Share of search (SoS) is the share of all brand-name searches in your market that point out your model. To search out it, rely what number of occasions individuals searched in your model identify, add up the searches for each competing model, then divide your quantity by that complete and multiply by 100.
For instance, let’s say your model will get 20,000 searches in a month, and your three most important rivals get 15,000, 10,000, and 5,000 searches, respectively. The overall branded search quantity in your class is 50,000. To calculate your share of search:
20,000 Ă· 50,000 Ă— 100 = 40%
As a result of SoS displays actual search habits, it offers you fast suggestions on model consciousness—a lot quicker than surveys or gross sales experiences.
In case your share of search rises, curiosity in your model might be rising and will quickly flip into a better market share. If it falls, rivals are gaining floor, so you might want to regulate your message or content material earlier than gross sales slip. Checking this metric each month or quarter will allow you to spot developments early.
These are related metrics that may simply be confused, particularly as a result of all of them measure aggressive visibility, however in very completely different contexts.
- Classical Share of Voice (SoV) tells you the way a lot paid-media publicity you’re shopping for versus rivals.
- Natural SoV exhibits how a lot of the natural search site visitors you win in your key phrase set.
- Share of Search reveals how usually individuals seek for your model identify in contrast with rivals—an early sign of name demand.
Right here’s a extra detailed comparability to make clear the variations:
| Facet | Classical Share of Voice | Natural Share of Voice | Share of Search |
|---|---|---|---|
| Core query | How loud is our paid media in contrast with rivals? | How seen is our web site in natural SERPs on a key phrase set? | How salient is our model in shoppers’ search behaviour? |
| What’s measured | % of complete promoting impressions, spend, or GRPs your model captures | % of complete natural clicks/site visitors your web site receives throughout tracked key phrases | % of all branded‑search queries within the class that point out your model |
| Major knowledge supply | Media-buying logs, Nielsen/Comscore, advert‑server experiences | Rating & CTR fashions (e.g., Ahrefs’ Rank Tracker) | Google Traits or key phrase analysis instruments like Ahrefs’ Key phrases Explorer |
| Calculation | Model advert impressions ÷ complete market impressions (or spend) | Website Explorer: your est. site visitors ÷ sum of site visitors of you + rivals; Rank Tracker: your clicks ÷ complete clicks throughout SERP outcomes for tracked key phrases | Model’s search quantity ÷ complete branded‑search quantity for competitor set |
| Replace cadence | Weekly – month-to-month (advert knowledge lag) | Day by day – weekly (is dependent upon rank‑examine schedule) | Month-to-month – quarterly (smooths model‑search noise) |
| Key strengths | Funds benchmarking & media‑combine planning; covers all paid channels | Granular, key phrase‑degree diagnostics; captures search engine optimization/content material wins & losses shortly | Main indicator of market‑share shifts; tied to actual demand, not spend |
| Essential limitations | Publicity ≠consideration; usually lagging/pattern‑primarily based knowledge | Solely natural Google outcomes; wants effectively‑chosen key phrase basket | Works greatest for distinctive model names; doesn’t clarify why demand modified |
| Typical homeowners | Model & media planners | search engine optimization and content material groups | CMOs, model & insights groups |
Tip
Ahrefs’ Rank Tracker mechanically calculates natural share of voice for all your goal key phrases.
It additionally calculates Share of Site visitors Worth (SoTV)—the share of your goal’s natural search site visitors worth in comparison with the overall natural search site visitors worth for all tracked key phrases.
What’s extra, you may monitor the progress of accelerating your natural share of search utilizing the historic knowledge.
First, it’s good to get the info on branded search quantity. For this, you need to use a device like Ahrefs’ Key phrases Explorer.
- Enter your model identify within the search field. Select one nation at a time.
- Go to the matching phrases report.
- Notice down the numbers: SV (search quantity for all key phrases containing your model identify within the chosen nation), and GSV (search quantity for all key phrases containing your model identify in all 217 international locations from Ahrefs’ database).
Repeat the identical steps in your rivals and key places.
Lastly, add all volumes collectively, divide your model’s quantity, and multiply by 100. The quickest solution to crunch the numbers and visualize outcomes is through the use of an LLM like ChatGPT.
For model names that might imply various things (like “Apple” or “Delta”), you need to use Ahrefs’ Mum or dad Subject function to filter out unrelated searches. This helps you focus solely on the subjects which might be clearly about your model. When you’ve narrowed it down, you may export the related knowledge to calculate your SoS extra precisely.
The SoS share alone solely tells you the way a lot curiosity you get. To really choose model energy in search, you may pair it with different associated metrics.
Class penetration
This metric tells you the way your brand-name searches stack up towards complete searches for the entire product class.
If most individuals already looking for you continue to make up solely a small slice of all class queries, your model is well-known to current followers however nonetheless hidden from the broader market.
By watching each branded and generic searches collectively over time, you may see whether or not you’re reaching new audiences past your present base and the way you stack up towards rivals.
You’ll be able to calculate it like this:
Class penetration (%) = (Branded search quantity Ă· Whole class search quantity) Ă— 100
For instance, let’s say you’re within the challenge administration area. If:
- Your model will get 90K branded searches/month.
- Whole month-to-month searches for all associated key phrases (together with rivals and generic phrases like “challenge administration instruments”) is 1.5M.
Then:
Class penetration = (90,000 Ă· 1,500,000) Ă— 100 = 6%
This tells you that 6% of all curiosity in your class goes to your model. Should you’re seeing excessive branded search quantity however your class penetration is low, it means you’re well-known amongst current customers, however have restricted attain past your base.
Momentum
Momentum looks at how your brand’s search volume rises or falls each month and stacks that trend against your competitors.
Faster growth means you’re gaining attention; slower growth means others are pulling ahead. By lining these shifts up with the dates your campaigns began, you can see which promotions truly lifted your visibility.
For instance, in the chart below, you can see how quickly Monday.com began to gain momentum in branded search in 2022. They’re on a good trajectory to catch up with Asana.
To quantify momentum:
Momentum = % change in branded search volume over a period
Suppose:
- Your branded search traffic went from 80K to 100K over the last 6 months = 25% growth.
- A competitor went from 50K to 90K = 80% growth.
Even though you have more total volume, they have more momentum. This helps you identify rising challengers early.
Conversion-oriented intent
Even if your overall branded search volume is small, ranking well for high-intent queries can still drive sales. Adding this layer to your share-of-search tracking turns it into a practical tool, letting you spot brand gains, rising competitors, or slipping demand sooner.
To measure this, use:
High-intent traffic ratio = Traffic from commercial/transactional queries Ă· Total traffic
Let’s say Ahrefs shows:
- Total organic traffic =Â 200K
- Traffic from commercial + transactional intent keywords =Â 40K
Then:
High-intent traffic ratio = 40,000 Ă· 200,000 = 20%
A high ratio here means you’re not just attracting awareness—you’re attracting potential buyers.
In Ahrefs, use Site Explorer >Overview > Organic keywords by intent to see traffic breakdown by intent. You can also compare this across brands to see who’s capturing demand.
You can also use Ahrefs to compare keyword intent between your brand and competitors. In the same Overview report, you can visualize this on a chart, showing how much of each brand’s keyword footprint targets informational, navigational, commercial, or transactional intent.
Share of Search in Google’s AI Answers
As Google moves toward AI-powered search results, the way people search for brands could start to change. With AI giving instant summaries on the search page, users might get answers faster, without fully typing a branded query or clicking through to a website.
If you want to see how often Google recommends your brand vs your competitors, try out Ahrefs’ Brand Radar. Simply enter your and your competitors’ brand names, and set the mode to AI overviews.
This will show you how many times your brand has been mentioned compared to competitors and calculate your share over all mentions.
Listed below are 4 concepts for utilizing SoS knowledge in your advertising and marketing technique.Â
Validate strategic course early
Share of search helps verify whether or not your model technique is resonating. Should you enter a brand new market and see an uptick in branded searches earlier than gross sales seem, it’s an indication that individuals are paying consideration and your positioning is working. It acts as an early pulse examine on market match.
Monitor marketing campaign momentum
Search curiosity builds throughout a number of touchpoints. Manufacturers that mix wide-reach campaigns (like TV or social) with helpful content material usually see compounding development in branded search quantity.
By monitoring this over a number of weeks or months, you may see how briskly your viewers responds and regulate your messaging cadence accordingly.
Spot aggressive shifts early
Evaluating your share of search development with rivals over time exhibits who’s gaining or dropping visibility, particularly round seasonal occasions or product launches. This helps you reply to market modifications earlier than they have an effect on click on share, site visitors, or engagement.
Observe long-term model impression
Share of search will be very helpful for measuring the impression of brand-building campaigns. You’ll be able to monitor modifications in branded search quantity in your personal area to see how consciousness shifts over time, however the actual perception comes from evaluating that development towards your rivals.
This helps you perceive whether or not the carry you’re seeing is actually market-moving or simply a part of a broader class development. In case your SoS rises whereas others stay flat or decline, it’s a powerful sign that your marketing campaign had a significant impression on model visibility.
If you’d like extra individuals Googling your model, it’s good to present up in the correct locations earlier than they even suppose to go looking.
Meaning getting talked about in trusted articles, opinions, and on-line communities the place potential prospects are already hanging out. Let’s have a look at a number of examples.
Run campaigns that spark branded searches
Run campaigns that stick in individuals’s minds. Whether or not it’s a cool product drop, a collaboration with an influencer, or a narrative within the media, give them a cause to look you up later.
For instance, when Duolingo introduced the dying of the Duolingo mascot throughout a viral marketing campaign in February 2025, the search quantity for the time period “duolingo” peaked to a brand new all-time excessive, and so did the branded site visitors to the location (see charts beneath).
Discover competitor mentions utilizing backlinks
Have a look at the place your rivals are talked about on-line and purpose to get your model featured in those self same locations. It is a confirmed solution to construct consciousness in the correct context, so when individuals are prepared to go looking, your model is already on their radar.
A method to do that is by following backlinks to your competitors. Here’s how it works in Ahrefs’ Site Explorer.
- Enter your competitor’s URL.
- Go to the Backlinks report.
- Enter the word “tool” in the Ref. page URL filter.
- Set the mode to Group by similar and sort the pages by Page traffic (to show the pages with the most organic traffic first).
Open referring pages and see if you can get a good angle to pitch your product.
Find competitor mentions using brand mentions in AI overviews
Another effective way to find high-profile brand mentions is to use Ahrefs’ Brand Radar.
- Click on the Filter dataset button and set the market scope to AI overviews that don’t contain your brand name, and Keyword does not contain [your competitors].
- Plug in your competitors in the next section and set the mode to AI overviews.
Now, look at the keywords where Google recommends your competitors but not your brand. These are the topics where you’re being left out of the conversation. Try to get your products or brand mentioned on those same pages. This could mean pitching your product to the author, offering expert input, or creating content that’s even more helpful.
Create content for non-branded searches
Of course, you don’t have to wait for others to mention your brand. You can take the lead by targeting non-branded keywords that relate to your audience’s problems. Then, position your brand as the solution directly within that content.
To do this effectively, you’ll need solid keyword research to find the right terms and topics. We’ve got a full guide on how to do that, so you can start creating content that not only ranks but also earns attention for your brand.
For example, I wouldn’t naturally link a marketing analytics brand like PostHog with the term “SEO for startups.” But thanks to a sharp, well-written article on the topic, they now rank in the top 10 for that keyword. By doing this, they’ve expanded their reach, boosted brand awareness, and introduced their product in a highly relevant context.
Monitor missed brand mention opportunities
And if you want to stay on top of what’s happening, tools like Ahrefs Alerts are perfect for keeping your finger on the pulse. You can set them up to monitor the web for pages that mention your competitors but not your brand. This helps you spot potential link or mention opportunities you might be missing out on.
You can also add filters, like Domain Rating or estimated traffic, to focus only on high-quality sites (these could give you a bigger SEO boost).Â
Optimize your branded search experience
Last but not least, when someone does look you up, make sure your site is ready: clear pages for things like returns, pricing, or support, and easy navigation that helps them find what they’re looking for fast. A list of your branded keywords will help you with that.
Simply go to Ahrefs’ Site Explorer, open the Organic keywords report, and plug in your brand name. Then see if the likely reason behind the keyword matches the page that ranks for it.
Whereas the share of search is a robust solution to gauge model curiosity and spot early shifts in market visibility, it’s vital to know its limitations.
- It’s a directional metric, not a exact one—knowledge will be affected by device sampling, algorithm modifications, or noise.
- Model identify ambiguity can skew outcomes, particularly for generic or multi-meaning names, so branded phrases must be vetted fastidiously.
- Not each branded search displays shopping for intent; some could also be for assist or normal data, so it helps to section queries.
- It’s additionally not splendid for all manufacturers—smaller manufacturers could lack quantity, whereas bigger ones can face knowledge dilution throughout merchandise or areas.
- Exterior elements may also trigger sudden spikes or drops unrelated to precise advertising and marketing efforts, like information, seasonality, or viral occasions.
- SoS in all probability shouldn’t be utilized in isolation—combining it with different metrics like direct site visitors, social mentions, and gross sales knowledge offers a extra full image.
Lastly, do not forget that third-party instruments have limits in accuracy and protection, so all the time cross-check the place doable.
Closing ideas
No metric is flawless and share of search has its quirks. Nevertheless it’s one of many few methods to peek contained in the minds of potential prospects at scale. Observe it, cross-check it, and mix it with what you already know. Over time, it’ll allow you to perceive not simply how your model is performing, however why.
Acquired questions or feedback? Discover me on LinkedIn.
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