GTM Product Review: Profound—AI Search Optimization

Overview

Profound is an AI startup that positions itself as an SEO equivalent for AI search, helping brands track and influence not only how—but how frequently—they’re mentioned in places like ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Grok. The platform claims to show how AI engines actually talk about your brand, track how they interact with your website, show you the queries people are making in your category, and monitor AI placement of shopping listings . . . if your site has an e-commerce component.

What makes Profound more than just another startup, however, is who's behind it. The company raised $20 million in June 2025 and another $35 million just two months later, with Sequoia leading the round. For those who aren't aware, Sequoia has already invested heavily in OpenAI and Anthropic . . . which of course means Profound isn’t some scrappy startup on the outside looking in—it’s backed by the same firms that are bankrolling the AI engines its platform is optimizing against. Which to me, feels less like coincidence and more like an inside job. I'm not saying this is a bad thing, I'm simply saying it's some kind of a thing and you can do whatever you want with it.

How It Works

Profound acts as both your mirror and your editor. First, it runs structured prompts into multiple AI systems, tracking when and how your brand appears. It also analyzes citations, sentiment and crawler behavior—basically anything the models might be relying on to decide whether or not to mention you.

Once these tactical things are done, Profound delivers guidance that’s practical enough to act on. For example, if your company shows up inconsistently when someone asks about “the best tech platforms” in your category, Profound might highlight that your product pages don’t include enough structured comparisons against common alternatives, and recommend adding content that explicitly frames your value proposition in those terms. It’s essentially the Google SEO playbook applied to AI-generated results, but without the luxury of knowing exactly what the algorithms believe are most important.

Other Features

Beyond its core measurement and guidance, Profound includes several modules that make the platform more attractive for GTM teams:

• Answer Engine Insights: Shows how AI engines actually talk about your brand, including tone, context, and placement in generated answers.

  
  

• Agent Analytics: Tracks how AI systems interact with your website, which pages they pull from, and how that information gets used in responses.

  
  

• Conversation Explorer: Lets you see the kinds of questions millions of people are asking AI tools in your category, so you know where your brand might need more presence.

  
  

• Shopping: Monitors product placement inside AI recommendations and “shopping-style” results, highlighting when your offerings are included—or when competitors are taking the slot (obviously not revelant to everyone).

On top of these modules, the platform still provides competitive benchmarking, a sandbox to test how new content might peform, real-time alerts when AI providers change their outputs, and integrations to feed visibility data into CRMs and analytics dashboards. Enterprise customers also get a white-glove version that includes SSO, SOC2 compliance, and strategic support.

But here’s the catch: Profound's ENTRY-level package is $500 per month, and only covers ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Microsoft Copilot. If you want visibility into engines like Google Gemini, Google AI Mode, Meta, Grok, Deepseek or Anthropic Claude, you’re pushed into an Enterprise license that falls into the dreaded “Call for Pricing” column. That split matters, because the engines that shape the bulk of AI-driven discovery are locked behind a higher-tier license.

My Thoughts

I like the "idea" of Profound. The inside-job nature of the funding makes me think it probably works, because (after all) if your investors are bankrolling the very AI companies you’re trying to optimize against, you probably have some kind of a head start. That said, this is still very early-stage technology. AI search optimization is a brand-new area, and the signals these models use to surface brands are far less transparent than Google ever was. That makes effectiveness and end-results VERY hard to gauge.

And make no mistake, the stakes are real here. Forbes recently reported that Google’s AI summaries are already cutting organic traffic anywhere from 15% to 64% depending on the industry, and Bain found that 32% of searches with AI summaries end in zero clicks to websites. Put simply, the leads that marketers once relied on from organic traffic are drying up, and doing nothing about it means falling behind. That context makes the $500 monthly price tag slightly less outrageous . . . because if Profound works, it’s a small amount to pay to stay in the game. The bigger issue is whether the starter package gives you enough coverage to matter, or if you’ll be forced into Enterprise pricing just to access the AI engines your buyers are actually using.

Bottom Line

Traditional SEO is dying fast. Companies no longer have the luxury of sitting back and waiting for Google to keep serving up organic traffic. AI assistants are already shifting how people discover and evaluate brands, and doing nothing here is exponentially more dangerous. Those are the facts.

That said Profound is expensive, unproven, and probably overhyped—but it’s also the first serious attempt at solving a problem every company will face: how to stay visible when buyers stop using Google and start asking AI for answers. At the same time, it’s worth noting that marketers can still do some of this work on their own. PRO TIP: You can literally ask an AI engine why your brand doesn’t rank as well as your competitors, or what it would take to be included in its “top five” list for a given category, and it will tell you. Try it.

The bigger warning here is that as AI search emerges, so does this new class of optimization technology. GTM teams need to do their homework—check references, look for independent product reviews, and make sure other brands are actually getting out of Profound what the website says they will. And while the company does offer demos, there is NO FREE TRIAL, which is concerning for a platform that starts at $500 a month and skyrockets up from there. Whether you take the early adopter risk and sign up for a platform like Profound now or wait until the category matures, there is one hard truth you have face: your brand's decline in organic traffic and conversions cannot be ignored.

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About Me (Eric Rudolf)

I am a career Marketing, Growth, Go-To-Market and Strategy exec who helps emerging tech firms create value—and ultimately scale—by using AI-based tools to accelerate GTM activities and lower GTM spend. These AI tools and tactics include Real-Time ICP Development, Audience Targeting, Anonymous User Resolution, Content Development, Graphic Design, Video Creation, Virtual Outbound, BDR Bullpens, AI-Based Competitive Analysis and Monitoring, Lead Scoring and Campaign Activation.

If you'd like to speak about the possibility of engaging a Fractional CMO, please feel free to fill out this form on my website. And be sure to connect with me on LinkedIn any time—my profile is always open.