How It Works

Every Citera analysis runs through a multi-stage pipeline. Each stage feeds the next, turning a raw URL into a GEO score, actionable findings and a real-world AI visibility report.

The analysis pipeline

When you submit a URL, Citera moves through these stages in order:

1. Crawl

Citera fetches the page through a managed crawler. It automatically picks the cheapest method that still captures the full content: a fast static fetch for normal pages, and a headless-browser render only when a page is a JavaScript-heavy single-page app. This keeps analyses fast and cost-efficient without missing client-rendered content.

2. Parse & extract

The crawled HTML is parsed into the building blocks an AI engine cares about: title, meta description, heading hierarchy, clean body text, word count and any JSON-LD structured data. Citera also extracts entities — statistics, quotes, named authors and dates — which feed the authority and freshness dimensions.

3. GEO score

The parsed page is evaluated across 5 weighted dimensions to produce the 0–100 GEO score. Each dimension returns its own sub-score plus specific findings — an issue paired with a concrete fix. See GEO Score for the full breakdown.

4. AI simulation

Citera generates realistic search queries from the page's topic and your brand, then sends them in parallel to multiple AI engines — ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, DeepSeek and Perplexity. It records whether your brand is mentioned and whether your domain is cited as a source. Read more in AI Simulation.

5. Competitor analysis

From the same AI answers, Citera ranks the competing brands by how often the engines actually recommend them — not by a guess. You get a share-of-voice view (you vs. your top rivals), a per-competitor breakdown showing which engine favours whom, and a per-engine view so you can see, for example, that Claude pushes one rival while Gemini pushes another. This tells you exactly where to close the gap. Read more in AI Simulation.