed your prompts — new prompt set isn't comparable to the old.
A competitor surged and pushed you down — check the Competitors view.
A model update changed how the engine responds (this happens; AI providers don't publish change logs the way Google does).

Wait one more scan cycle. If the drop persists, dig into individual prompts.

"My competitor is everywhere and I can't figure out why."

Open Citations. Look at which sources AI cites when mentioning the competitor. Patterns usually emerge: they have a major comparison post you're not in, a strong G2 presence, a recent press mention. Closing the gap starts there.

What's noise vs. what's signal

Likely noise	Likely signal
Visibility moves ±3% week-over-week	Visibility moves 8%+ in one direction over 3+ scans
One prompt's result flipped	A category of prompts shifted in a consistent direction
Sentiment changes by 2-3%	A new domain appeared in the citations list
One AI model behaved differently this run	A model is consistently different over multiple scans

When in doubt, wait one more scan before acting. Trends are more reliable than single data points.

Don't forget — AI visibility is a leading indicator

AI visibility doesn't directly tell you about revenue, signups, or pipeline. It tells you whether AI is recommending you.

The chain is:

AI visibility → Discovery in AI → Branded search / direct visit → Conversion → Revenue

If you're improving AI visibility but not seeing pipeline lift in the same quarter, that's normal. Give it a quarter or two. Cross-reference with branded search volume (Google Search Console) and direct traffic.