Athena collects $ 2.2 million to keep track of how the brands appear in the responses to

Athena, a startup focused on the visibility of research based on the AI, was launched by stealth with $ 2.2 million in funding. The round included the support of Y Combinator, FCVC, Red Bike Capital, Amino Capital and several veterans of research and SEO space, including Eli Schwartz and Ashley Scirup.

The company is building what calls a Geo (Generative Engine Optimization) platform. Unlike the traditional SEO, which focuses on helping the content in search engines such as Google, Geo is focused on the improvement of the way in which the brands appear in the responses generated by the Ai-the kind people get from tools such as chatgpt, Claude or panoramic views of Google.

Athena’s timing reflects a turn that already takes place through the behavior of consumers and business. While people turn to artificial intelligence chatbots to ask questions, compare research products or services, older SEO strategies are not always in step. Athena’s goal is to give companies a way to trace and improve the way they present themselves in this new research environment.

“We are in the middle of a great transition,” said Andrew Yan, CEO and co-founder of Athena, in an interview with Technological marketing news. “The traditional SEO is not dead, but its role is quickly reducing itself, especially for the discovery of Top-Of-Funnel. Artificial intelligence chatbots are becoming the default way in which people are looking for products, services and ideas. The brands can no longer rely exclusively on the Google rankings. The optimization of the generative engine (Geo) is now essential if you want to be visible where users do requests.”

The loan will reduce the platform, expand its data set and build tools for Saas, and -commerce and other sectors that depend on organic discovery. The platform is already used by over 80 companies, including coupons.com, Checkr, Artisan and Ollie.

Athena works by analyzing millions of responses from large models and mapping them to over 300,000 websites that are often mentioned by these systems. On the basis of these data, it provides detailed recommendations – such as updating the structure of a website, the revision of how the information or regulation of the type of content published is presented – to help the brands to increase the frequency with which and how favorably they are mentioned by the chatbots.

“The visibility in Ai’s chat does not concern the ranking at the top of the first page,” said Yan. “It concerns how often, how soon and how favorably your brand is mentioned in the answers. It is not always consistent among the models, which is why the measurement is fundamental. Athena keeps track of millions of real responses between surface platforms, which pushes to unleash your brand, which does not do it and what you can do to improve it. Transform something vague into something quantifiable and agile.”

Yan said that while some brands are already adapting to this turn, most of them do not. Even companies that dominate traditional search engines often cannot appear in chatbot responses, not because they lack content, but because their existing content is not built in such a way that linguistic models can understand or mention.

“Most brands don’t show up at all,” said Yan. “The main companies that dominate on Google are missing in chatbot responses because their content are not structured in a way that LLMS can understand or mention. We have seen that the brands are overcome by competitors with a much smaller web presence only because those competitors are optimizing for LLM.

Athena’s platform aims to help companies fill this gap, but Yan is fast in saying that Geo is not a connection or replacement of good content. While Geo is able to identify where a brand is absent and suggests corrections, it still takes time to be displayed those changes in chatbot behavior.

“The biggest blind point is to assume that what works for traditional SEO will work for LLM,” said Yan. “These models are not classification pages, they involve useful responses. This means optimizing the structure, clarity and credibility, not only the keywords. There is also a delay between making a change and seeing it reflected in the behavior of the model. Geo is not a silver bullet, but it is quickly becoming a fundamental part of how the brands control their digital presence.”

That delay is one of the reasons why Athena focuses on measurement. By monitoring which suggestions do or do not emerge a brand, the platform offers companies a clearer idea of how they are behaving through different artificial intelligence systems and where they have to adapt.

Yan said that the strategy should also be modeled by the type of activity. “Saas companies, for example, must focus on instructions for use of use and queries during decision-decision such as” the best tools for the rowing teams of onboarding, “he said.” Ecommerce brands must optimize for mentions, comparisons and product reviews. Publishers must make sure their relationships are mentioned as authoritative. A dimension does not adapt to everyone, which is why Athena’s recommendations are adapted to the most precious suggestions in every sector. ”

While the space is still relatively new, the competition is already resuming. While multiple companies start experimenting Geo, visibility should become more difficult, just like he did with traditional SEO.

“Yes, it’s already going that way,” said Yan. “The first removals are seeing enormous earnings, but as more brands wake up with Geo, the competition will increase and the bar will increase. That’s why we built Athena to give companies a clear and fast way to measure their current position and act before this space is saturated. The window for the out of measure is now.”

Eli Schwartz, an angel investor and a longtime SEO consultant, said that the transition to the research of the AI could remodel the way in which billions of online expenses are influenced. “In the next decade, the research to unlock billions will unlock in B2B spending and the consumption and the Athena platform offers brands the precision and speed they need to take this opportunity once in the generation,” he said.

Ashley Stathrup, a former CMO of Talend and Search Study Algolia, added that visibility in generative platforms is already influencing web traffic. “The panoramic chatgpts and are enormously interrupting organic web traffic,” he said. “Athenahq helps companies identify suggestions that count and grow their part of voice in this new research environment.”

Athena was founded by Andrew Yan and Alan Yao, both of whom have deep backgrounds in the AI and research. Yan previously worked on the acquisition of information on Google Search. Yao has created artificial intelligence tools on Servicenow and has worked with the Openii platform before the public release of Chatgpt. Their team includes engineers and consultants of companies such as Openni, Anthropic and Deepmind.

With the acceleration of Discovery Aiven Accelerating and LLMS who play an increasing role in the way people get answers, Athena is betting that Geo will become a standard part of the strategy of each brand, not just a niche experiment.

(Photo of Sarah B)

See also: because marketing experts are rethinking SEO, the purchase of announcements and the use of data

Tag: Advertising, AI, Data, Digital Marketing, Ecommerce, Google, Customization, Saas, Search, SEO