Key takeaways
- AI visibility is now part of search because buyers are getting answers directly from AI tools instead of clicking through results.
- The new HubSpot AEO tool helps you see whether your brand is showing up in those answers, and how you compare to competitors.
- Rankings alone are no longer enough. You need to understand prompts, citations, share of voice, and how your brand is being described.
- AEO tools show you where you stand. Strategy is what improves it.
- Brands that appear in AI answers are more likely to be considered before a buyer ever visits a website.
HubSpot is launching its AEO tool publicly, and it matters for one simple reason: it makes AI visibility measurable.
Search used to be relatively straightforward to track. Rankings, clicks, impressions, and traffic gave you a decent picture of performance. That still applies, but it no longer reflects how buyers actually research and compare options.
Buyers are increasingly using tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity to ask questions and get direct answers. Those answers often include a small set of recommended brands. If you’re not included, you’re not part of that decision.
That’s the gap AEO addresses.
Here’s our lead SEO and AEO expert, Nicole Horne, talking about HubSpot’s new AEO tool.
We’re just as excited as she is!
What is the HubSpot AEO tool?
HubSpot’s AEO tool helps you understand how your brand appears in AI-generated answers.
It tracks relevant prompts, shows whether your brand is mentioned, compares your visibility to competitors, analyses which sources are being cited, and highlights what you can improve.
AEO extends your search strategy into AI-driven discovery, where buyers are forming opinions before they visit your site.
Instead of guessing whether you are visible, the HubSpot AEO tool lets you see it.
Why AEO matters now
A buyer can now ask a question and get a direct answer. For example: “What is the best CRM for a scaling sales team?” or “Which agency can help with HubSpot and RevOps?”
A few brands are mentioned, and the rest are left out. Those results shape early consideration. If your brand isn’t included, you’re not part of the shortlist.
Brands that do appear in AI answers tend to have:
- Clear authority on the topic
- Content that is structured and easy to interpret
- Alignment between what buyers ask and what they publish
- A presence beyond their own website
This is what AEO helps you understand and improve.
The measurement problem
Most businesses have always had very little visibility into how they appear in AI-generated answers.
You could test prompts manually, but that just doesn’t scale. You could make assumptions, but those are often wrong. There hasn’t been a consistent way to track visibility, compare competitors, or measure progress over time.
Until now!
The HubSpot AEO tool offers the perfect solution. It gives you a baseline and shows you where your brand appears, where it doesn’t, and what is influencing those outcomes.
This is where measuring AI visibility becomes critical alongside metrics like share of voice, brand sentiment, and LLM visibility.
What the HubSpot AEO tool actually gives you
The value of this AEO Grader tool lies in how you use the data.
It helps you:
- Track the prompts that matter to your business
- See where your brand appears in AI-generated answers
- Track and improve your AI visibility across key prompts
- Compare your visibility against competitors
- Review the sources influencing those answers
- Prioritise what to improve next
This shifts AEO from theory to practice. You’re not trying to “optimise for AI” in a vague way. You’re working on specific gaps that you can measure.
Improving your visibility in AI answers
AI tools favour content that is clear, specific, and useful. They prioritise sources that consistently demonstrate authority on a topic.
So how do you actually improve your AI visibility?
To improve visibility, focus on:
- Content that answers real buyer questions
- Clear structure and formatting
- Useful comparison and product content
- FAQ and educational resources
- Credible third-party mentions and reviews
Technical SEO still matters, though. Your content needs to be accessible, crawlable and easy to interpret.
Visibility also depends on more than your own website. AI pulls from multiple sources, including reviews, industry sites, and external content. If you’re not present there, you’re limiting your chances of being cited.
What this means for marketing and RevOps teams
For marketing teams, this changes how search performance is evaluated.
Rankings and traffic still matter, but they don’t show whether your brand is visible in AI-generated answers.
You also need to understand:
- Which prompts you appear for
- Where competitors are being cited instead of you
- How your brand is described in those answers
This gives you a clearer view of visibility before the click.
For RevOps teams, AEO creates a link between visibility and pipeline influence. It allows you to connect prompt visibility, content performance, and lead quality more directly. Because HubSpot AEO sits within your CRM, it ties this visibility back to your audience, your data, and your execution.
How Spitfire approaches AEO
We treat AEO as an extension of how search and content already work, not a separate initiative.
Our focus is on:
- How your brand is represented in AI answers
- Where visibility gaps exist
- Which content and channels are influencing those outcomes
- How to improve consistency across all sources
AEO is about improving how your brand is understood across your website, third-party platforms, and industry sources.
As an Elite HubSpot Solutions Partner, we use AEO and the HubSpot AEO tool to measure and guide this work. Our focus is on outcomes such as visibility, share of voice, and lead quality.
Not sure where to start?
We’ve got you covered.
It’s completely normal to feel overwhelmed or unsure where to start. This is a significant shift.
The challenge isn’t understanding what AEO is, it’s knowing how to actually apply it.
That’s exactly why we’ve put together a more detailed AEO guide. It walks through how to approach visibility, what to measure, and where to focus first based on what we’re seeing in practice.
It includes:
- What AEO is and how it differs from SEO
- How buyer behaviour is changing
- How to measure visibility, share of voice, and sentiment
- What effective AEO content looks like
- How to build a practical AEO strategy
- How Spitfire supports implementation and execution
The aim is to give you a clear understanding of what to do next.
