Marketing executives love “Share of Voice” (SOV). It was an easy metric: “We possess 30% of the visibility on the first page of Google for these keywords.” This meant if there were 10 links and 4 ads, you showed up in 4 spots.
Generated Share of Voice (GSV) is a different beast. It is a “winner-take-all” metric.
The Collapse of Real Estate
In a Generative Search Experience (SGE / AI Overview), there is usually only one answer generated. That answer might contain 3-4 citations.
- If you are cited: You have visibility.
- If you are not cited: You have zero visibility.
Being “Rank #3” below the AI box is effectively being on Page 2. The click-through rate (CTR) decay is exponential. The user reads the answer and leaves.
Calculating GSV
GSV is calculated as:
GSV = (Frequency of Brand Mentions in AI Output) / (Total Queries Run)
If you run 1,000 permutations of “Best CRM meant for small business”:
- HubSpot is mentioned 800 times. (80% GSV)
- Salesforce is mentioned 200 times. (20% GSV)
- Zoho is mentioned 0 times. (0% GSV)
In the old world, Zoho might have been Result #5 and gotten traffic. In the AI world, Zoho effectively does not exist for this intent.
The Brutality of the Power Law
The distribution of GSV follows a steep Power Law. The top entity often gets 70-80% of the mentions. The “long tail” of search results is being cut off.
Optimizing for GSV
To improve GSV, you must increase your “Probabilistic Weight.”
- Brand Co-occurrence: Get mentioned alongside the market leaders in independent text.
- Sentiment Analysis: Ensure the sentiment around your brand is positive. Models avoid citing “controversial” or “low-rated” entities for best-of lists.
- Uniqueness: Provide a unique data point that the model needs to construct a complete answer (e.g., “The only CRM with a built-in AI dialer”).
The game has changed from “Traffic” to “Mindshare.”