TL;DR — Apply the MOFU filter on the GEO Matrix to see whether AI models include your brand in comparison and evaluation responses. Read actual AI responses in Visibility > Responses to understand what criteria models use when shortlisting brands in your category. Check Compare > By Funnel on the MOFU tab for your competitive ranking at the consideration stage. Pro tip: AI models heavily weight third-party review sites for comparison queries — check Visibility > Citation Sources to see which external sources are being used and prioritize earning coverage there.
The Question
“Does AI recommend my brand in the comparison/consideration phase?”Middle-of-funnel queries are the most commercially significant in AI search: “best X vs Y”, “alternatives to Z”, “which X is right for me”, “X comparison”. These are the prompts where a potential customer has defined their problem and is now deciding which brands to seriously evaluate. Being absent from MOFU AI responses is often more damaging than weak TOFU visibility, because the user is actively ready to shortlist — and AI is doing the shortlisting for them. You might also be wondering:
- “Which competitors does AI recommend instead of my brand during comparisons?”
- “What criteria does AI use when evaluating brands in my category?”
- “How do I improve my positioning in AI comparison responses?”
Where to Go in Qwairy
Start here: Overview > GEO Matrix (MOFU filter)
Navigate to Overview > GEO Matrix and apply the Funnel Stage: MOFU filter.
The matrix now shows only your middle-of-funnel prompts — comparison, alternatives, and evaluation queries.
Each cell shows your Brand Mention Visibility for that MOFU topic-provider combination. Note which topics have high competitor presence but low brand presence — these are active consideration gaps.
Go deeper: Visibility > Prompts (MOFU prompts) + Responses
Navigate to Visibility > Prompts, filter by funnel stage MOFU, and review the specific prompt texts.
For any prompt where your brand visibility is low, click into the response to read what AI models actually say. Pay attention to which criteria they use when comparing brands: pricing, integrations, ease of use, support quality. These criteria are your content and messaging targets.
Use the Responses view to read comparison answers verbatim and understand the narrative your competitors are benefiting from.
Complete the picture: Compare > By Funnel (MOFU tab) + GSC
Open Compare > By Funnel and select the MOFU tab for a direct competitive ranking at the consideration stage.
Then check Strategy > Google Search Console for comparison queries driving organic traffic (patterns like “vs”, “alternative”, “best for”, “review”) — these often mirror the MOFU prompts where AI visibility matters most, and strong GSC performance on comparison queries tends to correlate with improved AI citation.
What to Look For
GEO Matrix — MOFU Filtered View
The MOFU-filtered matrix answers one question per cell: when a potential customer asks an AI to help them choose between options in your category, does your brand get named? Each dark cell is a place where you are being actively excluded from consideration by the world’s most trusted recommendation engines.| Element | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Visibility per MOFU topic | Which comparison themes include your brand and which exclude it |
| Provider gaps | Whether specific AI models (e.g., ChatGPT) consistently exclude you from comparisons while others (e.g., Perplexity) include you |
| Competitor cell overlap | Topics where a competitor’s cell is bright while yours is dark — direct competitive displacement |
| Score trends | Whether your MOFU inclusion rate is improving or declining over time |
Compare > By Funnel — MOFU Competitive Ranking
This view ranks all tracked brands by their average Brand Mention Visibility on MOFU-tagged prompts. A brand with strong TOFU visibility but a low MOFU ranking is losing potential customers at the decision boundary — users know the brand exists but AI does not recommend it when comparisons happen.Pro Tip: Read 3-5 comparison responses verbatim in the Responses view. AI models tend to use consistent criteria when comparing brands in a category. If pricing is always mentioned for competitors but never for you, that is a data gap you can fix with structured pricing content. If integration lists are cited for competitors, publish a comprehensive integrations page.
Filters That Help
| Filter | How to use it for this question |
|---|---|
| Funnel Stage: MOFU | Scope all views to comparison and evaluation queries only |
| Provider | Find which AI models are most and least likely to include you in comparison responses |
| Period | Use 60-day windows — MOFU visibility moves faster than TOFU because comparison content can be updated and re-indexed more quickly |
How to Interpret the Results
Good result
Brand Mention Visibility above 45% on MOFU prompts, with your brand appearing in the top 3 most frequently mentioned options across comparison queries in your primary category. The Responses view shows your brand being positioned with accurate, favorable attributes (pricing, key features, use cases). Compare > By Funnel MOFU ranking places you ahead of your primary competitors on at least two major AI providers.Needs attention
Brand Mention Visibility below 25% on MOFU prompts, or a pattern where AI models consistently name 3-4 competitors in comparison responses without including your brand. If the Responses view shows your brand being mentioned but always with qualifiers (“not ideal for enterprises”, “limited integrations”), you have a positioning quality problem in addition to a visibility quantity problem — AI is including you but framing you unfavorably.Example
Scenario: Your insurance comparison platform covers 30+ providers and has strong organic traffic, but it appears in only 14% of MOFU AI comparison prompts like “best car insurance for young drivers” or “home insurance comparison UK”. You want to understand why AI is excluding you from the shortlist.
- Open Overview > GEO Matrix filtered to MOFU. Your brand appears in the “car insurance comparison” row on Perplexity (58%) but is nearly absent from the same row on ChatGPT (6%) and Gemini (9%). The “home insurance” and “life insurance comparison” rows show zero visibility across all providers.
- Navigate to Visibility > Responses and read 5 ChatGPT comparison responses for “best home insurance comparison sites”. ChatGPT consistently recommends MoneySuperMarket, Compare the Market, GoCompare, and Confused.com. It cites Trustpilot review pages and independent financial advice sites as sources. Your brand does not appear despite having a Trustpilot profile.
- Check Visibility > Citation Sources and confirm that your Trustpilot profile is not being cited — but competitors’ profiles are. The issue is that your Trustpilot listing has 85 reviews with a 3.8 rating while top competitors have 5,000+ reviews and 4.5+ ratings. The actionable fix is a Trustpilot review acquisition campaign and earning coverage on the 2 independent financial advice sites that AI models cite most for insurance comparisons.
Go Further
Export MOFU comparison data
Export consideration-phase competitor comparison data as XLSX for your strategy presentations
Consideration-phase leaderboard
Build a consideration-phase competitive leaderboard in Looker Studio using the competitor-metrics data source
Read MOFU responses verbatim
Read the Analyzing Answers documentation to see exactly how AI positions your brand during the consideration phase
Related Questions
How visible is my brand at the top of the funnel in AI search?
Understand your TOFU awareness presence before analyzing MOFU consideration gaps
Is my brand present in AI responses for purchase-intent queries?
Continue down the funnel — measure BOFU visibility for “buy now” queries
Is my SaaS product listed in AI best tools responses?
The MOFU question specific to software products competing in “top tools” lists