AI Visibility Glossary

The practice of optimizing content and online presence to appear in AI-generated answers and recommendations. Similar to SEO but focused on AI assistants like ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, and Perplexity rather than traditional search engine results.

The main AI-generated response section in Google AI Mode. Contains 81% of hotel mentions, with 96.8% of hotel links pointing to Google Business Profiles. The primary surface for hotel visibility in Google AI.

How often and prominently a hotel, brand, or website appears in AI-generated responses and recommendations. Measured through mention frequency, position stability, and source citation rates.

OpenAI's conversational AI assistant. For hotel queries, ChatGPT uses a "Sonic" classifier to decide when to trigger web search (98% for location-specific queries). Uses SerpAPI for Google data, making Google Business Profile optimization critical.

The AI process of identifying hotel names in text and linking them to structured data (e.g., Google Place IDs). Hotels with clear, consistent naming across sources are more reliably recognized and recommended.

The system that expands a single user query into multiple parallel searches across different providers. "Best boutique hotel Paris" might become 5-7 sub-queries sent to Google, Bing, TripAdvisor, etc. simultaneously.

The hotel's listing on Google Maps/Search showing address, reviews, photos, amenities, and booking options. When users click a hotel link in Google AI Mode, 79% land on GBP first. Essential for AI visibility — the primary gateway from AI to hotels.

Google's AI-powered search experience that generates conversational answers with hotel recommendations. Features AI Overview (81% of hotel mentions) and Local Pack (19%). Hotel links primarily go to Google Business Profile (79%).

A market concentration metric ranging from 0 to 10,000. Higher HHI means fewer hotels dominate the AI responses. Bordeaux boutique (HHI 2,348) is highly concentrated; London boutique (HHI 364) is competitive. Used to predict how difficult it is to rank in a market.

The clickable hotel name/card in an AI response that takes users to a destination (e.g., Google Business Profile, hotel website, or OTA). In Google AI Mode, 79% of hotel links go to GBP, 16.6% to hotel websites directly, and only 3.6% to OTAs.

A map-based results panel in Google AI Mode showing 3-4 nearby hotels with ratings, prices, and booking links. Appears in only 6.5% of queries but is highly valuable — 81% of its links go directly to hotel websites. Boutique queries trigger it most (10%).

How evenly distributed AI mentions are across hotels in a market. Concentrated markets (few hotels dominate) show higher position stability. Fragmented markets (many hotels compete) show more variation in AI responses.

The percentage of AI responses in which a specific hotel is mentioned, relative to all hotels mentioned in that market/query type. A hotel with 15% mention share appears in 15% of relevant AI recommendations.

An AI-powered search engine that provides sourced answers. Known for heavy reliance on TripAdvisor (95.5% of hotel queries) and Expedia (68.6%) as source citations. Displays source links prominently.

The consistency with which a hotel maintains its ranking position across repeated identical queries. A hotel with 90% position 1 stability appears first in 90 out of 100 identical query runs. Higher stability indicates stronger AI presence.

A categorization of hotel search queries by traveler intent: Luxury/5-star, Boutique/Design, Budget/Value, Family, Romantic/Couples. Different tiers show different position stability and market concentration patterns.

An algorithm that combines rankings from multiple sources into a single final ranking. Hotels appearing across multiple sources (TripAdvisor + Booking + hotel website) receive higher RRF scores and rank better in AI responses.

ChatGPT's fast pre-processing classifier that determines whether to trigger web search. Assigns a probability score — if above ~65%, search activates. Hotel queries with location (98%) or price (91%) almost always trigger search.

The inline reference links AI systems use to support their answers (e.g., "According to TripAdvisor..."). Different from hotel links — these are the sources AI cites for information, where OTAs dominate (47%) but users rarely interact with them directly.

The number of hotels that appear in the top 3 positions across multiple runs of the same query. Higher overlap indicates more predictable AI recommendations for that market segment.