Primary Ranking Metric: Choosing How Brands Are Ranked
Choose the per-project metric that orders the Brand Industry Ranking and your Industry Rank: Composite Score, Mention Rate, Visibility Score, Citation Rate, or Custom weights. Learn what each measures, which to pick for your goal, and what changes across the dashboard, exports, email, and PDF report.
Key Takeaways
- Primary ranking metric is a per-project setting that decides how every brand — you and your competitors — is ordered in the Brand Industry Ranking
- Choose Composite Score, Mention Rate, Visibility Score, Citation Rate, or Custom weights
- It sets the rank shown on the dashboard, the Brands Table, CSV/JSON exports, the monthly email, and the PDF report — all at once
Ayzeo ranks every brand in your project — your own plus the competitors you track — in the Brand Industry Ranking. That ranking, and the “Industry Rank #N” figure you see for your own brand, has always been calculated from a single fixed formula. The Primary ranking metric setting lets you change which number does the ranking, per project. You will find it in Project Settings → Project Details, and any project owner or admin can change it, on every plan.
If you have never touched this setting, nothing about your reporting changes. Read on to understand each option and when it is the right one for your business.
What the Primary Ranking Metric Controls
The Brand Industry Ranking is one ordered list of brands, and the primary ranking metric is the number it sorts by. Whatever you choose flows through to every place the ranking is shown:
- The AI Visibility Analytics dashboard, including your own Industry Rank
- The Brands Table and its ordering
- CSV and JSON exports of your brand data
- The monthly report email, where your rank shows as “Industry Rank #N”
- The PDF report you download or send to clients
Sentiment is not part of any ranking. Brand sentiment is tracked and reported separately — it never contributes to the ranking formula, whichever metric you choose.
Composite Score
Definition: A blended score of 60% Mention Rate, 25% Citation Rate, and 15% Visibility Score.
Composite Score is the balanced, all-in-one view. It leans hardest on Mention Rate — being named in the answer is the most valuable outcome — while still rewarding brands that get cited and that show up in AI search results. This is the formula Ayzeo used for every project before this setting existed, so it is the option to keep if you want your ranking to stay exactly as it has always been reported.
Default for existing projects: Every project created before this release keeps Composite Score, so nothing in its reporting changes.
Mention Rate
Definition: How often AI names the brand in its answers — the share of prompts where the brand is explicitly mentioned in the generated response.
A high Mention Rate means AI is putting the brand in front of users directly, as part of the answer they read. It is the closest thing to a recommendation, so ranking by Mention Rate rewards the brands users actually see named.
Default for new projects: Projects created from this release onward use Mention Rate by default.
Visibility Score
Definition: How often the brand appears in the AI web-search results the model consulted — the share of prompts where the brand shows up in what AI read while answering.
A high Visibility Score means the brand is present in the raw material AI works from, even before the model decides whom to cite or name. Ranking by Visibility Score rewards brands that dominate the search results feeding AI answers, which is often where comparison and “best X” queries are won or lost.
Citation Rate
Definition: How often the AI actually visited and cited the brand's URL during its research — the share of prompts where AI opened the brand's page.
A high Citation Rate means AI treats the brand's own pages as a source worth reading, not just a name in a list. Ranking by Citation Rate rewards brands whose content AI relies on directly, which is the goal if you want to be the source AI reads and links to.
Custom Weights
Definition: Your own integer mix of Mention Rate, Citation Rate, and Visibility Score. The three weights must add up to 100.
Custom weights let you build a blend that matches how you define success. For example, an agency reporting on a client that cares more about being cited than about raw search presence might use a 50/30/20 mix — 50% Mention Rate, 30% Citation Rate, 20% Visibility Score. As long as the three numbers sum to 100, you decide the balance.
Which Metric Should Your Business Choose?
There is no single right answer — the best metric is the one that matches what you are trying to achieve. Here is how to map a goal to a setting:
Goal: brand awareness → Mention Rate
If your priority is having AI name your brand in front of users, rank by Mention Rate. It rewards the brands that get said out loud in the answer.
Goal: be the source AI reads and links to → Citation Rate
If you invest in content and want AI to open and cite your pages, rank by Citation Rate. It rewards the brands whose own URLs AI actually visits.
Goal: win comparison and “best X” queries → Visibility Score
If you compete in comparison and recommendation queries where showing up in AI's search results is the battle, rank by Visibility Score. It rewards the brands present in what AI reads before it answers.
Goal: a balanced overview, or continuity with past reporting → Composite Score
If you want one balanced number, or you want your ranking to stay identical to how Ayzeo has always reported it, keep Composite Score.
Goal: map a client-specific KPI → Custom weights
If you are an agency and each client defines success differently, set Custom weights per project to mirror that client's KPI — any integer mix of the three metrics that sums to 100.
What Changes When You Switch
Changing the primary ranking metric is safe and reversible. Here is exactly what it does and does not affect:
- The ranking re-orders everywhere, immediately. The Brand Industry Ranking and your Industry Rank update across the dashboard, the Brands Table, exports, the monthly email, and the PDF report.
- The change is retroactive for any time period you view. The ranking is always computed live from your stored raw results, so switching the metric re-ranks past periods too — a 90-day view recalculates against the metric you just picked.
- Your raw metric trend charts do not change. Mention Rate, Citation Rate, and Visibility Score are measured from the AI answers themselves. Switching the ranking metric only changes how brands are ordered, never the underlying numbers or their history.
- The analytics page adapts to your choice. It highlights the primary metric's KPI card, defaults the trend chart and the Top Brands tabs to that metric, and shows a “Ranked by” label so everyone knows which metric is driving the order.
- The monthly email and PDF report label the rank with your chosen metric, so the rank a client reads always matches the metric you selected.
Want a quick second opinion? The ranking table has a Rank by switcher. Anyone viewing the dashboard can re-order the table by a different metric on the spot, without changing the project's setting or affecting anyone else's view.
How to Change It
Open Project Settings → Project Details, find Primary ranking metric, and pick the option you want. If you choose Custom weights, enter your three integers so they sum to 100, then save. The change applies to that project only, and any project owner or admin can make it on any plan.
New to the three metrics?
The ranking is built from Visibility Score, Citation Rate, and Mention Rate. If you want the full definition of each one and how AI produces them, start with the metrics guide.
Set Your Ranking Metric in Ayzeo
Open a project's settings to choose the metric that best reflects your goals, then watch the Brand Industry Ranking re-order across your dashboard and reports.
Go to Your ProjectsFrequently Asked Questions
Q: Do I have to change anything?
A: No. Every project created before this release keeps the Composite Score it has always used, so your ranking and reporting stay exactly the same until you decide to change the setting.
Q: Does switching the metric change my historical data?
A: It changes how brands are ranked for past periods, because the ranking is recalculated live from your stored raw results. It does not change the raw metrics themselves — your Mention Rate, Citation Rate, and Visibility Score trend charts are untouched.
Q: Can I look at another metric without changing the setting?
A: Yes. Use the Rank by switcher on the ranking table to re-order it by any metric for your own view. It does not change the project's primary ranking metric or affect what shows in emails and reports.
Q: Is sentiment part of the ranking?
A: No. Sentiment is tracked and reported on its own and never contributes to the ranking, whichever metric you choose — not even Composite Score or Custom weights.
Q: Do Custom weights have to add up to anything specific?
A: Yes. Custom weights are three integers — for Mention Rate, Citation Rate, and Visibility Score — that must sum to 100, for example 50/30/20.