Geo Probe

geo-probe

Measure whether AI answer engines surface a brand. Split because a skill can't reach the model providers: this skill generates the queries and scores the answers; the agent calls the model / web_search for each query and feeds the answers back.

When to use

• A GEO/visibility pass: "do AI engines mention or cite us, and how do we compare to competitors?"
• After GEO fixes, re-probe to see if mention/citation rates moved.

When NOT to use

• On-page GEO readiness (citability/structure/entity) — that is geo-score, which needs no model calls.
• When you can't make model calls — without answers, score has nothing to measure.

Preconditions

• queries: a seo-crawl JSON. score: an answers payload (below). Python 3.9+ stdlib only. The agent provides model answers between the two ops.

How to call

1. Generate queries:

"$ORKAS_NODE" "$ORKAS_PC_DIR/bin/run-skill.cjs" geo-probe geo_probe -- --op queries --input <crawl.json> [--brand X] [--domain x.com] [--competitors "A,B"]

→ { ok, data: { brand, domain, competitors, context_terms, queries:[{query, kind, intent}] } }

kind is unbranded (the measurement set) or branded (control). A branded query cannot measure visibility — asked "What is ?" a model names the brand by construction, so counting those rows reports a share of voice the probe never tested. Branded rows are kept only to separate "nobody recommends us" from "the model does not know we exist"; keep their kind when you feed answers back.

1b) Validate agent- or user-supplied candidates before probing with them:

echo '{"brand":"Orkas","domain":"orkas.ai","candidates":["best ai agent tools for teams","..."]}' | "$ORKAS_NODE" "$ORKAS_PC_DIR/bin/run-skill.cjs" geo-probe geo_probe -- --op filter

→ { ok, data: { kept:[...], rejected:[{query, reason}] } }. Rejects a query that carries the brand or domain core, duplicates, is under 3 or over 12 words, uses a bare ambiguous acronym (GEO, AEO, CRM… without its expansion — an answer engine will answer for the wrong industry), or compares AI answer engines rather than vendors. Every drop names its reason; never discard one silently.

2. The agent asks each query to one or more models / web_search, recording {query, model, mode:"param"|"retrieval", text} (mode = whether the model retrieved sources or answered from memory).

The queries op also returns context_terms (distinctive page-vocabulary words). Pass them through into the score payload so the brand can be disambiguated from a homonym.

3. Score the answers (pass the payload on stdin or --input):

echo '{"brand":"Orkas","domain":"orkas.ai","competitors":["Cursor"],"context_terms":["ai","agent","desktop"],"answers":[{"query":"...","model":"...","mode":"retrieval","text":"..."}]}' | "$ORKAS_NODE" "$ORKAS_PC_DIR/bin/run-skill.cjs" geo-probe geo_probe -- --op score

→ { ok, data: { share_of_voice, share_of_voice_basis, unbranded, branded_control, share_of_voice_all_answers, citation_rate, brand_mentions, domain_citations, ambiguous_mentions, competitor_share, context_terms, per_answer:[...], data_tier, note } }

4. Gate off-site references before naming them as the brand's:

echo '{"brand":"Floatboat","domain":"floatboat.ai","context_terms":["calendar","agent"],"references":[{"url":"https://www.g2.com/products/floatbot/reviews","title":"Floatbot Reviews 2026"}]}' | "$ORKAS_NODE" "$ORKAS_PC_DIR/bin/run-skill.cjs" geo-probe geo_probe -- --op disambiguate

→ { ok, data: { references_checked, citable, verdict_counts, references:[{url, verdict, data_tier, near_miss_tokens, context_hits}], data_tier, note } }

Run this on every third-party page, directory, or review listing before the report calls it the brand's. score gates model answer text; this gates the other channel — pages the agent found itself with web_search. Verdicts: cited (domain present) · corroborated (brand token + context term) · ambiguous (brand token alone) · near_miss (a token 1–2 edits from the brand) · absent. Only cited/corroborated may be named as the brand's.

near_miss is the trap this op exists for: a listing for a same-sounding company shares no exact token with the brand, so every equality test reports it merely absent and it reads as irrelevant rather than wrong. Report the near tie as a different entity — do not drop it silently.

Honesty

• share_of_voice is measured over unbranded rows only. Report it against branded_control: unbranded 0 with control 1.0 means the brand is recognised but never recommended; both near 0 means the answer engines do not know the entity at all — a different problem with a different fix. share_of_voice_all_answers is the un-split number, kept for comparison only; do not headline it. When a probe set carried no unbranded row, share_of_voice_basis says so instead of presenting the branded average as a clean score.
• share_of_voice counts only corroborated product mentions: the answer cites the domain, OR the brand token appears together with a page-context term. A brand-token hit with no context term and no domain is ambiguous (likely a homonym, e.g. "Orkas" → orcas/whales) and is excluded from share_of_voice (surfaced as ambiguous_mentions). Without context_terms, it falls back to counting any brand-token hit.
• citation_rate counts sourced domain citations and is the most reliable signal.
• disambiguate cannot return Measured, at any verdict. A page the target site does not control is someone else's statement about it, so an off-site reference is Estimated at best and unverified when uncorroborated.
• data_tier is Measured only when every answer came from a retrieval-capable model, otherwise Estimated. Always report which it is — never present a parametric-memory mention as a real citation.