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DevTune provides a comprehensive set of metrics to measure your AI search presence. This guide explains each metric, how it is calculated, and how to interpret it.

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Primary KPIs

These three metrics are your top-level indicators of AI search presence.

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Overall Presence Rate

Your primary metric for AI search visibility. Definition: The percentage of tracked prompts where your brand appeared in AI responses, whether through citation source matches or brand term mentions. Calculation: 
Overall Presence Rate = (Prompts where your brand appeared / Total prompts tested) x 100
Example:
  • 100 prompts tested across all platforms
  • Your brand appeared in 45 responses (via citation or brand mention)
  • Overall Presence Rate: 45%
Interpretation:
  • 70%+ = Strong presence. AI platforms consistently surface your brand.
  • 50-69% = Moderate presence. Visible in many queries but with significant gaps.
  • 30-49% = Developing presence. Content improvement will have significant impact.
  • Below 30% = Early stage. Focused content creation is the priority.

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Share of Voice

Your brand’s share of total AI search mentions relative to competitor brands. Definition: The proportion of all brand mentions and citations (yours plus competitors) that belong to your brand. Calculation: 
Share of Voice = (Your mentions + Your citations) / (Total mentions + Total citations across all brands) x 100
Example:
  • Your brand: 120 mentions and citations
  • Competitor A: 80 mentions and citations
  • Competitor B: 50 mentions and citations
  • Total: 250
  • Your Share of Voice: 48%
Interpretation:
  • Share of Voice above 40% indicates market leadership in AI search.
  • Compare to your actual market position. If your market share is 30% but your AI search Share of Voice is 15%, there is room to improve AI visibility.
  • Track Share of Voice trends to see whether you are gaining or losing ground relative to competitors.

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Sentiment Score

How positively or negatively AI platforms discuss your brand. Definition: An aggregate score representing the tone of AI responses that mention your brand. Sentiment analysis evaluates whether mentions are positive, neutral, or negative. Interpretation:
  • Positive sentiment means AI platforms describe your product favorably
  • Neutral sentiment means factual, balanced mentions
  • Negative sentiment may indicate known issues, common complaints, or unfavorable comparisons
  • Sudden sentiment changes warrant investigation

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Secondary Metrics

Six secondary metrics provide deeper analytical capability.

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Docs Presence

Definition: The rate at which citation sources tagged as “docs” appear in AI responses. This measures how well your documentation is recognized and cited by AI platforms. Usage: Compare Docs Presence to overall presence. If your docs are cited less than your marketing site, it may indicate documentation quality or discoverability issues.

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Blog Presence

Definition: The rate at which citation sources tagged as “blog” appear in AI responses. This measures how well your blog content is surfaced by AI platforms. Usage: Blog presence indicates whether your content marketing is reaching AI-mediated audiences. High blog presence suggests your blog content is authoritative and well-indexed.

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Brand Mentions

Definition: The rate at which AI responses contain your brand terms (name mentions) regardless of whether citation URLs are present. Calculation: 
Brand Mention Rate = (Prompts with brand term matches / Total prompts tested) x 100
Usage: Brand mentions capture visibility that citation tracking alone would miss. If an AI response says “You could use DataForge” without linking to dataforge.io, the brand mention is detected but no citation source is matched. Brand Mention Rate plus citation-based presence together form your Overall Presence Rate.

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Top of Answer

Definition: The rate at which your brand appears in the first position or opening section of an AI response. Being mentioned first or at the top of an AI response carries more weight than appearing later. Calculation: 
Top of Answer Rate = (Prompts where your brand appears first / Prompts where your brand appears) x 100
Usage: High Top of Answer rate means AI platforms consider your brand a primary recommendation, not just an also-mentioned option.

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Avg Citation Rank

Definition: Your average position among cited sources when your citation sources appear. A rank of 1 means you are the first-cited source. Lower numbers are better. Usage: Citation rank indicates how prominently your content is featured among sources. A low average rank means AI platforms cite you early and prominently.

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Primary Citation Share

Definition: The proportion of all citations that point to your primary citation sources versus competitor citation sources and other sources. Calculation: 
Primary Citation Share = (Citations to your citation sources / Total citations) x 100
Usage: Primary Citation Share measures how much of the citation real estate belongs to you. This is complementary to Share of Voice, which includes brand mentions.

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Coverage Confidence

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Wilson Score Interval

DevTune uses a Wilson score confidence interval to indicate how reliable each metric is given the sample size. Why this matters: If you have only tested 10 prompts, a presence rate of 50% is much less reliable than if you had tested 200 prompts. The Wilson score interval provides a lower and upper bound for the true metric value based on sample size. How to read it:
  • A narrow confidence interval (e.g., 45%-55%) means the metric is reliable
  • A wide confidence interval (e.g., 20%-80%) means more data is needed
  • As you accumulate more test runs, confidence intervals narrow

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Trailing Window Analysis

Metrics are calculated over trailing time windows to smooth out variability between individual test runs. Available windows:
  • 7-day trailing window for recent performance
  • 30-day trailing window for monthly trends
  • 90-day trailing window for quarterly assessment
Trailing windows ensure that a single anomalous test run does not distort your understanding of current performance.

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Position Distribution

Beyond average metrics, DevTune tracks the distribution of where your brand appears in AI responses. Position categories:
  • First mention - Your brand appears before any other brand
  • Early mention - Your brand appears in the first third of the response
  • Mid mention - Your brand appears in the middle section
  • Late mention - Your brand appears toward the end
  • Not present - Your brand does not appear
Position distribution helps you understand not just whether you appear, but how prominently you appear.

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Platform-Specific Metrics

All metrics are available per platform. Each platform may show different results because:
  • Platforms have different training data and knowledge bases
  • Citation behavior varies by platform
  • Brand mention patterns differ
  • Response structure and length vary
Use per-platform metrics to identify:
  • Your strongest platforms
  • Platforms needing content improvement
  • Where competitors outperform you by platform

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Prompt-Level Metrics

All metrics are also available per prompt. This granularity helps you:
  • Identify which prompts produce the strongest presence
  • Find prompts where competitors dominate
  • Discover content gaps at the individual query level

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Understanding Metric Relationships

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High Presence Rate, Low Citation Share

Your brand is mentioned frequently but specific URLs are not cited. This may indicate:
  • AI platforms know about your brand but do not reference specific pages
  • Content is recognized but not structured for citation
  • Brand awareness is stronger than content depth

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High Citation Share, Lower Presence Rate

When present, your citations dominate, but you are not present in many prompts. This indicates:
  • Strong content quality for covered topics
  • Gaps in topic coverage
  • Focus on expanding prompt coverage

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Platform Divergence

Large differences between platforms suggest platform-specific content opportunities. A platform where you are weak may respond to different content approaches than your strong platforms.

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Setting Goals

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Realistic Targets

Set metric goals based on your current baseline:
  • A 5-10% improvement in Overall Presence Rate per quarter is a strong target
  • Share of Voice targets should be benchmarked against your actual market position
  • Sentiment goals should focus on maintaining positive or improving from neutral

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Tracking Progress

Review metrics weekly for short-term trends and monthly for strategic assessment. Use the trailing window analysis to filter out noise and identify genuine progress.

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Next Steps