Why did your ChatGPT visibility drop after peaking at 21.7%?

AI models don't update continuously. Training cycles and weighting adjustments can cause visibility to fluctuate even when content has not changed. The six-week trend is more important than any single week's result.

What is a citation source in AEO?

A citation source is a website or platform that AI engines reference when generating answers. Authoritative and consistent citation sources can increase the likelihood of a brand appearing in relevant AI-generated answers.

How long did it take to see results from schema markup?

In BLOOM Transitions' experience, organisation schema helped resolve an AI disambiguation issue within days. FAQPage schema and structured service content took around one to two weeks to influence citation visibility.

What does an AI Overview in Google search results mean for AEO?

An AI Overview means Google's AI is generating a direct answer at the top of the search results page and citing sources it considers relevant. Being cited in an AI Overview can indicate growing authority for a specific query.

What's next in the experiment?

The next phase focuses on client case studies, peer citation outreach, client reviews on HubSpot Marketplace, and a fuller keyword ranking update across the 50 tracked terms.

Can BLOOM Transitions run this experiment for my business?

Yes. BLOOM Transitions offers AEO audits, strategy, schema implementation and AI visibility tracking for small and mid-sized businesses across New Zealand and Australia.

Tineke Madgwick Jul 30, 2026, 10:13:32 AM

AEO Month Two: 55x Visibility Growth & What the Data Actually Shows

Our Three-Source Picture

We started this experiment in May 2026, ranking for 8 keywords. All of them were our own brand name. Every commercial keyword (the ones that actually bring in clients) showed a dash in our SEMrush position tracker. Not ranking at all.

This is the update. And yes, some of the data surprised us.

We've tracked BLOOM's AI visibility across three independent sources: HubSpot's AEO Grader for brand visibility and share of voice, SEMrush for keyword rankings and competitor analysis, and our own manual testing across ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity from devices in New Zealand, Australia, and the United States.

When all three pointed in the same direction, we called it signal rather than noise.

HubSpot AI Search Grader

Overall brand visibility

11.59%, up from 0.21% in May - a 55x increase in nine weeks.

By platform

ChatGPT: 10.86% (up from 4.3% at baseline).
Gemini: 18.47% (up from zero).
Perplexity: 5.43% (up from zero).

Share of voice

16%, up from 1% in May.

Prompt wins this week

"Which HubSpot agencies specialise in SMBs in New Zealand?" up 33.33%.
"Who are the best HubSpot partners in New Zealand?" up 25%.
"Which HubSpot agencies in NZ specialise in CRM implementation and lead generation?" up 25%.

Source: HUBSPOT AI GRADER, 15–22 July 2026

SEMrush Position Tracking

We now have 15 keywords ranking in the top 10, up from 8 in May. More importantly, the new entries are commercial terms, not just brand names.

Keywords that were showing dashes in May and are now in the top 10

"Who are the best HubSpot partners in New Zealand?" - position 5, up 95 places.
"Best HubSpot agency New Zealand" - position 6, up 94 places.
"HubSpot Gold Partner New Zealand" - position 8, up 92 places.
"HubSpot agency New Zealand" - position 9, up 91 places.
"HubSpot Gold Partner NZ" - position 10, up 90 places.
"HubSpot audit NZ" - position 1, up 99 places. This was the first commercial keyword to rank and it is still holding.

SOURCE: SEMRUSH, 23 July 2026

Competitor Visibility

This is the data point we found most interesting rather than most surprising.

BLOOM grew from 9.18% to 13.33% in competitor visibility over the month. The broader competitive set moved in different directions, some up, some down. AI visibility is not a static landscape, and one month of movement does not tell the full story for any business.

What it does tell us is that the work BLOOM has done on foundation and citations is registering in the data, and that the NZ HubSpot and AEO space is actively evolving. The agencies we share this space with are working hard, too. In some cases, we are actively learning from and referring to each other. Rising tides and all that.

SOURCE: SEMrush, 22 June - 20 July 2026

What Surprised Us Most: AEO Outcomes Compound

The Gemini jump is the most interesting data point in the month-two outcomes. In a single week, Gemini visibility went from 4.89% to 18.47%. We had not published anything new that week. We had not made any technical changes.

What had happened was that content we published three and four weeks earlier, the AEO services page, the blog posts, and the Vanguard 86 "best NZ HubSpot agencies" roundup, had continued to be indexed, weighted, and cited by Gemini's systems. The compounding happened in the background while we were focused on other things.

That is one of the biggest things we have learned from doing this experiment on ourselves rather than only advising clients: AEO outcomes are not linear, and they do not always appear when you expect them to. The work you do in week two can show up as a visibility spike in week six. If you stop measuring, you stop seeing it.

What the Citation Data Tells Us

Our HubSpot citation analysis for the period 26 June to 24 July 2026 shows bloomtransitions.co at 359 citations as an owned domain source. The top external sources citing BLOOM in AI answers are ecosystem.hubspot.com across six different URL variants, with a combined frequency of 566 citations, and vanguard86.com with 116 citations for their updated NZ HubSpot agency roundup that now includes BLOOM.

This confirms what we have been saying about citation strategy: the HubSpot Marketplace listing rewrite and the Vanguard 86 peer relationship were the two highest-leverage external citation moves we made. Both are showing up directly in the data.

hubspot.com remains the dominant cited domain in our category at 2,444 citations total. Being on that platform, accurately described, is not optional if you want to appear in AI answers about HubSpot agencies in NZ.

What's Not Working (Yet)

We want to be clear about what has not moved yet, because honesty is the whole point of this series.

AEO-specific keywords are still showing dashes. "AEO agency New Zealand," "answer engine optimisation NZ," and "AI search visibility NZ" are not ranking yet. These are the terms that would most directly drive inbound enquiries for our AEO service, and they represent the next phase of work.

SEO agency and Shopify agency terms are also still not ranking. These are higher-competition keywords and will take longer. The commercial HubSpot terms moved faster because the authority signals, specifically the HubSpot Marketplace listing and the Vanguard 86 roundup, were directly relevant to those queries.

The lesson is simple: AEO and SEO work fastest in the areas where you already have external authority signals. Building authority in a new category takes longer, and we are still in that building phase for AEO-specific queries.

What Happens Next

Phase 3 of the experiment is now underway. The focus is citation building for AEO-specific queries. We are updating our listings on directories and roundups that AI engines actively cite for AEO and digital marketing queries in NZ and AU. We are also working on a client case study structured specifically for AEO citation.

Post 5 brings the month-three data and the full 90-day comparison. That is the post that tells us whether this experiment delivered on its original promise.

Spoiler alert - we're quietly stoked so far.

FAQ

Why is Gemini outperforming ChatGPT in BLOOM's visibility data?

In our experience, Gemini appears to index and weight new structured content faster than ChatGPT. ChatGPT peaked at 21.7% in late June, then pulled back, while Gemini has been steadily climbing and reached 18.47% in the week of 15 to 22 July. Both platforms have their own training cycles and weighting systems. That's why we track all three platforms separately. They behave differently.

What is Person schema and why did it move BLOOM's rankings?

Person schema is structured data code that connects a named individual to an organisation as a verified entity. We added Person schema linking Tineke Madgwick to BLOOM Transitions, with a sameAs link to LinkedIn. "Tineke Madgwick BLOOM Transitions" jumped 98 positions to number 2 in Google search within weeks of implementation. Named author attribution is an E-E-A-T signal that both Google and AI engines respond to.

Why are AEO-specific keywords still not ranking?

AEO is still a relatively new category, and the external authority signals that help a keyword rank, such as citations in relevant roundups and directories, take time to build in a new topic area. Our HubSpot keywords moved faster because we already had authority signals in that space through the HubSpot Marketplace listing and the Vanguard 86 roundup. Building those same signals for AEO-specific queries is the focus of Phase 3.

How does share of voice work in the HubSpot AI Grader?

Share of voice measures how often BLOOM is mentioned across all tracked prompts relative to competitors. At the start of the experiment in May, BLOOM had 1% share of voice versus Concentrate at 58%. In the period 26 June to 24 July, BLOOM reached 16% share of voice. That does not mean we have overtaken competitors. It means we are appearing in significantly more AI-generated answers than we were nine weeks ago.

Can BLOOM run this kind of AEO experiment for other businesses?

Yes. We offer AEO audits, strategy, schema implementation, and AI visibility tracking for SMBs across New Zealand and Australia. The methodology we have developed through this experiment is what we bring to every client engagement. Get in touch to start with an audit.

AEO, AI Search, Digital Marketing, Answer Engine Optimisation