AI Visibility Rankings · Marketing

Account-based marketing agencies: AI search visibility ranking (2026)

How AI search engines rank account-based marketing agencies by visibility and citations. 20 brands measured monthly across Google AI Mode: which brands the AI names in answers, which domains it cites as sources, and how the leaders compare. Account-based marketing agencies helping B2B teams run target-account programs, orchestrate multichannel campaigns, personalize outreach, and turn named-account strategy into pipeline. Composite score: 70% visibility (% of AI answers naming the brand) + 30% citation rate (% citing the brand's domain). Full methodology →

Refreshed Jul 05, 2026

Avg visibility across category

Avg citation rate

20/20

Brands successfully audited

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When AI engines like ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and Gemini answer questions about account-based marketing agencies, Directive comes up most often, appearing in 75% of sampled AI responses. That is the highest citation rate among the 20 brands ranked on this page. The Marketing Practice and Madison Logic Services round out the top three, but Directive holds a meaningful lead in raw AI visibility.

The rankings reflect which sources AI engines trust most. The top cited domains include directiveconsulting.com, abmagency.com, demandbase.com, salesbread.com, and YouTube. Unlike many categories where third-party review aggregators dominate AI citations, this category is driven heavily by the agencies' own published content and niche industry sites, meaning brands that invest in topical authority and original thought leadership earn disproportionate AI visibility.

For buyers, the practical takeaway is that AI engine prominence correlates with third-party validation and depth of published expertise on ABM specifically. Before committing to any agency on this list, check whether they have recent case studies, independent reviews on recognized platforms, and content that addresses your specific use case (pipeline generation versus brand awareness, for example), since those are exactly the signals AI engines weight when forming recommendations.

At a glance

Category leader Directive 12% visibility · named in 1 of 8 AI answers

Most cited brand Directive 75% citation rate · the AI's most-trusted source brand in account-based marketing agencies

Top cited domain directiveconsulting.com Referenced by AI across the account-based marketing agencies query set — the highest-leverage PR target in this category

Visibility spread 12pp Gap between top and bottom of the ranking · 18 brands at 0% (invisible to the AI)

What we observed in this categoryauto-generated

Directive leads the account-based marketing agencies category with a composite score of 31.2, far ahead of second-placed The Marketing Practice at 8.8. Both share identical visibility of 12.5%, yet the gap in composite score is significant. The remaining 18 brands in the audit, including Ironpaper, Transmission, and Refine Labs, all register composite scores of 0.0. This concentration means two brands effectively own all measurable AI presence in the category against a field of 20.

The Marketing Practice and Directive share the same 12.5% visibility score, but their citation rates diverge sharply. Directive carries a 75.0% citation rate while The Marketing Practice records 0.0%. This means The Marketing Practice is named by Google AI Mode but not trusted enough to be cited as a source. Madison Logic Services inverts this pattern entirely, with 0.0% visibility but a 12.5% citation rate, suggesting it is referenced as a source without being prominently named in AI-generated responses.

Google AI Mode is the top engine for every brand in the audit, indicating the data is anchored entirely on that single engine. The top cited sources list includes directiveconsulting.com alongside third-party or lesser-known domains such as abmagency.com, salesbread.com, and digitallitmus.com. The category average visibility is just 1.2% and average citation is 4.4%, confirming that AI coverage across the full 20-brand field is extremely thin and concentrated at the very top.

Movers & shakers since last refresh

Biggest visibility risers

Directive 0% → 12% · rank #0 → #1
+12pp
The Marketing Practice 0% → 12% · rank #0 → #2
+12pp

The ranking

#	Brand	Visibility	Citation	Top engine
1	Directive directiveconsulting.com	12%	75%	Google AI Mode
Directive holds a 75.0% citation rate against a category average of 4.4%, making it the only brand in the audit with both meaningful visibility and active citation by Google AI Mode.
2	The Marketing Practice themarketingpractice.com	12%	0%	Google AI Mode
The Marketing Practice matches Directive on visibility at 12.5% but records a 0.0% citation rate, meaning it is named in AI responses but its domain is not used as a cited source.
3	Madison Logic Services madisonlogic.com	0%	12%	Google AI Mode
Madison Logic Services achieves a 12.5% citation rate despite 0.0% visibility, an unusual position where the AI cites its content without prominently featuring the brand by name.
4	Ironpaper ironpaper.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
Ironpaper records a composite score of 0.0 with no visibility and no citations, placing it in a large group of 17 brands that currently have no measurable presence in Google AI Mode.
5	Transmission transmissionagency.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
Transmission also scores 0.0 across all metrics, identical to ranks 4 through 20, which reflects the category's extreme AI visibility concentration in just two brands.
6	New North newnorth.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
7	Refine Labs refinelabs.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
8	Sapper Consulting sapperconsulting.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
9	Gripped gripped.io	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
10	BBD Boom bbdboom.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
11	Aptitude 8 aptitude8.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
12	Revenue Pulse revenuepulse.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
13	Heinz Marketing heinzmarketing.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
14	Agent3 agent3.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
15	Momentum ITSMA momentumitsma.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
16	B2B Fusion b2bfusiongroup.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
17	Walker Sands walkersands.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
18	Vendelux Studio vendelux.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
19	2X 2x.marketing	0%	0%	Google AI Mode
20	Influ2 Services influ2.com	0%	0%	Google AI Mode

Sources AI engines trust in this category

Across the 8 buyer-intent queries we ran on account-based marketing agencies, these are the domains Google AI Mode cited most often. If you're not on this list — or if your competitors are — that's a concrete PR / linkbuilding target.

directiveconsulting.comabmagency.comyoutube.comsalesbread.comdemandbase.comthegrowthsyndicate.comdigitallitmus.comsalesmotion.io

How to read this ranking

Four things worth knowing before you act on the numbers above. These are the same definitions across every industry page — for category-specific observations, see the What we observed section above (where available) and the per-brand insights inline in the ranking.

Visibility = being named

A brand's visibility % is the share of AI answers that mention it by name in the response prose. This is who AI engines actively recommend to the buyer. More on visibility →

Citation rate = being trusted

Citation rate is the share of AI answers that include the brand's domain as a clickable source link. This is what the AI treats as authoritative evidence, different from being named. More on citation rate →

Top engine differs by brand

The "top engine" column shows which AI surface each brand performs best on. Big gaps between a brand's score across engines usually points to specific content or schema gaps. How AI engines pick sources →

Rankings move month to month

AI engines re-crawl and re-rank on shorter cycles than classical search. We re-audit every brand on this list at least every 30 days and refresh this page automatically. How AI search ranking works →

Get your own account-based marketing agencies brand audited

The brands above were curated from public market-leader lists. Want the same measurement against your own brand — including the queries you appear on, which competitors get named instead, and a prioritised fix list? Run a free preview.

Audit your account-based marketing agencies brand → Browse all rankings Methodology →

Frequently asked about account-based marketing agencies AI visibility

Who leads AI visibility in the account-based marketing agencies category?

Directive leads with a composite score of 31.2 and a 75.0% citation rate. The Marketing Practice ranks second at 8.8 but holds a 0.0% citation rate despite matching Directive on visibility.

How concentrated is AI visibility across the 20 brands in this category?

Only two brands, Directive and The Marketing Practice, record any AI visibility, both at 12.5%. The remaining 18 brands all score 0.0% visibility and 0.0% citation.

What sources does Google AI Mode cite most for account-based marketing agency research?

The top cited sources include directiveconsulting.com, abmagency.com, youtube.com, salesbread.com, and demandbase.com. Several of the most-cited domains do not correspond to top-ranked brands in the audit.

Can a brand be cited without being visible in AI responses in this category?

Yes. Madison Logic Services records a 12.5% citation rate alongside 0.0% visibility, showing that Google AI Mode can reference a brand's content as a source without prominently naming the brand.

What is the category average visibility and citation rate for account-based marketing agencies?

The category average visibility is 1.2% and the average citation rate is 4.4%, both pulled down heavily by the 18 brands scoring zero across all metrics.

Which AI engine dominates coverage of account-based marketing agencies in this audit?

Google AI Mode is listed as the top engine for every single brand in the audit, meaning all measurable AI visibility and citation data originates from that one engine.