Keats vs Profound: an AEO alternative for smaller teams

Profound is the big name in this market. It raised a $180 million Series D in September 2026 at a $1.8 billion valuation, and it says a third of the Fortune 100 use it. If you're comparing it with Keats, you're probably asking a narrower question: do I need all of that to find out whether ChatGPT recommends us, and to prove that our fixes changed the answer?

This page sets out what each does, where Profound is plainly ahead, and the situations where each one is the right purchase. Every fact about Profound comes from its own pages, read on 12 November 2026.

What you get from each

Profound sells to enterprise marketing, content and PR teams. Its pricing page lists a free trial (50 prompts, run daily for 7 days, on ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Overviews) and then Enterprise at a custom price, with up to ten answer engines: ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Mode, Gemini, DeepSeek, Claude, AI Overviews, Exa, Muse Spark and Qwen. Around the tracking sit Prompt Volumes, Agent Analytics, sentiment, shopping reports and the AI Marketer, which in Profound's words "identifies the work worth doing, drafts it, and pings you for approval." There is also an Agency Growth plan with credits per client workspace; the page doesn't print its price.

Keats asks your buyers' questions on five assistants (ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Overviews, AI Mode and Perplexity) every week, with several samples per question, and marks each change against its noise band so a lucky week doesn't read as progress. Each gap becomes a card ranked by how much visibility it could win back, with a brief your writer or your agent works from. When you report the change live, Keats compares the questions it targeted with control questions at day 21 and day 35 and gives you a verdict.

The table

Checked on 12 November 2026, from each company's own pages.

Where Profound is stronger

Breadth is the clearest gap. Profound reads ten assistants on Enterprise; Keats reads five, and doesn't cover Claude, Copilot or DeepSeek. If your buyers are developers or analysts who live in Claude, that matters. Profound also refreshes daily.

It does more of the work for you. Its AI Marketer drafts the content; Keats stops at the brief and leaves the drafting to your agent or your team. Profound reports crawler visits and AI referrals through Agent Analytics, which Keats doesn't do at all, so it can speak to traffic as well as mentions.

And it passes procurement. SSO, SCIM, role-based access and SOC 2 are on its Enterprise plan; Keats has none of them yet. Profound has named customer results (Plaid, Ramp, MongoDB) where Keats has no published case study.

Where Keats is different

Keats is for the person who has to answer "did it work?" with a number they'd defend. A weekly rate built on several answers per question, with its band, and a verdict that compares the questions you worked on with ones you left alone, separates your change from a model update or a rival's launch. The method is set out in proving AEO results.

The price is on the page, and the API and the MCP server come with every plan. Profound's MCP is listed for Enterprise only. If your plan is to point Claude or another agent at the work each week, Keats lets you do that from its entry plan: the agent reads the gaps, takes the top card, and reports the change shipped so the clock starts.

When Profound is the better choice

• You're a large brand that needs ten assistants, daily data and shopping reports in one contract.
• Security review requires SSO and a SOC 2 report.
• You want the tool to draft the content, not hand over a brief.
• You need AI crawler and referral traffic beside visibility.

When Keats is the better choice

• You need a monthly figure you can publish internally, without a sales cycle.
• Your question is which fix to make next and whether the last one moved answers.
• You run an agent and want it to do the weekly cycle through the API.

If the brief-versus-draft question is the deciding one, our page on an agent-first rival that writes and publishes looks at that trade in detail, and the roundup of AEO tools puts both beside the rest of the market.