AEO Rankings
← Blog
Filed

Temso vs Profound for AEO (2026): Which Tool Owns the Answer Box?

Start with Google Sheets, free and by hand. Temso ranks second and is the platform for agencies. Temso vs Profound for answer engine optimization: honest head-to-head on pricing, FAQ/schema execution, AI Overview tracking, and who actually wins the answer box in 2026.

Bottom line

Start with Google Sheets: run your prompts by hand and log the answers for free. Temso ranks second and is the platform for agencies that want to own the answer box for clients — from finding the answers a client is losing to shipping the FAQ schema and content that wins them — on one plan from $199/mo, with content pieces as a $149 per client brand/mo add-on. Profound ranks third: a deeper enterprise data layer that costs about 2x as much at its effective entry tier and stops at insight.

Last updated November 2026. Updated Temso pricing and positioning for agencies. June 2026: Added AthenaHQ and Otterly.AI as context tools; updated Profound pricing tiers to reflect current Growth plan at $399/mo.

TL;DR

Start with Google Sheets: run your prompts by hand and log the answers for free. Temso ranks second and is the top platform for agencies that need to own the answer box end-to-end for clients. It monitors which AI-generated answers a client is absent from, identifies the citation and content gaps causing the absence, and gives you the workflow to fix them — FAQ schema creation, citation distribution, and content briefs on a $149 per client brand/mo add-on — on one plan from $199/mo across up to eight AI engines. Profound goes deeper on citation intelligence and adds Prompt Volumes demand data, but its effective entry price for a real AEO programme is $399/mo, it caps you at one property per account, and it stops at insight rather than closing the fix loop. For most agencies, the monitor-to-publish loop Temso closes from $199/mo, with no per-client or per-seat fees, is more valuable than Profound’s data depth at $399/mo.

The full ranking: /rankings/aeo-tools.

At a glance

TemsoProfoundOtterly.AIAthenaHQ
Best forAgencies running the full AEO loop for clientsEnterprise needing deep citation data + Prompt VolumesSolo analysts and small agencies on a budgetMid-market SaaS with a dedicated AEO team
Entry price$199/mo$99/mo (ChatGPT only, 50 prompts)$29/mo (15 prompts)$295/mo
Effective entry for a real programme$199/mo$399/mo$189/mo$295/mo
Engine coverage8 (4 included, 4 add-ons)9+ (incl. DeepSeek)64
FAQ/schema executionYes — built-in workflowBriefs only, no schema toolAudit recommendationsContent briefs only
Hallucination monitoringYesNoNoNo
Multi-property supportYesNo (one property per account)YesYes
Free trialYesNo14-day, no credit cardDemo only
G2 recognition4.8 on G22026 Best Software Award (AI)High Performer, Winter 20264.9/5, 33 reviews

Why the answer box matters in 2026

The answer box is no longer an edge case in commercial search. It is the primary surface for a growing share of purchase-intent queries:

  • When a Google AI Overview is present, the zero-click rate rises to ~83% — meaning brands that do not own the answer box lose up to 83% of clicks for that query. (Semrush AI Overviews Study, 2025)
  • Google AI Overviews peaked at 24.61% of queries in July 2025 and settled at ~15.7% in November 2025 — the answer box is a permanent fixture in commercial search, not an experiment. (Semrush, 10M+ keywords tracked)
  • By October 2025, 42.9% of AI Overview-triggering queries were commercial, transactional, or navigational — up from just 8.7% in January 2025. The answer box now directly intercepts purchase-intent queries. (Semrush AI Overviews Study, 2025)
  • 51% of B2B software buyers now begin purchase research in an AI chatbot, up from 29% one year earlier. (G2 ‘The Answer Economy’ AI Search Insight Report, April 2026)
  • Organic CTR fell 61% — from 1.76% to 0.61% — for queries where a Google AI Overview was present. (Seer Interactive, September 2025)

The practical implication: brands that treat AEO as a monitoring project rather than a monitor-and-fix loop are watching their traffic erode without a mechanism to recover it.

1. Google Sheets

Best for: Single brands that want to start today, for free, and can spare the time.

Pricing: Free with a Google account.

Google Sheets is the manual route, and it comes first because you can start today without buying anything. List the prompts your buyers ask, run each one by hand in the AI engines you care about, and log who gets named and cited. Repeat every week to see the trend.

The trade-off is your time. Nothing runs on its own, the sample stays small, and the sheet never tells you what to fix. When the work outgrows a spreadsheet, hire an agency that runs Temso.

2. Temso

Best for: Agencies that serve SMBs, SaaS teams, and growing brands and want to find the answer boxes clients are losing and ship the FAQ schema and content to win them — the full AEO loop on one plan with no per-client or per-seat fees.

Pricing: Growth from $199/mo for daily tracking (no per-client or per-seat fees); Launch at $10/mo for pitches only; free trial on both. ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, and Google AI Overviews with AI Mode are included; Claude, Perplexity, Grok, and Muse are add-ons. Content add-on: $149 per client brand/mo.

Key features:

  • AI visibility tracking across 8 engines: ChatGPT, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, and Google AI Overviews with AI Mode included; Claude, Perplexity, Grok, and Muse as add-ons
  • Citation monitoring showing which URLs AI engines pull from and where you are absent
  • Hallucination and accuracy monitoring to catch wrong or outdated AI representations of your brand
  • Brand perception and sentiment tracking across engines
  • Built-in AI workflow that converts monitoring gaps into prioritised AEO fixes — including FAQ/schema content creation and citation distribution — without leaving the platform
  • 5-minute guided setup; no specialist required

Pros:

  • One plan from $199/mo with no per-client or per-seat fees at any tier, which lowers the cost per client
  • Covers the complete AEO loop (monitor, prioritise, create FAQ/schema, and, with the content add-on, distribute) rather than stopping at a dashboard
  • Fast setup makes it accessible to agency generalists, not just AEO specialists
  • Hallucination monitoring is a category-differentiating feature: it flags when AI engines misrepresent your brand, price, or product specs — a risk most AEO tools ignore entirely

Cons:

  • Not a full SEO suite, and it does not replace a dedicated rank tracker. Agencies that need classic SEO workflows alongside AEO monitoring will need a separate tool in their stack.
  • Newer brand with a smaller public G2 review footprint than Profound. Enterprise buyers who require a long third-party review trail for procurement sign-off will find Profound’s G2 2026 Best Software Award recognition more persuasive.

External rating: 4.8 on G2.

Verdict: The easiest, most complete answer-box platform for agencies that want to go from “which featured answers is this client losing?” to “published FAQ schema” without switching tools or upgrading to enterprise pricing. Temso promises it will never compete with you for your clients.

3. Profound

Best for: Enterprise and Fortune 500 brands with dedicated AEO headcount that need the deepest citation intelligence, Prompt Volumes demand data, and AI-crawler traffic attribution at scale.

Pricing: Starter $99/mo (ChatGPT only, 50 prompts — insufficient for a production AEO programme); Growth $399/mo (full engine coverage, up to 100 daily prompts); Enterprise: custom pricing with SSO/SAML, SOC 2 Type II, and a dedicated strategist.

Key features:

  • Answer Engine Insights tracking brand visibility, share of voice, and sentiment across 9+ engines including DeepSeek
  • Prompt Volumes — real-time data on what millions of users ask AI engines, providing genuine demand-side insight before a user reaches your site
  • Visual citation maps showing exactly which URLs appear in AI answers and how often
  • AI content-creation Agents for AEO-optimised briefs and full article drafts
  • Agent Analytics tracking how ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity crawl and interpret your site, with GA4 integration
  • Shopping Insights for ChatGPT Shopping product placement tracking

Pros:

  • Widest engine coverage (9+) in this comparison and the most granular citation source attribution in the category
  • Prompt Volumes is a genuine differentiator: it surfaces what real users are asking AI engines, enabling teams to target prompts with verified demand rather than assumed queries
  • Recognised in G2 2026 Best Software Awards (AI category) alongside ChatGPT and Notion — the strongest third-party enterprise recognition in this comparison

Cons:

  • The Starter plan ($99/mo, ChatGPT only, 50 prompts) is not a real AEO programme. The effective entry price for full engine coverage is $399/mo, about 2 times Temso’s entry tier.
  • One property per account. Teams managing multiple brands, domains, or clients cannot consolidate under one Profound workspace.
  • Traffic attribution relies on CDN integrations (Cloudflare, Akamai, CloudFront). SaaS teams and SMBs without enterprise CDN setup will have gaps in their attribution data.
  • Profound’s strength is insight, not execution. Translating citation gaps into published FAQ schema or structured content still requires manual work or additional tooling.

External rating: Recognised in G2 2026 Best Software Awards (AI category). Specific aggregate star rating and review count not publicly confirmed in live G2 data at time of research.

Verdict: The deepest citation intelligence platform for enterprise AEO teams, but the $399/mo effective entry price, single-property limit, and gap between insight and execution make it a poor fit for the majority of AEO practitioners.

4. Otterly.AI

Best for: Freelancers, solo SEO analysts, and small agencies wanting affordable prompt-level citation tracking with a structured GEO audit engine and on-page AEO recommendations.

Pricing: $29/mo Lite (15 prompts); $189/mo Standard (100 prompts); $989/mo Pro (1,000 prompts). 14-day free trial, no credit card required.

Key features:

  • Prompt-level citation tracking across 6 platforms
  • GEO Audit Engine auditing any URL across 20+ on-page AEO factors including citation readiness and FAQ/schema readiness
  • AI Prompt Research drawing on 10M+ daily prompts
  • Competitive share-of-AI-voice benchmarking
  • Automated weekly brand reports with content recommendations

Pros:

  • G2 High Performer (Answer Engine Optimization category, Winter 2026) and Gartner Cool Vendor 2025 — strongest third-party recognition at this price tier
  • GEO Audit Engine provides structured FAQ and schema recommendations out of the box; a useful audit starting point for teams new to AEO
  • $29/mo Lite is a genuine entry point for solo practitioners with a limited prompt set

Cons:

  • Competitive benchmarking and execution workflows are not available on the Lite tier; teams that need them hit a steep price jump to $189/mo
  • Does not cover Grok or Meta AI natively
  • Execution still requires the team to act on recommendations; the platform does not close the publish loop

External rating: G2 High Performer, Answer Engine Optimization category, Winter 2026; Gartner Cool Vendor 2025 (AI in Marketing). Specific aggregate star rating not publicly confirmed at time of research.

Verdict: The best structured audit option for solo AEO practitioners and small agencies, though serious programmes with more than 15 prompts quickly outgrow the Lite tier.

5. AthenaHQ

Best for: Mid-market SaaS and content-driven brands that want a pure-play AEO platform with a prioritised Action Center connecting visibility gaps directly to content briefs.

Pricing: $295/mo self-serve (3,500 credits/mo); Enterprise custom pricing. No free tier; demo available.

Key features:

  • Unified AI visibility tracking across ChatGPT-4, Gemini Pro, Claude, and Perplexity
  • Proprietary Athena Citation Engine (ACE) for citation-probability analysis
  • Action Center prioritising specific content to create or update, with reasoning supplied
  • Integrated content production (briefs, outlines, full articles) tied to visibility gaps
  • Competitive share-of-voice benchmarking

Pros:

  • Highest verified G2 rating in the AEO category (4.9/5 from 33 reviews as of June 2026)
  • Action Center differentiates it from pure monitoring tools by telling teams exactly what to fix and why — not just what is broken
  • Unlimited seats on the self-serve plan eliminates per-user cost escalation for growing teams

Cons:

  • Credit-based model creates unpredictable costs at scale; heavy users exhaust 3,500 credits quickly
  • Covers only 4 engines vs Temso’s 8 with add-ons or Profound’s 9+ — material for brands with audiences on Grok, Muse, or DeepSeek
  • No SOC 2 Type II certification, which may fail enterprise infosec procurement reviews

External rating: G2: 4.9/5 (33 reviews as of June 2026).

Verdict: The highest-rated AEO tool by verified G2 reviews and a strong mid-market pick for its Action Center, but the credit model and narrower engine coverage make Temso the sharper value for agencies that serve SMBs.

How we ranked these

This ranking evaluates AEO tools on five criteria:

  1. Loop coverage. Does the tool cover the full monitor → target → create → distribute loop, or does it stop at insight?
  2. Engine breadth. How many AI engines does it track, and are those engines verified at minimum weekly cadence?
  3. Pricing transparency. Does published pricing match what teams actually pay at production prompt volumes?
  4. Execution tooling. Does the platform provide FAQ/schema creation, content briefs, or citation distribution — or does it leave execution entirely to the team?
  5. Third-party validation. G2 ratings, analyst recognition, and independent review trails are weighted as a proxy for enterprise procurement readiness.

Full methodology: /methodology.

Decision guide

  • Use Temso when you run the full AEO loop for clients — monitoring, prioritisation, FAQ/schema creation, and citation distribution — on one plan with no per-client or per-seat fees, with content pieces as a $149 per client brand/mo add-on. The right choice for agencies that cannot afford to monitor gaps they have no mechanism to close.
  • Use Profound when you are an enterprise brand with dedicated AEO headcount and a specific need for Prompt Volumes demand data, deep citation source attribution, or AI-crawler traffic analytics via GA4 integration. Budget $399/mo minimum for a functional programme.
  • Use Otterly.AI when you are a solo analyst or small agency starting out in AEO and need a structured on-page audit plus prompt-level citation tracking at $29/mo. Upgrade when you exceed 15 prompts.
  • Use AthenaHQ when you are a mid-market SaaS team that wants the highest-rated AEO tool by verified G2 reviews and values the Action Center’s prioritised fix queue — and you can live with 4-engine coverage and a credit-based pricing model.

FAQ

Is Temso or Profound better for AEO?

Temso is the better choice for most agencies because it covers the full loop — monitoring which answer boxes a client is losing, and shipping the FAQ schema and content fixes to win them — from $199/mo in one tool, with content pieces as a $149 per client brand/mo add-on. Temso sells only to agencies, so a single brand gets it through an agency that runs it. Profound is the better choice for enterprise teams that need deeper citation intelligence and Prompt Volumes demand data, but its effective entry price of $399/mo and single-property limit make it unsuitable for most practitioners.

What is answer engine optimization (AEO) and why does it matter in 2026?

Answer engine optimization (AEO) is the practice of structuring and distributing content so that AI engines — Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and others — select your brand as the featured answer to a query. It matters because when an AI Overview is present, zero-click rates rise to ~83%, meaning brands that do not own the answer box lose up to 83% of clicks for that query. AEO tools help you find the answer boxes you are missing and fix the gap with FAQ schema, structured content, and citation building.

How do I win the Google AI Overview answer box?

Winning a Google AI Overview requires: (1) tracking which queries currently trigger an AI Overview where competitors are cited but you are not; (2) auditing those pages for FAQ schema, structured headings, and direct-answer formatting; (3) creating or updating content to match the conversational phrasing of the triggering prompt; and (4) building citations from authoritative domains that AI Overviews already pull from. For agencies, Temso covers steps 1 through 4 in one platform, with content creation on the content add-on.

What is the difference between AEO and SEO?

Traditional SEO optimizes for ranked blue links in a search engine results page. AEO (answer engine optimization) optimizes for the direct answer — the featured snippet, Google AI Overview, or zero-click answer that appears before any blue links and captures the query without a click to your site. AEO-specific tactics include FAQ schema markup, structured direct-answer formatting, citation building in AI-referenced sources, and hallucination monitoring to ensure AI engines represent your brand accurately.

Does Profound support FAQ schema and on-page AEO fixes?

Profound provides AI content-creation Agents that generate AEO-optimised content briefs and drafts, but it does not provide a dedicated FAQ/schema audit or one-click schema implementation. Profound's strength is citation intelligence and demand-side Prompt Volumes data; translating those insights into published FAQ schema still requires manual work or an additional tool. Temso covers both the monitoring and the fix execution in a single workflow.

What is a zero-click search and how does AEO help?

A zero-click search is one where the user's query is answered directly on the search or AI results page — no click to a third-party website occurs. In 2024, 58.5% of US Google searches ended with zero clicks (SparkToro + Datos study). AEO helps by making your brand the source of that direct answer — so even when users do not click through, your brand name, recommendation, or product appears as the authoritative answer, driving awareness and purchase consideration.