This startup knows what AI is saying about your brand

Internet users are increasingly turning to AI tools like ChatGPT, rather than traditional search engines, as they look for information online, meaning businesses trying to reach them need to adapt—quickly.

“There’s this pattern that plays out on the internet, where a new sort of technology emerges that changes how consumers interact with information online,” says Alex Sherman, CEO and cofounder of startup Bluefish. “Brands and marketers are always initially not quite sure how to place that and how to use it, but as consumer adoption scales, it becomes really clear that this is where the eyeballs are going.”

With even search engines like Google supplementing raw search results with AI-powered summaries, showing up—and receiving favorable mentions—in AI discussions is becoming as important to brands as appearing in search results or on social media.

Today, that technology is generative AI. A recent Adobe survey found that more than half of U.S. consumers intend to use it for online shopping this year. Bluefish helps marketers track, measure, and optimize how their brands appear in AI discussions—similar to how SEO experts have long worked to influence Google results.

Bluefish, which works with companies like Adidas, real estate firm Tishman Speyer, and advertising giant Omnicom, sends massive numbers of queries to AI systems such as ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini every day to determine what those systems are saying about its customers’ brands. The company then reports on brand visibility in AI results, the sentiment of those mentions, and how influential corporate content is in shaping what models have to say versus third-party discussions.

“Our technology analyzes millions of AI prompt responses every day to give marketers a really clear picture of how they’re being portrayed to consumers by those large language models, and then enable them to take action and start to actually optimize the way those models are describing their products and their services to those consumers,” Sherman says.

That optimization often means adding content to corporate websites designed specifically for large-language models—sometimes in volumes far greater than what human visitors would typically consume. Useful additions include FAQs tailored to match the kinds of queries AI users might pose, Sherman explains.

Because reaching the right audience is key, Bluefish recently launched a feature called Custom AI Audiences that lets customers track their performance by audience segment. For example, a bank could see how AI portrays its brand to financial advisers, retail investors, or college students. Behind the scenes, this requires sending targeted queries to AI systems crafted to elicit responses as if they were coming from those user groups.

“We have a very expensive bill from the AI providers every month,” Sherman says.

Bluefish—which just announced a $20 million Series A led by NEA with participation from Salesforce Ventures—focuses primarily on large enterprises, with pricing and plans built to match their scale. Roughly 80% of its customers are Fortune 500 companies across industries such as financial services, consumer goods, and travel.

Other firms in the space, sometimes calling their work generative-engine optimization (GEO), focus on different market segments. Since AI tools generate responses based on content across the internet, techniques for optimization can include AI-specific website adjustments, but also long-standing strategies like building social media presence, sparking positive forum discussions, and securing press coverage.

Though the field is still young and AI tools continue to evolve, Sherman expects this area to claim a growing share of marketing budgets as consumers spend more time with AI.

“It is sort of the channel that’s eating all of the other channels,” he says. “Ultimately, we basically see most online marketing as turning into AI marketing over the next few years.”

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