How to track if your brand is mentioned in llms?

SEO is changing - and fast. As AI-driven tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity become the go-to search interfaces for millions of users, the way people discover brands is shifting dramatically. These tools don't show a list of ten blue links like Google does. Instead, they generate direct answers to user questions - often without linking to external websites at all. If your brand isn't mentioned in those answers, you're invisible. It's that simple. In this guide, we'll show you exactly how to track whether your brand is being mentioned in LLMs, using:

• A free, manual method (yes, even with an Excel sheet if needed),
• A premium, automated solution with Qwairy's Visibility Platform , built specifically for GEO (Generative Engine Optimization).

By the end of this article, you'll know not only how to audit your brand visibility across LLMs, but how to turn those insights into real growth opportunities. Let's dive in.

Part 1: What It Means to Be "Mentioned" in an LLM

Before you can track whether your brand is mentioned in large language models (LLMs), you need to clearly understand what a "mention" actually looks like. In traditional SEO, visibility often means ranking on page 1 of Google for a relevant keyword. In the world of LLMs, it's not about ranking - it's about being named or used as a source directly in the AI's response. There are two ways your brand can show up in a response from an LLM:

1. Brand Mentions

This is when the LLM explicitly names your brand as part of an answer. Example:

Even if there's no link, this is powerful. Your brand is trusted enough to be part of the answer - that builds awareness and reputation.

2. Source Mentions

This happens when the LLM uses content from your website or blog as a source to build its response. Some LLMs - like Perplexity or SearchGPT (ChatGPT with browsing) - will cite these sources with a clickable link.

Here, your site acts as a trusted reference, much like getting a backlink - except it's inside the AI's answer.

Part 2: The Free Method - Tracking Mentions Manually (with Excel or Google Sheets)

You'll want a Google Sheet or Excel file with the following structure:

Step 1: Identify Prompts That Your Audience Would Use

You're not just guessing here - you want to test real, relevant prompts your audience is likely to type into ChatGPT or Perplexity.

Where to find them:

• Use your existing SEO keyword list, and rephrase top keywords as full questions. You can also use this method to identify prompts users type into AI search engines .
• Use Google Search Console to find queries that already trigger your pages.
  • Add a Regex filter like:
    ^(who|what|where|how|which|why|when|best|vs|top|is|should)\s
    This will help you extract natural-language, conversational queries that resemble LLM prompts.
• Try Microsoft Copilot or Perplexity and look at their suggested follow-up questions.
• Brainstorm from your customer support logs or sales conversations.

Step 2: Run the Prompts in ChatGPT, Perplexity & Gemini (ideally in private mode)

Open each LLM and manually run your list of prompts.

Where to run them:

• ChatGPT (with web browsing enabled for best results)
• Perplexity.ai (uses real-time web results and cites sources)
• Gemini (Google's LLM, integrated into Google Search in many regions)

Part 3: The Scalable Solution - Tracking Brand Mentions Automatically with Qwairy

While tracking LLM mentions manually with spreadsheets can be insightful, it becomes time-consuming fast - especially if:

• You manage multiple brands or clients,
• You want to monitor 20+ prompts weekly,
• You need to present clean reports to stakeholders.

That's exactly why we built Qwairy.co : a SaaS tool designed specifically for **GEO (Generative Engine Optimization )**. Qwairy helps you track, understand, and improve your brand presence inside LLM responses - across tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity. Here's how you can track if your brand is mentioned on LLMs with Qwairy.

Step 1: Add your brand and select your prompts

Getting started is simple.

• Enter your brand name into Qwairy.
• Qwairy will scan LLMs to understand how you are described today.

Once your brand is set up, Qwairy automatically:

• Generates a list of prompts your users are likely asking LLMs.
• Suggests keywords, topical clusters, and competitor comparisons.

You can also add your own custom prompts if you're targeting specific customer questions, product features, or branded comparisons.

Step 2: Adjust your monitoring

Once your prompts are selected, you can fine-tune what you want Qwairy to track:

• Choose which LLMs to monitor: ChatGPT (SearchGPT), Gemini, Perplexity.
• Decide if you're focusing on brand mentions, source mentions, or both.
• Add competitors to benchmark against - Qwairy can even suggest them automatically based on LLM data.

Step 3: Follow data weekly with the Dashboard

Qwairy's dashboard is where the magic happens. You can view:

• Your brand visibility score and share of voice (overall and by LLM)
• All mentions per prompt, filtered by LLM, brand, or keyword,
• Your positioning vs competitors, in both brand and source categories,
• Which URLs were used as sources - so you can reverse-engineer what content ranks.

Every week, Qwairy updates your dashboard with fresh LLM data.

In the next part, we'll explore how to act on this data: how to build the right content, earn better citations, and improve your GEO performance.

Part 4: Improve your GEO presence

Once you started tracking, here is when the fun starts. Your goal isn't just to monitor LLMs - it's to influence what they say about your brand. The first thing to do is to identify:

• Prompts that are highly relevant to your product or category
• …but where your brand is missing, while competitors are mentioned

Here are a couple things you can do:

• Create or update a blog post targeting that exact question.
• Include structured formatting (like bullet points, numbered lists, and clear subheadings). LLMs love easy to digest content.
• Mention competitor names (LLMs love comparative content).
• Use semantic keywords that are commonly associated with your industry and the prompt.

Work on your backlink Strategy

One of the most overlooked GEO strategies is working upstream - not just on your own content, but on the content that LLMs rely on. From Qwairy's source data, you'll see which domains LLMs are regularly quoting in your niche. You can also dive deeper into how ChatGPT selects its sources  in this dedicated guide. These might include:

• Industry blogs or media sites
• Aggregators and comparison platforms
• Niche communities (like Reddit, Stack Overflow, etc.)
• Trusted review platforms (like G2, Capterra, or Trustpilot)

Your goal: Get your brand or content featured there. Ways to do this:

• Contribute a guest article or expert quote
• Get listed in roundups or comparison guides
• Pitch your product to the editorial team
• Get mentioned in relevant discussions or user reviews

If that source gets pulled into a future LLM answer, you do too.

Conclusion & Next Steps

The way users discover and engage with brands is changing fast. Search isn't just about Google anymore - it's happening inside AI models like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity. And in this new world of LLMs, being mentioned is everything. Whether it's as a cited source or a trusted brand recommendation, your visibility in these platforms will increasingly determine:

• Who gets discovered,
• Who gets trusted,
• And ultimately, who gets chosen.

So what should you do next?

👣 If you're just getting started

• Use the free method: build your prompt list, run tests in LLMs, and track mentions in a spreadsheet.
• Focus on identifying your most strategic opportunities: prompts where you should be present but aren't.

⚙️ If you want to scale

• Set up your brand in Qwairy.co  and start tracking mentions automatically.
• Use the dashboard to monitor performance weekly and spot drops or gains.
• Benchmark against competitors and reverse-engineer their presence.

🚀 If you're ready to lead

• Turn insights into action: optimize your content, build authority with cited sources, and speak the LLMs' language.
• Treat LLM visibility as a long-term channel - just like SEO was in its early days.
• Set KPIs and report GEO performance alongside classic SEO metrics.

FAQ

What does it mean to be mentioned in an LLM?

Being mentioned in an LLM means your brand is either explicitly named in the AI's response (brand mention) or your website content is used as a source to build the response (source mention).

How can I track brand mentions in LLMs for free?

You can manually track mentions by creating a spreadsheet, identifying relevant prompts your audience would use, and running them in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini to check for brand mentions.

What's the difference between brand mentions and source mentions?

Brand mentions occur when the LLM explicitly names your brand in the answer, while source mentions happen when the LLM uses content from your website as a reference and may cite it with a link.

How does Qwairy help track LLM mentions automatically?

Qwairy automatically generates relevant prompts, monitors your brand across ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity, provides visibility scores, tracks competitor performance, and offers actionable insights to improve your LLM presence.