What AI citation services cost and where prices jump
GetCito alone has a free plan; the rest are managed agencies that start at a monthly retainer or a sales call, far above self-serve monitors.
The short answer
The cheapest paid way in is GetCito’s Growth plan at $599 a month, which bundles a human team with 50 prompts of tracking. AEO Engine’s Growth plan sits at the median, $1,597 a month on a 90-day initial term, and Percepture’s Launch tier at $3,500 a month is the dearest entry plan.
Siege Media, Go Fish Digital and iPullRank publish no prices and quote after a sales conversation or a proposal request.
We checked the published prices of 5 of these 8 tools and answered 32 questions about what they do, each on the vendor’s own pages, between 2 September 2026 and 20 October 2026.
- GetCito is the one pick with a free plan, which you host yourself, and its paid plans start at $599 a month.
- AEO Engine’s Growth plan costs $1,597 a month and its Scale plan $2,997 a month, each with a 90-day initial term.
- Percepture publishes its whole rate card, from Launch at $3,500 a month through Growth at $6,000 a month and Authority at $8,500 a month.
- Siege Media, Go Fish Digital and iPullRank publish no pricing, so every engagement starts with a sales conversation or a proposal request.
The 8 tools compared
| Product | From | Free plan | Prompt or credit allowance | Claude | Coverage in the vendor’s words |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AEO Engine | $1,597 a month | – | Yes | Partly | Yes |
| Percepture | $3,500 a month | No | Partly | Yes | Partly |
| GetCito | $599 a month | Yes | Yes | – | Partly |
| Siege Media | On request | – | Partly | – | – |
| Go Fish Digital | On request | – | Partly | Partly | Partly |
| Digital Elevator | – | – | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Minuttia | $1,075 per audit | – | Partly | No | Partly |
| iPullRank | $30,000 per engagement | No | Partly | Partly | Partly |
What the prices show
- Free entry exists at GetCito alone, whose free plan is self-hosted with a separate AI-provider API bill, and GetCito also has the cheapest paid entry plan at $599 a month.
- Managed agency retainers start far above self-serve tools, at $1,597 a month for AEO Engine and $3,500 a month for Percepture, whose Authority tier reaches $8,500 a month, while most self-serve tools start under $100 a month.
- Unpublished pricing is the rule at Siege Media, Go Fish Digital and iPullRank, and iPullRank scopes every engagement as a custom retainer with no self-serve tiers.
- Prices jump at the tier above entry, with GetCito going from $599 a month to $999 a month, AEO Engine from $1,597 a month to $2,997 a month and Percepture from $3,500 a month to $6,000 a month, while Digital Elevator lets buyers buy single sprints with no retainer lock-in.
- Free audits offer a way in before paying, from AEO Engine’s email-gated checker with its 0-100 score to Digital Elevator’s free AI Visibility Report for qualified teams and iPullRank’s free AI Search Readiness quiz.
What each one costs
AEO Engine
Best for a managed program under $2,000 monthly: AEO Engine runs a managed answer engine optimization (AEO) program from $1,597 a month, with the same four tracked engines on every tier.
- Price: $1,597 a month
- Who it’s for: An ecommerce or business software brand that wants an agency to build content, schema, public relations and links under a fixed monthly retainer.
- Skip it if: Teams that want to run their own monitoring should pick GetCito, whose open-source tracker is free to self-host.
Scale costs $2,997 a month and includes 60 articles a month. The prompt ceiling climbs to 1,000 on the most expensive tier.
Both plans carry a 90-day initial term and bill monthly. Enterprise starts from $10,000 a month and is scoped on a call. The free audit asks for a verified work email instead of payment details.
What it does well
- A published rate card, with Growth at $1,597 a month and Scale at $2,997 a month, lets a buyer budget before any call.
- Queries ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews with the client’s own prompts on every plan.
- Content volume is fixed per plan: 30 articles a month on Growth and 60 on Scale.
- A free AI Overviews checker reports which sources are cited for each query.
Where it falls short
- Claude is absent from the paid dashboard, and Grok, Microsoft Copilot and DeepSeek are tracked on no plan.
- Each plan starts with a 90-day initial term.
- There is no public API, so tracking data stays inside its own platform.
Percepture
Best for mid-market budgets near $3,500 monthly: Percepture suits mid-market brands with a budget of $3,500 a month that want a managed generative engine optimization (GEO) program covering five named engines.
- Price: $3,500 a month
- Free plan: no
- Who it’s for: Mid-market and enterprise brands that want one agency to run the audit, content, digital public relations and monthly reporting as a single retainer.
- Skip it if: Startups on small budgets should pick GetCito, which has the cheapest paid entry plan at $599 a month.
Launch costs $3,500 a month and covers audits, schema work and monthly reports on mentions and sentiment in AI answers. Growth costs $6,000 a month and Authority $8,500 a month, and Enterprise is a custom scope at $10,000+/month.
AI Link and Mention Building adds $1,000 to $1,600 a month per tier, and the digital public relations add-on starts at $4,500 a month. Every package button books a strategy call instead of a checkout.
What it does well
- Four published tiers from $3,500 a month to $10,000+/month let a buyer price a program before the first call.
- Names Grok as a target engine, alongside ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews.
- Reports sentiment in AI answers every month alongside mention counts.
- Google AI Overviews gets its own workstream, with appearance counts tracked in reporting.
Where it falls short
- There is no free plan, and every purchase starts with a strategy call.
- Claude is a target of the optimization work but is missing from the monthly reporting list.
- There is no public API, so results arrive as agency reports.
GetCito
Best for a free self-hosted start: GetCito suits developer-led teams that want to start free: its open-source tracker costs nothing to self-host and covers ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews.
- Price: $599 a month
- Free plan: yes
- Who it’s for: A developer-led team that can host its own tool and pay its own AI-provider bill, or a team that wants tracking bundled with a staffed GEO team.
- Skip it if: Buyers who need Microsoft Copilot covered without an Enterprise quote should pick Go Fish Digital, whose GEO service page names Bing Copilot as a target.
The self-hosted plan is free under an open-source license, running on your own AI-provider API keys. Growth costs $599 a month for 50 prompts plus a bundled human GEO team, and Scale costs $999 a month for 100 prompts.
Both paid plans track four engines in one region, and Growth and Scale are bought directly through Stripe checkout. Enterprise is custom-quoted for the full engine list and unlimited tracking.
What it does well
- The self-hosted plan is free under an open-source license and installs from GitHub.
- It has the cheapest paid entry plan, at $599 a month.
- Growth and Scale bundle a strategist, content writer, developer, backlink specialist and community manager.
- Prompts are both tracked and optimized: Growth tracks 50 and optimizes 10, and Scale tracks 100 and optimizes 20.
Where it falls short
- The free plan tracks ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews alone and needs self-managed hosting plus a separate AI-provider bill.
- Claude and Microsoft Copilot require the custom-quoted Enterprise plan.
- Paid plans are capped at one region and carry no time-limited free trial.
Siege Media
Best for six-month programs quoted by sales: Siege Media suits brands that can commit to a program built for 6+ month horizons, with one agency running research, public relations, content, affiliate and Reddit work.
- Price: On request
- Who it’s for: Brands that want a single agency working toward AI citations through research, public relations, content, affiliate and community work for 6+ months.
- Skip it if: Teams that want a published rate card or a self-serve start should pick GetCito or AEO Engine, which both publish their plan prices.
Every call to action is a proposal or assessment request, and Siege Media asks for a twelve-month contract. The retainer is metered in time-based content units bought each month, with no prompt allowance.
Each engagement includes monthly tracking of the brand’s share of voice in category prompts, delivered as agency reporting instead of a dashboard. Roadmaps are reviewed quarterly.
What it does well
- Every engagement tracks the brand’s share of voice in AI answers each month.
- Affiliate partnerships place the brand on the editorial roundups AI cites most, with commission revenue on top.
- Original research and data stories are built to earn links and AI citations.
Where it falls short
- A twelve-month contract and a 6+ month horizon rule out buyers who need results in weeks.
- Siege Media publishes no engine coverage list; ChatGPT results appear in case studies.
- The program is sold whole, so brands wanting search engine optimization (SEO) or public relations alone still buy the six-pillar model.
Go Fish Digital
Best for GEO inside a full-service SEO program: Go Fish Digital suits established brands that want GEO run inside a broader SEO, digital public relations and paid media program, backed by its own Barracuda platform.
- Price: On request
- Who it’s for: Established brands that want a 20-year multi-office agency to run GEO alongside technical SEO and digital public relations.
- Skip it if: Buyers who want a GEO specialist with a published starting price should pick AEO Engine, whose Growth plan costs $1,597 a month.
Every route is a proposal request, demo booking or custom quote, and platform access normally comes inside an engagement. The free AI Visibility Audit form asks for work email, name, company, phone and a monthly marketing budget band, with no card.
The service is built around Google AI Overviews, with an AI Overview Analyzer that scores how often a page is referenced in those answers. Google AI Mode, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Bing Copilot are also named targets.
What it does well
- Treats Google AI Mode as a first-class target, using query fan-out and passage-level optimization.
- Rewrites pages and passages using similarity scoring against real AI-generated answers.
- Names Bing Copilot as an answer surface its optimization work targets.
- Fixes schema markup, IndexNow pings, sitemap coverage and internal linking for AI crawlers.
Where it falls short
- Case studies show broad SEO and marketing results; none report audited AI-citation share.
- Gemini appears on no GEO service page engine list, and no page covers Claude specifically.
- There is no public API, and no export for Barracuda’s own data is documented.
Digital Elevator
Best for buying one scoped sprint at a time: Digital Elevator suits brands that want to buy AI visibility work in scoped sprints, running one or sequencing all three.
- Who it’s for: Brands that want a productized AI visibility engagement with named, scoped sprints instead of an open-ended program.
- Skip it if: Teams that need a monitoring tool they run themselves should pick GetCito, whose open-source tracker is free to self-host.
The sprints run in order: Foundation and Measurement, then Content, then Off-Page. A buyer can run one, sequence all three, or keep Content and Off-Page running as ongoing layers.
Tracking starts from a Peec AI baseline and continues across ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews and Gemini. The mentions programs track from fifteen prompts on the entry plan to fifty on the top one.
What it does well
- A buyer can stop after one sprint, such as Foundation and Measurement, before committing to the rest.
- Builds definition, comparison and category pages plus off-site placements on Reddit, editorial sites and best-of roundups.
- A free AI Visibility Report runs five priority queries before any paid sprint.
Where it falls short
- Microsoft Copilot, Grok, Meta AI and DeepSeek are tracked on no Managed tier.
- There is no API, data feed or dashboard login, so tracking data cannot be pulled into other software.
Minuttia
Best for B2B software teams with content budgets: Minuttia suits established B2B software teams with content budgets, offering a one-off audit at $1,075 per audit bought without a contract.
- Price: $1,075 per audit
- Who it’s for: Established business software teams that want one agency for AI search strategy, editorial content and digital public relations.
- Skip it if: Ecommerce and other non-software brands should pick AEO Engine, which works with ecommerce brands from $1,597 a month.
The audit costs $1,075 per audit as a one-time purchase, with audit plans banded by page count. Ongoing work runs on custom, value-based retainers and starts with a 30-minute intro call and a budget qualification form.
Clutch reports a $5,000 minimum project size and a $5,000 monthly fee in client-submitted deal data, with a $100-149/hr blended rate.
What it does well
- The one-time audit at $1,075 per audit is bought from the page with no contract.
- Every content piece goes through a triple-layer review.
- Digital public relations work is aimed at earning the brand mentions AI engines pick up.
Where it falls short
- Citation tracking currently covers Perplexity alone, and Claude, Microsoft Copilot and Google AI Mode are not tracked.
- Retainers are custom, and the Clutch figures are client-submitted deal data rather than an official price list.
- The B2B software focus makes it less relevant outside software.
iPullRank
Best for enterprise teams funding $30,000 engagements: iPullRank suits enterprise brands that want expert AI search strategy and can fund $30,000 per engagement.
- Price: $30,000 per engagement
- Free plan: no
- Who it’s for: Enterprise and mid-market brands that want AI search strategy, content, technical work and measurement from a specialist agency.
- Skip it if: Small businesses that want software with instant signup should pick GetCito, whose Growth and Scale plans are bought through Stripe checkout.
Each engagement is a custom, scoped retainer that starts from a sales conversation, with no self-serve tiers. Scope is sized in keywords: 1,000 at Emerging, 2,500-3,000 at Growth and 5,000+ at Elite.
A free readiness scan asks for a domain, brand name, first name, work email and business size, with no card. iPullRank reports a client’s ChatGPT visibility moving from 32% to 67% inside a year.
What it does well
- Counts Google AI Overviews inclusions year on year as a measured client result.
- Engineers brand visibility in Google AI Mode alongside ChatGPT and AI Overviews.
- Measurement Engineering builds the client’s own tracking, data pipelines and dashboards.
- Technical assessments cover crawler access, structured data, templates and passage-level retrieval.
Where it falls short
- There is no free plan, and no engagement starts without a discovery call.
- There is no direct content management system (CMS) publishing, so client teams must implement the content and technical work themselves.
- Case-study revenue figures are reported by iPullRank and not independently audited.
Prices compared
Entry price, a month
Source: Each vendor’s pricing page, read between 25 September 2026 and 18 October 2026.
A buyer can start with GetCito at $599 a month, while AEO Engine’s managed retainer costs $1,597 a month, the median entry price. Percepture’s Launch tier at $3,500 a month is the dearest entry plan, so a managed agency budget starts in the thousands each month.
“Too busy to implement a new strategy? Our team can manage everything from content optimization to PR outreach on your behalf.”
What it means for a buyer
A buyer who can run software and pay an API bill can start with GetCito’s free plan, and its Growth plan at $599 a month is the lowest paid step. A managed agency costs $1,597 a month at AEO Engine and commits the buyer to a 90-day initial term.
Budgets for Siege Media, Go Fish Digital or iPullRank start with a sales call, since none publishes a price. Siege Media’s model is built for 6+ month horizons, so a buyer who wants to test an agency first can buy Digital Elevator’s single sprints with no retainer lock-in.
Which one to pick
- If you need to start at no cost and can host the software yourself: pick GetCito. GetCito has a free plan that runs on your own hosting with your own AI-provider API keys and a separate API bill, and its Growth plan at $599 a month adds a human team.
- If you need a managed agency at the lowest published monthly price: pick AEO Engine. AEO Engine’s Growth plan costs $1,597 a month, billed monthly with a 90-day initial term.
- If you need to avoid a retainer and buy one piece of work at a time: pick Digital Elevator. Digital Elevator sells single sprints and an ongoing off-site cycle with no retainer lock-in required.
- If you need PR-led work that also targets Claude and Grok: pick Percepture. Percepture’s work targets Claude and Grok for citations, with its Launch tier at $3,500 a month.
- If you need an enterprise team for a scoped, expert-led engagement: pick iPullRank. iPullRank is built for enterprise and mid-market brands that want expert AI Search strategy, and each engagement is a custom, scoped retainer that starts with a sales conversation.
- Skip all of these if you want a self-serve monitoring dashboard under $100 a month: Self-serve AI visibility tools mostly start under $100 a month, while AEO Engine’s cheapest paid tier is $1,597 a month.
How we compared
We compared 8 tools on price, free plan and 3 questions a buyer asks, reading each vendor’s pricing page and product pages between 2 September 2026 and 20 October 2026. We did not sign up for or run any of them. The median, the cheapest and the dearest plan are taken over the 3 picks priced in US dollars a month, so their prices compare directly.
Questions buyers ask
Do any AI citation services have a free plan?
GetCito is the one pick with a free plan. You host it yourself and pay a separate AI-provider API bill, so it takes real setup work. For AEO Engine, Siege Media, Go Fish Digital, Digital Elevator and Minuttia, a free plan is unconfirmed.
What does the cheapest paid citation service cost?
GetCito has the cheapest paid entry plan, at $599 a month for Growth. Growth covers 50 prompts with a bundled human team, and Scale costs $999 a month for 100 prompts.
Why do citation agencies cost more than AI visibility software?
Citation agencies sell managed work, so AEO Engine’s cheapest tier is $1,597 a month while most self-serve AI visibility tools start under $100 a month. CiteLens, a self-serve monitor, starts at $79 a month.
Do AI citation agencies require a long contract?
Some do. AEO Engine’s Growth plan at $1,597 a month carries a 90-day initial term, and its higher Dominate tiers run on 90-day rolling contracts. Siege Media builds its model for 6+ month horizons, while Digital Elevator requires no retainer lock-in.
Which citation services publish their prices?
Percepture publishes a rate card that starts with Launch at $3,500 a month, and Digital Elevator publishes tiered sprint pricing. Siege Media, Go Fish Digital and iPullRank publish none and quote after a sales conversation or a proposal request.
Can I get a free AI visibility audit before paying?
Yes. AEO Engine’s free checker returns a 0-100 score with per-engine breakdowns across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude, but it asks for a work email and a competitor’s web address before it emails the report. Digital Elevator gives qualified teams a free AI Visibility Report before any paid sprint, and iPullRank has a free AI Search Readiness quiz.
Which AI engines does the entry plan cover?
GetCito’s free Self-Host plan covers 2 engines and its Growth and Scale plans cover 4: ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews. Claude and Microsoft Copilot are not among them, and the full engine list comes with the custom-quoted Enterprise plan. AEO Engine covers four engines on every tier, and its prompt ceiling rises with price from 150 up to 1,000.
Sources
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai/aeo-report, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai/ai-overview-checker, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai/platform/ai-blog-writer, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai/platform/ai-search-tracking, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
- AEO Engine, aeoengine.ai/platform/seo-reporting, read on 10 September 2026 aeoengine.ai
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- Digital Elevator, thedigitalelevator.com/ai-visibility-report, read on 23 September 2026 thedigitalelevator.com
