A different line-up
The shops and brands an assistant recommends for a question are often not the ones you benchmark against.
AI visibility · Competitor tracking
See which competitors AI assistants name instead of you.
Sphen.ai lists the competitors named in the same AI answers as you, prompt by prompt, and the competing domains those answers cite.
In short
How does competitor tracking work in Sphen.ai?
Sphen.ai reads competitors out of the AI answers it samples for your prompts. Brands named in the same answers are listed per prompt under Competitors mentioned. Competing domains appear in the Cited domains table. The Mentions tab adds pages on the web about you or a tracked competitor, and marks the ones AI assistants cited.
Updated:
The problem
Your real competitors in AI are not always the ones you watch.
Domains, not just brands
Competitors win through the pages that get cited — their own shop, or a review site that writes about them.
No context
Knowing a competitor exists is useless without the question on which it beat you.
How it works
How does competitor tracking work?
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01
Competitors per prompt
Open a prompt in the Prompts deep dive: Competitors mentioned lists the brands that appeared in the same answers.
Demo store · sample data -
02
Competing domains
Rankings shows the Cited domains table next to engine coverage — the domains that were cited where you were not.
Demo store · sample data -
03
Where they get mentioned
The Mentions tab lists pages on the web about you or a tracked competitor, and marks the ones AI assistants actually cited.
Demo store · sample data
In the app
Where do you see competitors in the app?
Competitors mentioned per prompt
Open a prompt in the Prompts deep dive. The prompt details list the brands that appeared in the same AI answers under Competitors mentioned. Each competitor is tied to the question it appeared on, so you know where you were compared and with whom. Use this view for the prompts that matter most to your store, and check it again after later scans.
Cited domains
The Rankings deep dive shows the Cited domains table next to engine coverage. It lists the domains AI answers cited for your prompts, including competing shops and review sites. The Sources deep dive goes further and ranks external domains with their citations, their share and the engines that cited them. Both pages open from the AI visibility deep dives dropdown on Analytics.
Mentions and Opportunities
The Mentions tab lists pages on the web that mention your store or a tracked competitor and marks the ones AI assistants cited. The About competitors counter shows how many mentions concern a competitor. Filters narrow the table by type, by you or competitors, and by cited or not. Opportunities lists sites AI cites that do not mention you yet, each with evidence and an outreach draft.
You stay in control
What stays under your control?
- Competitors come from real sampled answers, not from a list you have to maintain.
- Each competitor is tied to the prompt it appeared on.
- Nothing is sent to anyone: Sphen.ai reads answers and pages, it never contacts competitors or sites.
Plans
Which plans include it?
AI visibility tests per month
- Essential3
- Business8
- Growth15
Do I have to enter my competitors?
No. Competitors that appear in the same AI answers are listed per prompt under Competitors mentioned in the prompt details. They come from the sampled answers themselves, so the list reflects who assistants name for your questions, not who you expected to see.
Where do I see competing domains?
In the Cited domains table on the Rankings deep dive, and in more detail on the Sources deep dive. Both open from the AI visibility deep dives dropdown in the tab row on Analytics. Sources also shows which engines cited each domain.
How does this connect to Mentions?
Mentions lists pages about you or a tracked competitor and marks the ones AI assistants cited. Opportunities shows sites AI cites that write about competitors but not about you, with the evidence and a draft you can edit and send from your own inbox.
Does Sphen.ai contact competitors or the sites it finds?
No. Sphen.ai reads AI answers and web pages. It never contacts competitors or websites. Outreach drafts in Opportunities are drafts only. You review and edit them, send them from your own inbox and then mark the site as contacted in the app.
Can I see competitors per product?
Where the AI Shopping tab is switched on for your store, it shows readiness and competitors per product. The tab is rolling out gradually and is not available in every store yet. The per-prompt view under Competitors mentioned works without it.
Why does the list of competitors change between scans?
AI answers are non-deterministic and every scan is a sample. A brand can appear in one run and be missing in the next. Look at which competitors come back across several scans on the same prompt. Those are the ones assistants name consistently.
See it on your own catalog.
Install Sphen.ai, let it read your store, and decide exactly what goes live.