Elmo

Elmo is an open-source AI visibility platform focused on Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). It helps brands understand how AI models such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini talk about their brand, which sources they trust, and what specific actions are needed to earn recommendations.

Purpose Elmo's core purpose is to measure and improve a brand's exposure in AI answer engines. Traditional SEO focuses on how web pages rank in search results, whereas AEO/GEO focuses on whether a brand can be mentioned and cited in AI-generated answers. Elmo simultaneously tracks the web searches that AI engines conduct when answering and the sources they cite.

Key Capabilities

• Coverage of multiple answer engines: Elmo tracks ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot, Claude, as well as models such as Grok, Mistral, DeepSeek, and Qwen. Among these, consumer products such as ChatGPT and Google AI Mode are scraped from the interface users actually see, rather than approximated through APIs; other models are covered through direct API calls and OpenRouter.
• Visibility and share of voice: It runs fixed prompts to each AI engine on a schedule, scores brands by how often they appear in answers (0 to 100%), and calculates a brand's share of voice relative to competitors based on mentions, while also breaking down the domains and URLs cited by models. Because AI answers vary from run to run, Elmo repeatedly samples and reports trends rather than single-run results.
• Answer records: Each answer records whether the brand appeared, which competitors appeared alongside it, and which sources the model cited.
• Opportunity recommendations: It ranks optimization opportunities by impact and continuously updates them so users know what to do next.
• Self-hosting and data autonomy: Open source, MIT licensed, Docker-based, with all data stored in Postgres, supporting self-hosting at any time, with no lock-in.
• Integration capabilities: It provides API and MCP access, allowing integration with existing tech stacks and agents.
• BYOK: Supports Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) to track any AI model.

How to Use

1. Add a brand: Point the website to Elmo, and it will suggest prompts buyers might ask and competitors to track based on products, competitors, and user personas.
2. View the current state: View visibilitydegree, share of voice, and the sources cited by AI, sampled up to 4 times per day from real applications.
3. Clear fix direction: obtain opportunities ranked by impact and continuously receive updates. Self-hosted users can run it for free, only bearing the cost of their own infrastructure and the API keys of the chosen AI provider; they can also choose the Elmo Cloud hosted service, purchased self-service.

Use cases

• Marketing teams: used to optimize brand visibility in AI search and answer engines.
• Agencies: provide a white-label solution, allowing AI visibility tracking services to be offered to clients under their own brand, domain, and SSO.
• Teams focused on data autonomy: can self-host, with data stored in their own Postgres. It is officially stated that 200+ brands already use it to optimize AI visibility.

Limitations and information not yet provided

• Specific system requirements and deployment step details for self-hosting are not yet provided in the materials.
• Apart from Starter ($29 per month), Basic ($99 per month), Pro ($299 per month), Business ($649 per month), and self-hosted free, more detailed billing rules, refund policies, etc. are not yet provided.
• The specific geographic and language coverage tracked by each model is not yet provided in the materials.
• The specific pricing and feature details of the white-label solution are not yet provided in the materials.
• Whether the free version (Starter) can be used long term and whether it has a time limit are not yet provided in the materials.

Elmo states in the FAQ that Profound's pricing page lists a free trial and an Enterprise plan requiring contact with sales, while Elmo Cloud is self-service with public pricing; starting from the Elmo Cloud Basic plan, each prompt is checked 4 times per day.