New market map: GEO (generative engine optimization) in 2026 — 145 companies, 10 layers The money i...
New market map: GEO (generative engine optimization) in 2026 — 145 companies, 10 layers
The money is splitting two ways. Pure-play monitoring is led by Profound ($1.8B valuation, 2,500+ brands), while the incumbent SEO suites are adding AI modules fast: Semrush's AI product is at $38M+ ARR. Adobe is buying Semrush, HubSpot bought XFunnel, Sitecore bought Scrunch.
Layer by layer:
1. Visibility monitoring, enterprise (16) — Profound ($1.8B val.), Bluefish AI ($43M raise), Brandlight ($30M). Daily prompt runs across ChatGPT, Perplexity and AI Overviews.
2. Visibility monitoring, self-serve (31) — Peec AI ($10M rev.), Scrunch ($225M val.), Searchable ($85M), Otterly (~20K users, founder-stated).
3. Content optimization (16) — AirOps ($225M val.), Search Atlas ($30M rev.), Surfer ($15M rev.), Jasper.
4. Agencies (11) — iPullRank, Seer Interactive, First Page Sage (from $2,000/month). GEO audits plus content rewrites plus off-site citations, sold as a service.
5. Technical layer for AI crawlers (10) — Mintlify ($500M val.), Botify, Rank Math (4M+ users), Yoast. llms.txt, schema, pre-rendering.
6. Incumbent SEO suites (14) — Semrush ($38M+ AI ARR), Adobe LLM Optimizer, Ahrefs Brand Radar (3,000+ companies), Conductor, Similarweb.
7. Ads inside AI answers (10) — ChatGPT ads (US test since Feb 2026), Google AI Mode ads, ZeroClick ($55M), Gravity ($30.5M). Perplexity has stepped back from ads.
8. AI crawlers & licensing (11) — Cloudflare Pay per crawl, TollBit ($24M), ProRata/Gist (500+ publications), Microsoft's publisher marketplace.
9. AI shopping (13) — Shopify Agentic Storefronts, Stripe Agentic Commerce Suite, OpenAI Instant Checkout, ReFiBuy ($13.6M), Azoma ($11.2M).
10. Answer engines (13) — ChatGPT Search (~900M weekly users), Gemini (950M monthly), Google AI Overviews (2B+ monthly, second-hand), Perplexity ($20.4B val.).
Data as of Nov 2026, public sources; company-reported numbers are labeled as such on the map.
Bookmark this — we'll update it every quarter.
Full list + sources: ai-geo-map.vercel.app
The money is splitting two ways. Pure-play monitoring is led by Profound ($1.8B valuation, 2,500+ brands), while the incumbent SEO suites are adding AI modules fast: Semrush's AI product is at $38M+ ARR. Adobe is buying Semrush, HubSpot bought XFunnel, Sitecore bought Scrunch.
Layer by layer:
1. Visibility monitoring, enterprise (16) — Profound ($1.8B val.), Bluefish AI ($43M raise), Brandlight ($30M). Daily prompt runs across ChatGPT, Perplexity and AI Overviews.
2. Visibility monitoring, self-serve (31) — Peec AI ($10M rev.), Scrunch ($225M val.), Searchable ($85M), Otterly (~20K users, founder-stated).
3. Content optimization (16) — AirOps ($225M val.), Search Atlas ($30M rev.), Surfer ($15M rev.), Jasper.
4. Agencies (11) — iPullRank, Seer Interactive, First Page Sage (from $2,000/month). GEO audits plus content rewrites plus off-site citations, sold as a service.
5. Technical layer for AI crawlers (10) — Mintlify ($500M val.), Botify, Rank Math (4M+ users), Yoast. llms.txt, schema, pre-rendering.
6. Incumbent SEO suites (14) — Semrush ($38M+ AI ARR), Adobe LLM Optimizer, Ahrefs Brand Radar (3,000+ companies), Conductor, Similarweb.
7. Ads inside AI answers (10) — ChatGPT ads (US test since Feb 2026), Google AI Mode ads, ZeroClick ($55M), Gravity ($30.5M). Perplexity has stepped back from ads.
8. AI crawlers & licensing (11) — Cloudflare Pay per crawl, TollBit ($24M), ProRata/Gist (500+ publications), Microsoft's publisher marketplace.
9. AI shopping (13) — Shopify Agentic Storefronts, Stripe Agentic Commerce Suite, OpenAI Instant Checkout, ReFiBuy ($13.6M), Azoma ($11.2M).
10. Answer engines (13) — ChatGPT Search (~900M weekly users), Gemini (950M monthly), Google AI Overviews (2B+ monthly, second-hand), Perplexity ($20.4B val.).
Data as of Nov 2026, public sources; company-reported numbers are labeled as such on the map.
Bookmark this — we'll update it every quarter.
Full list + sources: ai-geo-map.vercel.app
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