> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.tryhikoo.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# How Hikoo works

> The core concepts behind Hikoo: prompts, citations, share of voice, and AI readiness.

Hikoo answers one question: when people ask AI assistants about your space, does your brand show up, and what can you do about it. This page explains the ideas that everything else builds on.

## From prompts to citations

<Steps>
  ### You define prompts

  A **prompt** is a natural-language question a real user might ask an AI assistant, for example "best project management tool for startups". You create prompts, import them, or let Hikoo generate them. See [Prompts](/guides/prompts).

  ### Hikoo asks the AI assistants

  Every day, Hikoo sends your prompts to the AI assistants and records their full answers. Behind each answer the assistant runs its own **search queries**, which Hikoo also captures. See [Search queries](/guides/search-queries).

  ### Hikoo records citations

  A **citation** is one instance of an assistant mentioning or linking your brand (or a competitor) in an answer. Hikoo matches, ranks, and analyzes each answer to know who was cited, in what position, and how positively. See [Citations](/guides/citations).
</Steps>

## The metrics you will see

| Term                 | What it means                                                               |
| -------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Visibility score** | How often your site is cited relative to competitors.                       |
| **Share of voice**   | Your share of all citations across the tracked brands.                      |
| **Rank**             | Your position in a given answer (for example rank 2 of 6).                  |
| **Sentiment**        | Whether an answer portrays your brand positively, neutrally, or negatively. |
| **Citation rate**    | How often a prompt produces a citation of your site.                        |

## Platforms Hikoo tracks

Hikoo tracks visibility across the major AI assistants and answer engines:

<Columns cols={3}>
  <Card title="ChatGPT" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/chatgpt.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=34fbaa350b8b99387f0edcf88d108fce" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/chatgpt.svg" />

  <Card title="Perplexity" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/perplexity.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=0010251cd3a5416bdea57be8246a3c68" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/perplexity.svg" />

  <Card title="Claude" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/claude.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=525fc2b4b2fe73dcf91d65f2ff997e0d" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/claude.svg" />

  <Card title="Gemini" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/gemini.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=50e2ddc7c9f8579d97b9b7b9143cb7bf" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/gemini.svg" />

  <Card title="Google AI Overviews" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/google.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=898ec8e290ca260d4c3d73f902e3cdec" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/google.svg" />

  <Card title="Google AI Mode" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/google.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=898ec8e290ca260d4c3d73f902e3cdec" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/google.svg" />

  <Card title="Copilot" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/copilot.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=7deb9818d7de09a43de1eae4507d49e5" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/copilot.svg" />

  <Card title="Grok" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/grok.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=2d2fe0504e51f2bda418b27e4baa1ecc" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/grok.svg" />

  <Card title="Mistral" icon="https://mintcdn.com/hikoo/OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk/logos/platforms/mistral.svg?fit=max&auto=format&n=OmwQaFULLdM2wfuk&q=85&s=a7aac0f5262b1cc87f2e1fcb3df75f8b" width="24" height="24" data-path="logos/platforms/mistral.svg" />
</Columns>

Which platforms you can track is set by your plan.

## The two sides of GEO

Winning AI citations takes two things, and Hikoo covers both.

<Columns cols={2}>
  <Card title="Being readable" icon="gauge" href="/guides/health">
    AI readiness: your site must let AI crawlers in and expose clean, structured content. This is the **Analyzer** (audit, health, pages).
  </Card>

  <Card title="Being worth citing" icon="trophy" href="/guides/elevate">
    Coverage: you need content and third-party presence for the topics AI answers. This is **Elevate** (content gaps) and **Battlemap** (competitors, source intelligence).
  </Card>
</Columns>

## How the app is organized

The dashboard groups features into modules. This documentation follows the same structure.

| Module        | What it covers                                                                                                                                                                                                  |
| ------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| **Overview**  | The [dashboard](/guides/dashboard) home and your [marketing plan](/guides/marketing-plan).                                                                                                                      |
| **Spotlight** | [Citations](/guides/citations), [prompts](/guides/prompts), [topics](/guides/topics), [search queries](/guides/search-queries), [sentiment](/guides/sentiment), and [agent analytics](/guides/agent-analytics). |
| **Battlemap** | [Competitors](/guides/competitors) and [source intelligence](/guides/source-intelligence).                                                                                                                      |
| **Elevate**   | [Content gaps](/guides/elevate) where competitors get cited and you do not.                                                                                                                                     |
| **Analyzer**  | [Audit](/guides/audit), [health](/guides/health), and [pages](/guides/pages).                                                                                                                                   |

## Everything is scoped to a website

Every metric belongs to a specific **website**. Use the site switcher in the sidebar to change the active site, and the shared filter bar (time range, platform, topic, market) to slice any view. Websites live inside [workspaces](/guides/workspaces), which hold your team and your subscription.

<Card title="Ready to explore" icon="arrow-right" href="/guides/dashboard" horizontal>
  Open the dashboard guide to see these concepts in the product.
</Card>