AEO for retail media platforms: AI search visibility ranking
How AI search engines rank retail media platforms by visibility and citations. 20 brands measured quarterly across Google AI Mode: which brands the AI names in answers, which domains it cites as sources, and how the leaders compare. Retail media platforms used by brands and retailers to buy, sell, manage, and measure on-site and off-site commerce advertising inventory. Composite score: 70% visibility (% of AI answers naming the brand) + 30% citation rate (% citing the brand's domain). Full methodology →
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When buyers inquire about Retail media platforms, AI engines frequently mention Criteo as the leading brand. Criteo is prominently featured in 12.5% of answers, showcasing significant visibility. Other top brands that regularly appear are Kevel and Pacvue. This places Criteo ahead in the conversation, reinforcing its standing as a preferred choice.
AI rankings are heavily influenced by domains such as google.com, tinuiti.com, osmos.ai, gartner.com, and criteo.com. These sources are commonly referenced for their authority and informative content. This reliance on well-known aggregator and review sites aligns with AI engines prioritizing trustworthy, validated information when generating answers.
For buyers evaluating options on this page, consider how AI engines favor brands with recent reviews and third-party validation. A brand like Criteo, with topical authority and citation across major domains, demonstrates its strength not just in visibility but in being a reliable source of information within the Retail media platforms category.
At a glance
What we observed in this category
Criteo leads the retail media platforms category with a composite score of 23.8, ahead of Kevel at 20.0 and a cluster of brands sitting at 8.8. That gap matters because the category average visibility is only 3.8 percent and average citation is 5.6 percent, meaning Criteo and Kevel are pulling significantly above the norm while most competitors remain effectively invisible to AI answers. For AEO purposes, the distance between rank one and ranks three through six is already meaningful and appears to be widening.
A clear divergence exists between being named and being cited as a trusted source. Pacvue, Skai, Quartile, and CitrusAd each achieve 12.5 percent visibility but carry a 0.0 percent citation rate, meaning Google AI Mode surfaces them in responses but does not anchor answers to their own content. Koddi presents the inverse pattern, scoring zero visibility yet a 25.0 percent citation rate, suggesting its domain content is used as a reference even when the brand itself is not named in the answer.
The top cited sources in this category are dominated by third-party and analyst properties: google.com, tinuiti.com, osmos.ai, and gartner.com all appear before most brand domains. Only criteo.com and kevel.com earn direct citation alongside those external authorities. This tells an AEO story where the AI engine is anchoring heavily on intermediary and analyst content rather than vendor-owned pages, which structurally disadvantages brands that have not built presence on those referring domains.
Movers & shakers since last refresh
Biggest visibility risers
-
Criteo 0% → 12% · rank #3 → #1+12pp
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Kevel 0% → 12% · rank #2 → #2+12pp
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Pacvue 0% → 12% · rank #7 → #3+12pp
The AEO ranking
| # | Brand | Visibility | Citation | Top engine |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |
criteo.com
|
12% | 50% | Google AI Mode |
Criteo leads with a composite score of 23.8 and a 50.0 percent citation rate, more than three times Kevel's citation figure and far above the 5.6 percent category average. |
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| 2 |
kevel.com
|
12% | 38% | Google AI Mode |
Kevel matches Criteo's 12.5 percent visibility but trails on citation at 37.5 percent, and its domain appears directly in the top cited sources list alongside analyst properties. |
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| 3 |
pacvue.com
|
12% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
Pacvue holds 12.5 percent visibility, equal to Criteo and Kevel, but records a 0.0 percent citation rate, indicating it is named in answers without its content being used as evidence. |
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| 4 |
skai.io
|
12% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
Skai sits at 12.5 percent visibility and 0.0 percent citation, identical to Pacvue and Quartile, placing it in a flat mid-tier cluster that scores well below Criteo's composite of 23.8. |
||||
| 5 |
quartile.com
|
12% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
Quartile shares the 8.8 composite score with three other brands at rank three through six, reflecting no citation activity and no differentiation from peers at this AEO performance level. |
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| 6 |
citrusad.com
|
12% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 7 |
koddi.com
|
0% | 25% | Google AI Mode |
| 8 |
cervinodata.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 9 |
mabaya.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 10 |
smec.ai
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 11 |
promoteiq.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 12 |
thetradedesk.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 13 |
perpetua.io
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 14 |
moloco.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 15 |
gotvantage.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 16 |
mirakl.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 17 |
epsilon.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 18 |
stackadapt.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 19 |
cocarri.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
| 20 |
mikmak.com
|
0% | 0% | Google AI Mode |
Sources AI engines trust in this category
Across the 8 buyer-intent queries we ran on retail media platforms, 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.
How to read this AEO 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 →
AEO 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 90 days and refresh this page automatically. How AI search ranking works →
Run an AEO audit on your own retail media platforms brand
The brands above were curated from public market-leader lists. Want the same answer engine optimisation 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.
Frequently asked about AEO for retail media platforms
Who leads AEO in retail media platforms?
Criteo leads with a composite score of 23.8 and a 50.0 percent citation rate, well ahead of second-placed Kevel at 20.0. Both brands rose from zero visibility in the previous period to 12.5 percent in the current audit.
What sources does AI cite most for retail media platforms research?
Google AI Mode draws most heavily on google.com, tinuiti.com, osmos.ai, and gartner.com in this category. Only criteo.com and kevel.com from the vendor set appear in that top cited sources list.
Why do some brands appear in AI answers but never get cited?
Pacvue, Skai, Quartile, and CitrusAd each show 12.5 percent visibility but 0.0 percent citation, meaning the AI names them without treating their own content as a source. Koddi shows the opposite, earning 25.0 percent citation with zero visibility.
How concentrated is AEO performance in retail media platforms?
The category average visibility is 3.8 percent and average citation is 5.6 percent across 20 brands, but the top two brands alone account for all citation activity above zero, making the distribution highly concentrated at the top.
Which brands improved the most in this AEO audit period?
Criteo, Kevel, and Pacvue are the biggest visibility risers, each moving from 0.0 to 12.5 percent visibility. Criteo also gained 37.5 percentage points in citation, the largest citation delta recorded in the data.
Does owning high visibility guarantee strong citation in this category?
No. Four brands at 12.5 percent visibility carry 0.0 percent citation, while Koddi achieves 25.0 percent citation despite zero visibility, showing that source authority and brand mention are tracked separately by Google AI Mode.