--- title: "Reading Your HubSpot AEO Dashboard: Citations, Competitors and What to Write Next" description: "Learn to read HubSpot’s AEO dashboard: visibility, citations, competitors and content types, and turn the data into a list of posts to write." image: https://salestempo.io/hubfs/AEO.png --- [Skip to content](https://salestempo.io/blog/reading-your-hubspot-aeo-dashboard-citations-competitors-and-what-to-write-next#main-content) [![Sales Tempo blue with transparent background](https://salestempo.io/hs-fs/hubfs/blue%20and%20transparent%20large%20logo-1.png?width=7684&height=1326&name=blue%20and%20transparent%20large%20logo-1.png)Homepage](https://salestempo.io/) - [Home](https://salestempo.io) - [What We Do](https://salestempo.io/what-we-do) - [Salesloft](https://salestempo.io/salesloft) - [About Us](https://salestempo.io/about-us) - [Blog](https://salestempo.io/blog) Get started - [Home](https://salestempo.io) - [What We Do](https://salestempo.io/what-we-do) - [Salesloft](https://salestempo.io/salesloft) - [About Us](https://salestempo.io/about-us) - [Blog](https://salestempo.io/blog) Get started ![Illustration of an analytics dashboard with charts linked by teal lines to three chat bubbles, representing AI answers citing a source.](https://salestempo.io/hs-fs/hubfs/AEO.png?width=1000&height=558&name=AEO.png) AI HubSpot AEO # Reading Your HubSpot AEO Dashboard: Citations, Competitors and What to Write Next ![Zac Harding](https://salestempo.io/hs-fs/hubfs/Zac%20Harding.1.jpg?width=48&height=48&name=Zac%20Harding.1.jpg) Zac Harding October 28, 2026 ## **What the dashboard is telling you** HubSpot’s AEO dashboard shows how often AI answer engines mention and cite your company when buyers ask questions in your space. AEO stands for answer engine optimization: getting named when someone asks ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity instead of searching Google. Those are the three engines HubSpot tracks. The dashboard holds a lot of numbers. I read it in three passes: visibility and citations, competitors, and content types. Each pass ends with a list of things to write. Before you read anything, check the setup. Setup asks for your products and ideal customer profiles. When we set it up for a client, HubSpot drafted the ICPs from their website. Review them closely, since HubSpot suggests the prompts it tracks from them. Then confirm your prompts are showing results. If a prompt you added is blank, fix that first. Blank data looks a lot like a gap you need to fill. ## **Pass 1: Visibility and citations** Visibility is how often your brand is mentioned across the prompts HubSpot tracks. Citations show when an engine links to or names your site as a source. The overall numbers are a starting point. The prompt-level view is where the work is. Sort your prompts into three groups: - **Cited often.** Protect these. Keep the pages current. - **Cited sometimes.** Close. These pages usually need a clearer, more direct answer near the top. - **Rarely or never cited.** These are your gaps. If it’s a question your buyers ask and you can answer it, it goes on the list. Watch the trend and the sentiment over time too. Rising visibility with negative sentiment means you’re getting mentioned for the wrong reasons. ## **Pass 2: Competitors** The competitor reports show your share of voice and who gets mentioned when you don’t. On a recent client dashboard, one large national player took most of the mentions and a few specialists split the rest. In our experience that pattern is common. For each competitor that keeps showing up, answer three questions: 1. Which page of theirs gets cited? 2. What format is it? A guide, a product page, a comparison? 3. What claim does the answer engine repeat from it? That tells you what the engine is looking for. You don’t need to copy the competitor. You need a page that answers the same question better, with your own proof. HubSpot’s recommendations also point to outreach, not just pages on your own site. Take that seriously. An [xfunnel.ai study of 250,000 AI citations](https://searchenginejournal.com/ai-search-engines-often-cite-third-party-content-study-finds/540692/) found third-party sites were the largest source of citations across engines. Being named on someone else’s site counts. ## **Pass 3: Content types** HubSpot breaks citations down by content type, from listicles and comparison articles to product pages, blogs, reviews and research. This shows what kind of page an engine trusts for each kind of question, which tells you what format to write in. | Content type | What it signals | What to do | | --- | --- | --- | | Listicles and roundups | Engines rely on outside lists for “best” and “top” questions | Get onto those lists, and publish an honest comparison of your own | | Product and service pages | Engines quote specifics: capabilities, specs, who it’s for | Rewrite service pages to answer buyer questions directly, with details | | Blogs | Engines cite explanations for “how” and “why” questions | Write focused posts that answer one question each | The pattern holds beyond one dashboard. A [Wix Studio AI Search Lab study](https://searchengineland.com/ai-citations-favor-listicles-articles-product-pages-study-472364) of more than 1 million AI citations found listicles, articles and product pages made up 52 percent of all citations, with listicles leading on commercial questions. Also watch for research and peer-reviewed sources in the mix. When those get cited, the engine wants proof. Cite real studies in your own content so you can be the page that connects the research to the buyer’s problem. ## **Turn it into a topic list** The three passes give you one list. For each gap prompt, write down who gets cited instead and in what format. Then decide what you’ll publish. Here’s an illustrative example for a direct mail company: | Prompt you’re missing | Who gets cited | Format | What you’ll write | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | How to improve direct mail response rates | National printer | Guide | A guide built on your own campaign results | | Best direct mail companies | Industry roundup | Listicle | Outreach to the roundup, plus your own comparison page | | Direct mail vs. email for B2B | Trade publication | Blog | A focused post with sourced response data | Group the list into topic clusters. Use HubSpot’s content recommendations as a starting point, not the final answer. On Marketing Hub Professional or Enterprise, you can draft the post in HubSpot so the structure fits what answer engines look for, then edit in Claude for your brand voice and have a person review it. While you write, check HubSpot’s SEO recommendations for the pages you’ll link to. It scans your site and lists technical fixes page by page. A great post linking to a broken service page loses the citation anyway. **What to do this week** 1. Confirm your ICPs and prompts are set up and returning data. 2. Pull the five prompts with the lowest visibility that you should own. 3. Note the competitor and format cited for each. 4. Write one piece for the top gap, then check the dashboard again in a month. If you want a second set of eyes on your AEO dashboard, [book a call with me](https://salestempo.io/meetings/zaclharding/discovery-meeting). ## Share this post [mailto:https%3A%2F%2Fsalestempo.io%2Fblog%2Freading-your-hubspot-aeo-dashboard-citations-competitors-and-what-to-write-next](mailto:https%3A%2F%2Fsalestempo.io%2Fblog%2Freading-your-hubspot-aeo-dashboard-citations-competitors-and-what-to-write-next) ## Keep reading ### [![Showing the process of picking the topic clusters](https://salestempo.io/hs-fs/hubfs/Topic%20Cluster.png?width=1000&height=558&name=Topic%20Cluster.png) HubSpot SEO Keywords Build Topic Clusters From Customer Intent, Not Keyword Lists](https://salestempo.io/blog/build-topic-clusters-from-customer-intent-not-keyword-lists) ### [![Illustration of a checklist next to a tangled cable being organized, in navy and amber.](https://salestempo.io/hs-fs/hubfs/Minimalist_editorial_illustrat_Nano_Banana_2_23911.png?width=1000&height=558&name=Minimalist_editorial_illustrat_Nano_Banana_2_23911.png) AI Marketing team structure Are You Actually Ready for AI Content Help? 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