Yoast AI Brand Insights

Yoast has released a new tool in beta called Yoast AI Brand Insights, which is part of a broader package named Yoast SEO AI+. This move marks a shift for Yoast, because unlike many of its products the new tool does not operate as a plugin and does not require access to a content management system.

This post covers what the tool does, the announcement and reaction, the potential impact, and the sources you can consult to dig deeper.

About the Tool

Yoast SEO AI+ and Brand Insights

Yoast SEO AI+ is a subscription-based package that includes Brand Insights as a central component.  Brand Insights operates as a standalone, web-based service, meaning you do not need a WordPress site, a plugin installation, or CMS access to use it.

The tool is currently in beta and is aimed at marketers, brand managers, and businesses that want to see how their brand is referenced in AI systems.

Key Features

Here are the main features offered by Brand Insights:

• Sentiment Tracking
  The tool analyzes keywords associated with your brand and classifies them by positive or negative sentiment. It presents a graph showing changes over time.
• Citation Analysis (Brand Mentions)
  It tracks when your brand is mentioned in AI-generated answers and records which sources or sites are cited in those mentions.
• Competitor Benchmarking
  You can monitor how your brand performs in comparison with selected competitors for brand mentions, sentiment, and rank in AI answers.
• Question Monitoring
  You can specify key brand questions (for example “Is Brand X good?”) and see whether AI systems mention your brand in responses to those queries.
• AI Visibility Index
  Yoast combines multiple metrics, sentiment, ranking in AI answers, mentions, and citations, into a single composite score they call the AI Visibility Index.

How It Works (User Flow)

To use the tool you typically follow these steps:

1. Subscribe to Yoast SEO AI+ or upgrade your existing plan.
2. Access the Brand Insights section via the MyYoast interface.
3. Enter your brand information, location, and choose or generate brand-relevant questions.
4. Run the analysis (it takes around five minutes).
5. Review results in the dashboard: metrics on visibility, mentions, sentiment, citations, competitor comparison.

If there are too few or no results, the tool may not detect brand mentions for your queries.

‍

The Announcement and News Reaction

Yoast officially announced the beta release of Brand Insights on October 1, 2025. Yoast Media coverage has described the tool as a new direction for Yoast, stepping beyond plugins and traditional SEO into AI visibility.

Several themes appear in commentary:

• The tool is seen as a response to how search behavior is shifting toward AI and chat-based interfaces.
• Analysts note that the transparency of AI models is limited, so Brand Insights offers a way to peek behind that opacity by tracking how brands appear in generated answers.
• Pricing is also mentioned: Yoast bundles the tool in Yoast SEO AI+ at a rate of USD 29.90 per month (billed annually) or equivalent.
• The announcement quotes Niko Körner, Senior Director of Product at Yoast, saying:

“With Yoast AI Brand Insights, our customers can not only track their brand’s visibility, sentiment, and credibility in AI platforms like ChatGPT, but also see how they compare against the competition. As AI answers become a new starting point for customer journeys, this competitive perspective is crucial to staying ahead.”

• He added:

“We worked hard to create a simplified KPI that truly reflects brand performance in the age of AI. Our AI Visibility Index combines sentiment, rank in LLM answers, brand mentions, and citations into one clear metric.”

Yoast also stated that they will add actionable recommendations in future versions to help businesses improve their AI visibility, and that support for more large language models is in development.

Impact and Considerations

Why This Matters

The development of tools like Brand Insights reflects shifts in how people discover brands online. Instead of going first to search engine result pages, many now begin with AI chat interfaces.  In that environment, being cited by AI models can influence brand perception and potential customer journeys.

By tracking sentiment, sources, and competitor mentions, brands can gain a more nuanced view of how AI systems portray them. That information may help brands adjust content strategy, optimize citation sources, or strengthen narratives that AI is more likely to pick up.

Strengths

• Because the tool is web-based and independent of CMS, it lowers barriers to adoption for brands that are not linked to a single website platform.
• It combines multiple dimensions into a single index, which may simplify tracking over time.
• The inclusion of competitor benchmarking helps situate your performance relative to peers.

Limitations and Challenges

• The tool is still in beta, meaning features might be incomplete or refined over time.
• It depends on the visibility of brand mentions in AI models — if a brand is rarely or never referenced for certain queries, results may be sparse.
• The AI Visibility Index is a composite metric whose internal weighting and algorithmic choices are not fully public, meaning interpretations should be careful.
• The tool currently supports monitoring for ChatGPT (and likely a few other models) with plans to extend support.
• Since it is not a plugin, it does not directly influence how your website is indexed or ranked; its role is primarily diagnostic and strategic.

What Brands Should Do

• Use the tool to audit how AI systems reference their brand and monitor changes over time
• Compare performance with competitors to identify gaps
• Investigate cited sources and consider optimizing presence on high-authority sites that tend to be cited
• Review content strategy, especially FAQs or branded questions, to ensure relevancy and clarity for AI models
• Keep in mind that this tool complements but does not replace traditional SEO metrics

‍