Understand AI Brand Representation
Examine how AI platforms identify and describe companies, including their offerings, audiences, and competitive positioning.
RESEARCH SERVICES
Original Research. Real Insights. Stronger Market Authority.
Return On Now develops original AI Visibility research and competitive benchmarks that help organizations understand how AI platforms represent companies, evaluate competitors, and create proprietary findings for strategy and thought leadership.
Understand your market. Evaluate the competition.
Give your organization original findings worth sharing.
We specialize in AI Visibility and AI Brand Representation research, including competitive comparisons, industry benchmarks, and custom AI-platform evaluation studies.
We can adapt our AI Visibility research approach to a defined industry, company group, platform selection, or research question.
During each engagement, we establish the research scope, evaluation criteria, methodology, and deliverables before work begins.
Why Invest in Original AI Visibility Research?
AI platforms increasingly influence how people research companies, evaluate vendors, and compare alternatives. But organizations often lack reliable evidence about how those platforms represent businesses across their industries.
Original research can answer questions that existing articles, platform rankings, and generic AI Visibility reports cannot.
Compare Your Competitive Market
Evaluate how AI platforms represent companies across a defined industry or competitor group using consistent research criteria.
Build Thought Leadership
Develop original findings that give customers, analysts, journalists, and industry peers something substantive to discuss.
Strengthen Market Authority
Create proprietary statistics and insights that publications, websites, and AI platforms can reference and credit.
Support PR and Content Marketing
Turn research findings into industry reports, articles, presentations, webinars, and lead-generation campaigns.
Our original AI Visibility research can help your organization understand your market, while creating evidence you can use in your own communications.
Research Services
AI Brand Representation Research
How accurately do AI platforms understand and describe companies in your market?
We evaluate how major AI platforms represent selected businesses across five core elements: Identity, Category, Offerings, Audience, and Positioning.
The research identifies differences in accuracy, completeness, and company identification across platforms.
Use the findings to guide your External AI Visibility Consulting engagement.
Typical applications: AI Visibility assessment, brand representation analysis, and competitive intelligence.
AI Visibility Competitive Benchmarking
Understand how AI represents your business relative to competitors.
We evaluate a defined group of companies using consistent prompts, company reference information, and documented scoring criteria.
The resulting analysis identifies competitive differences and recurring representation gaps across the selected companies and AI platforms.
Typical applications: Competitive positioning, AI Visibility strategy, and market comparisons.
Commissioned AI Visibility Industry Research
Give your organization original research it can publish and promote.
We develop industry-level AI Visibility benchmarks for companies, agencies, and industry associations that want proprietary findings for thought leadership, PR, and lead generation.
Projects can include research design, AI-platform evaluation, quantitative scoring, comparative analysis, and a publication-ready report.
Typical applications: Sponsored industry benchmarks, branded research reports, and proprietary thought leadership.
Custom AI Visibility Research
Have a specific question about how AI platforms represent companies, brands, or competitive markets?
We can adapt our AI Visibility research approach to a defined industry, company group, platform selection, or research question.
During each engagement, we establish the research scope, evaluation criteria, methodology, and deliverables before work begins.
Typical applications: Specialized AI representation studies, targeted competitive analysis, and recurring AI Visibility benchmarks.
Original Research
COMING SOON | NOVEMBER 17, 2026
The Cybersecurity AI Brand Representation Benchmark
Our first original AI Brand Representation industry benchmark examines how five major AI platforms describe cybersecurity companies.
The study evaluates company identity, business category, offerings, audiences, and positioning to identify differences in how AI platforms represent businesses.
Full research report coming November 17, 2026.
Research Experience Behind the Work
Established Research Experience. A New Generation of Questions.
Return On Now founder Tommy P. Landry brings more than 30 years of professional experience across marketing, technology, and business leadership.
Earlier in his career, Tommy managed primary market research projects through established research firms, including IDC and Forrester, while working at AMD and Anue Systems.
Today, he applies that research-management experience and his AI Visibility expertise to original studies examining how AI platforms understand, describe, and compare businesses.
The Cybersecurity AI Brand Representation Benchmark demonstrates this approach. The study evaluated 30 cybersecurity companies across five AI platforms using a defined research methodology, documented scoring criteria, and comparative analysis.
That combination of research experience and specialized AI Visibility knowledge provides the foundation for commissioned industry studies and competitive benchmarks.
How a Research Engagement Works
Define the Research Question
We establish the AI Visibility questions you want to answer, the companies or industry you want to examine, and how you intend to use the findings.
Design the Study
We define the company cohort, AI platforms, standardized prompts, reference information, scoring criteria, and deliverables.
Collect and Evaluate AI Responses
We gather AI-platform responses, compare them against the defined reference information, and apply the agreed evaluation criteria.
Analyze and Report the Findings
We examine the results, identify patterns and differences, and develop a report with supporting statistics, charts, methodology, and business implications.
Put the Research to Work
Your organization can publish the findings, develop thought leadership, support PR and content campaigns, or use the results to inform its AI Visibility strategy.
Publication, Licensing, and Exclusivity
Different organizations have different objectives for commissioned research.
Some want to publish findings immediately. Others need an exclusive period to support a launch, campaign, or lead-generation initiative.
Return On Now offers flexible publication and licensing arrangements, including agreed publication embargoes and extended exclusivity options.
We establish publication rights, ownership, attribution, confidentiality, and permitted uses before each project begins.
Our standard approach preserves the ability to publish completed research after an agreed period.
Clients seeking additional exclusivity can discuss those terms during project scoping.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who commissions AI Visibility research?
Companies, agencies, and industry associations that want original evidence about how AI platforms represent businesses within a defined market or competitive group.
Can we publish the research under our own brand?
Yes. We can develop commissioned AI Visibility research reports for use under your organization's brand, subject to agreed licensing, attribution, and publication terms.
Can we use the findings as a lead magnet?
Yes. An original industry benchmark can support lead-generation campaigns, thought leadership, executive outreach, and industry education.
What kinds of research does Return On Now conduct?
We specialize in AI Visibility and AI Brand Representation research, including competitive comparisons, industry benchmarks, and custom AI-platform evaluation studies.
How much does a research project cost?
Pricing depends on the number of companies and AI platforms evaluated, research complexity, methodology, deliverables, and licensing terms. We provide custom proposals based on the agreed scope.
Can we repeat a benchmark over time?
Yes. We can repeat an established evaluation framework to examine changes in AI Brand Representation across different collection periods.
What Could AI Visibility Research Reveal About Your Industry?
Whether you want to understand how AI platforms represent companies in your market, compare competitors, or commission an original industry benchmark for thought leadership, Return On Now can develop research around your objectives.
Let's discuss the questions you want to answer and the proprietary findings your organization could put to work.
Discuss Your Research Project