The Visibility Gap in AI: From Mentions to Occupancy A Governance-Ready Framework for Measuring Brand Presence in AI Assistants

This white paper introduces the Prompt-Space Occupancy Score (PSOS™), a governance-ready framework for measuring brand visibility inside AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, and Grok. As generative AI becomes the default interface for discovery and decision-making, brand presence in model outputs is emerging as a material driver of demand capture, market share, and enterprise value.

Current “AI visibility” reports focus on exposure-based metrics—counting mentions and reporting relative growth (e.g., “700% increase in visibility”). These metrics are flattering but misleading. They obscure the Visibility Gap: the divergence between human brand recall and model recall.

PSOS addresses this gap by measuring three critical dimensions:

• Occupancy: share of prompts where the brand appears.

• Positioning: rank within AI-generated answers.

• Decay: persistence of visibility over 30/60/90-day audits.

The paper provides:

• A critique of exposure metrics and their systemic flaws (relative baselines, framing bias, snapshot bias, opacity).

• Comparative case studies in fintech, retail, healthcare, and industrial procurement, showing how incumbents, challengers, and new entrants perform under PSOS.

• A technical appendix explaining prompt cluster design, weighting rules, and decay formula.

• An operational annex with practical guidance for marketers, data teams, and community engagement.

• Ethical considerations for managing AI visibility transparently and sustainably.

By standardizing visibility measurement, PSOS allows boards, investors, and operational teams to treat AI visibility as a governance-ready KPI—akin to GAAP in finance or ESG in sustainability.

Conclusion: Mentions fade. Occupancy endures. PSOS turns AI visibility into a measurable, auditable asset for the AI era.