You can spend money on AI visibility in six ways. Only one does the placement work and re-tests the answers for under $1,000. That one is us, which is why we exist.
The other five are real options, and for some founders they are the better one. This page says which is which. Prices checked October 2026.
1. Trackers (Peec, Otterly, Profound, Ahrefs, Semrush and about thirty others)
A tracker runs your prompts every day on a few AI engines. You get a dashboard: mention rate, share of voice, sentiment, cited domains.
It does not pitch a list, write a page or ask anyone for a review. You do that.
Typical price for one person: Otterly from $29 a month, Peec from $95 a month. Ahrefs Brand Radar costs about $199 a month on top of an Ahrefs plan. Profound dropped its self-serve plans in September 2026 and now sells to enterprises and agencies.
Choose a tracker if you enjoy outreach, have the hours and want daily numbers. Choose us if you want the outreach done and a fair before and after. Detail: Peec AI alternatives compared, Tracker vs done-for-you, Peec alternative, Profound alternative, Otterly alternative.
2. Free graders (HubSpot, Mangools, Ahrefs, pickedby.ai) and cheap checks (Kovmere)
A free grader gives you a score out of 100 in about a minute. Most run one sample on one or two models, often small ones. They score how the AI describes your brand, not whether it names you for a buyer’s question.
Kovmere sells a $19 one-time check: 20 questions, 3 runs, 5 engines, plus up to three suggested fixes. Honestly good value, if you will do the fixes yourself.
Our free check is 5 questions x 3 runs x 4 engines, read by a person. You get no score. You get who was named instead and which sources were cited.
Choose them if you want a quick number today. Choose us if you want the reading list behind the number. Detail: Free AI visibility checkers compared.
3. GEO and AEO agencies
Agencies do the work and keep doing it. Most ask for three to six months.
- The typical small-business range is $1,500 to $5,000 a month.
- WebFX starts around $3,000 a month with a six-month commitment.
- Web Aloha is one of the cheapest, at $333 to $999 a month.
Choose an agency if you are funded and can pay a retainer without flinching. Choose us if $1,000 a month is the number that makes you close the tab. We do one fixed-price project. A $349 a month plan comes only after the day-30 re-check, with a 3-month minimum.
4. Fiverr and Upwork GEO gigs
Fiverr now has a whole category for this. Basic packages run about $65 to $100, premium ones a few hundred. Fiverr’s own FAQ puts the average base project at about $156.
Many gigs are rebranded SEO link packages or “AI-optimised” page rewrites. A few are decent.
Choose a gig if you have time to vet sellers, write the brief and judge the output, and mainly want pages rewritten. Choose us if you want named placements and a measured before and after, and would rather not be the project manager.
Red flags on any gig, ours included if we ever sold one: guaranteed mentions, refusal to name the target sites, per-mention pricing.
5. ChatGPT ads
Since 2026 you can buy ads inside ChatGPT, shown to users on the free and Go plans. They start at $25 a day, with a suggested $3 to $5 a click.
OpenAI says the ads do not change the organic answer. The ad is a labelled box under the answer. It disappears the moment you stop paying.
Choose ads if you need clicks this week and have at least $750 a month to test with. Choose us if you want to be in the answer itself. The two are not substitutes. Many founders should eventually do both.
6. Directory submission (ListingBott and similar)
A directory service submits your product to 100 or so startup directories for a one-time fee. ListingBott is $299 for 100 listings.
It is sold on domain rating, not AI visibility, and it is honest about that. Across 9,978 AI answers, ChatGPT and Gemini rarely cited directories.
Choose directories if you want a domain-rating bump for ordinary SEO and know that is what you are buying. Choose us if the goal is AI answers. We never sell directory submission. Detail: Directories vs earned lists.
7. Doing it yourself
The whole method is on this site, free:
- Ask five buyer questions three times on five assistants.
- Write down who was named and which sources were cited.
- Pitch those sources, claim one review profile and answer the cited threads as yourself.
- Ask the same questions again in 30 days.
It costs nothing but evenings.
Choose DIY if you have the evenings and like outreach. Choose us if you would rather spend them on the product. Either way, run the free check first. It is the same first step.
What nobody on this page can sell you
Nobody, us included, can make an AI say your name. Answers change from run to run, and models update on their own schedule.
What you can buy is the work (placements, pages, profiles) and honest measurement. Anyone selling a guaranteed ranking is selling something else.
Prices checked October 2026 on each vendor’s own pricing page. We re-check them every 90 days. If a price has moved, their page wins over ours.
Questions
Why would you write about your competitors at all?
Because you will search for them anyway. Better you read accurate facts here than a sales page there. Several are good products. Some suit you better than we do, and each page says when.
How current are the prices?
Every price was read from the vendor's own page in October 2026 and carries that date. Prices move. If one looks wrong, check their pricing page and tell us at hello@heardofyou.io.
Where does Heard of You fit?
Between the trackers and the agencies. Trackers tell you that you are invisible, for $25 to $95 a month. Agencies do the work for $1,500 to $5,000 a month. We do the work once, at a fixed price, then re-test the answers.