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Read articleSearch & AI reputation, measured and fixed
Your buyers Google you. Then they ask ChatGPT. Most of what they find, you didn't write.
BRANDefenders finds out exactly how your brand shows up across search and AI, puts a number on what the gaps are costing you, and fixes them. Start with a free assessment, delivered in 48 hours.
Free · No commitment · Delivered in 48 hours
Cost of the gaps · EstimateSample
Value at risk / mo
$63K
Annual drag
$756K
Lost Revenuereview-sentiment gap
Lost Deal Flowsearch-narrative gap
Lost AI Visibilitycitation gap
Trusted by enterprise brands in
The Problem
Your Brand Perception Is Being Written Without You
Right now, someone is searching your brand. An AI is answering a question about your industry. And you have no idea what they're seeing or hearing.
01
Search Results Are Controlled by Others
Competitors, review sites, and news outlets own your first impression. You react instead of control.
02
AI Is Answering Questions About You
ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity are recommending your competitors. Your brand narrative is being written without you.
03
Reputation Damage Compounds Daily
Every day without control, negative perceptions spread through search algorithms and AI training data.
How this works
Four steps, from first look to full scale
No jargon, no long ramp. Here's exactly what happens when you engage, starting with a free read on where you stand.
- 01
Free assessment
We audit how you appear across Google, ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and the review platforms your buyers check. 48 hours, no commitment.
- 02
Activation sprint
We fix what's broken first: the negative results, the wrong AI answers, the thin authority.
- 03
Ongoing operation
Your team or ours keeps it moving, with monthly reporting on what changed.
- 04
Scale
Roll the same system across a portfolio or a franchise network.
Built for organizations already spending $3,000+/month on marketing. Ongoing engagements typically start around $4,500/month — and the initial assessment is always free.
Find your industry
The stakes are different in your world
Pick your field to see the specific risks, benchmarks, and outcomes we work on for brands like yours.
Healthcare
Patients research you before they ever book. Own that first impression.
Finance & Banking
Trust takes years to build and seconds to lose. Protect it continuously.
Legal
Clients vet firms online first. Make the record they find the right one.
Franchise
One weak location can define the whole brand. Defend it network-wide.
Pharmaceutical
Perception moves regulators, prescribers, and investors. Get ahead of it.
Insurance
You start from a trust deficit. Every reputation signal has to count.
Behavioral Health
Families choose care in a vulnerable moment. Be the name they trust.
Direct Sales
"Is it a scam?" shouldn't be the first result. Reclaim the narrative.
Interactive · Free · No signup
Don't guess what reputation costs you. Put a number on it.
Two live tools, built on the same model our analysts use. Pick one and start dragging.
The Code Yellow MethodA discipline of awareness, not a deliverable
Twelve questions we answer before we touch your brand.
Six about how the market actually sees you. Six about what you are actually going to do. They come from Rich Galgano, who ran them for 26 years building Windy City Wire, which he sold in 2020 for nearly half a billion dollars. He is our chairman, and we are the only Code Yellow licensed marketing firm in the country.
It is a way of thinking before it is a way of working, twelve prompts that force us, and you, to stop and see clearly before a single decision gets made.
The Board
The external landscape, what the world sees.
WHO
Who the customer actually is: a real person with a daily reality, a frustration, and a reason to buy.
WHAT
What the brand actually says, and whether the promise is clear in five seconds to a total stranger.
WHEN
When customers are reached, and whether the message meets them where they are in the buying journey.
WHERE
Where customers find this business, and whether it is dominant on the right channels or spread thin.
WHY
Why a customer should choose this business over a competitor, and whether that difference is visible.
HOW
How the brand builds what cannot be copied: trust, content authority, and an identity that compounds.
The Mirror
Internal accountability, what the organization will do about it.
IS
What is actually true about this brand right now, underneath the messaging and the internal story.
AM
Who the business really is in this market today, not who it used to be or hopes to become.
WILL
Whether the business will actually act on what the findings say, or file them away and move on.
HAVE
What the business has genuinely earned in reputation, authority, and trust, versus what it claims.
DO
What the business is actually doing right now, day to day, versus what it says its priorities are.
SHOULD
Whether the business should be doing what it is doing, the way it is doing it, or change course.
“Code Yellow is paying attention. That is it. That is the whole thing.”
The System
The Reputation Equity Engine™
Stop guessing how your reputation is perceived. Measure it, move it, and know what that movement is worth, across search, AI, and stakeholder touchpoints.
01
Measure
Intelligence & Scoring
Full-spectrum intelligence across search results, AI answers, reviews, authority media, and entity signals. Delivered as the RE² Score.
- RE² Audit
- RE² Score (0-100)
- RE² Index Benchmarking
- RE² Pulse Monitoring
02
Move
Execution & Control
An execution engine designed to deploy controlled assets, correct entity data, engineer AI citations, and activate suppression playbooks.
- Asset Deployment
- AI Citation Engineering
- Review Workflows
- Crisis Shield
03
Monetize
Revenue Attribution
A revenue attribution layer connecting RE² Score movement to influenced pipeline, conversion-rate lift, and retained revenue.
- REV Attribution
- Pipeline Influence
- Valuation Metrics
- Board Reports
Inputs
Search Results
AI Outputs
Stakeholder Data
RE²Engine
Outputs
Controlled Narrative
Protected Brand
Proven ROI
RE² Score™
One Score for Your Whole Reputation
The RE² Score quantifies your reputation equity across all digital touchpoints. Track progress, benchmark competitors, and prove ROI to stakeholders.
Your Current RE² Score
72
+14vs last quarter
Percentile
Top 15%
in your industry
7 Weighted Score Components
Search Control
20%82
AI Representation
20%68
Authority Coverage
15%74
Narrative Quality
15%71
Trust/Review Signal
10%76
Volatility/Risk
10%65
Commercial Influence
10%79
12-Month Trend
+38% improvementJFMAMJJASOND
Competitive Landscape
1
Your Brand(You)
72
+14
2
Competitor A
68
+8
3
Competitor B
61
+3
4
Competitor C
54
-2
5
Competitor D
47
-5
23%
Higher than industry avg
4
Positions gained
Measured across
Google
Bing
ChatGPT
Claude
Gemini
Google, Bing, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini & more
The dashboard above is an illustrative sample. In a live RE² audit, rankings and score movements are measured from established public data sources, not fabricated or estimated.
Semrush
Ahrefs
Google Analytics
Search Console
Similarweb
Two ways to win
Get the Intel, or Get it Managed
Both paths run on the same RE² Engine. The only question is who does the work: your team with our intelligence, or ours end to end.
Get the Intel
You run the strategy
We hand you the engine.
The RE² Engine brings every buyer signal, AI-visibility read, review, and search-control lever into one place. We put it in your team's hands to turn into strategy and action.
- The full RE² dataset, buyer signals, AI visibility, review velocity, and search control.
- Strategies mapped to your company goals, investor expectations, and target markets.
- Built for organizations with a team ready to execute enterprise marketing in-house.
Get it Managed
Full serviceWe run it for you
The engine, the team, the results.
Everything in Get the Intel, then we field the whole team. Our specialists handle on-page copy, earned placements, reviews, and AI citations, and hold momentum through every market shift.
- Full-service execution, start to finish, we run all of it for you.
- Your always-on team and insurance policy against reputation risk.
- Enterprise specialists accelerating brand and enterprise value growth.
Not sure which fits? Start with a free RE² Score, the intel comes first either way.
The business case
Where Reputation Shows Up in the Numbers
We track score movement against pipeline, conversion, and retained revenue, so you can see what moved, when it moved, and what it was worth.
The RE² Value Equation
Step 1
Reputation Movement
↓
Step 2
Trust Delta
↓
Step 3
Conversion Impact
↓
Result
Revenue Lift
This is how RE² gets measured on the same scorecard as CRM, paid media, and sales enablement, rather than sitting outside the budget conversation. The on-page copy, the earned placements, and the review strategy still have to be done; data points the way, action collects the return.
01
28%1
Reputation's Share of Value
Portion of S&P 500 market capitalization, roughly $11.9T, attributable to corporate reputation.
02
82%2
Buyer Trust
Consumers who say trust in the company behind a brand is a deciding factor in whether they buy.
03
5–9%3
Revenue Per Star
Revenue increase associated with each one-star improvement in a business's online rating.
04
22%4
Cost of Negative Search
Prospective customers lost for every negative result that ranks on page one of search.
Sources: 1 Echo Research, Reputation Dividend Report (2024) · 2 Edelman Trust Barometer (2024) · 3 Harvard Business School, M. Luca, “Reviews, Reputation, and Revenue” (2016) · 4 Moz, negative search-result visibility study
Case Study
Healthcare SaaS Company
A leading healthcare technology company was losing deals because of outdated negative press appearing in search results. After 6 months with RE², they reshaped how their brand showed up across search and AI.
"We went from explaining away bad search results to having prospects tell us they chose us because of what they found online."
Lauren H., VP of Marketing
Client name withheld under NDA. Results shared with permission.
Brand Search Ranking
Page 3
Before
→
Position 1
After
AI Recommendation Rate
12%
Before
→
89%
After
Average Review Score
2.8
Before
→
4.7
After
RE² Score
47
Before
→
78
After
Calculate Your Potential ROI
See what controlled reputation could mean for your business
Free RE² Score
Discover What's Being Said About Your Brand
Get your free RE² Score, a reputation report card that shows exactly where your brand stands across search engines, AI platforms, and key stakeholder touchpoints.
No commitment required. Results delivered within 48 hours.
The Audit Includes
- Complete RE² Score assessment (7 weighted dimensions)
- Search control audit across priority queries
- AI representation analysis (ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude)
- Authority coverage and narrative quality review
- Volatility/risk identification with prioritization
- Prioritized 90-day action roadmap
Since 2011
Serving brands
1,000+
Reputations Protected
4.9
Avg Client Rating
91%
Client Retention
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