Public AI Visibility Market Strategy Report - Online Stock Brokers

Answer Capsule

Public holds 16.67% valid recommendation coverage in the October 2026 Online Stock Brokers benchmark, placing it ninth of ten tracked brands. The brand is visible but under-recommended: it appears in 21.43% of qualified observations yet converts only a fraction of that presence into recommendation credit. Its clearest win is a strong positive sentiment profile at 0.8125 with zero negative mentions. Its clearest weakness is a top-three rate of 1.34% and a rank-one rate of 0.15%, meaning AI systems rarely place Public on the buyer shortlist. The clearest opportunity is closing the gap between raw mention presence and valid recommendation coverage inside the Brand Recommendation cluster.

Who This Report Is For

This report is for Public's marketing, growth, and product leadership teams, and for category analysts tracking how AI-generated recommendations are reshaping broker discovery in the Online Stock Brokers market.

Report Card

Executive Summary

Public is visible in AI-generated answers about online stock brokers but is not being recommended at the rate its presence would suggest. The brand recorded 144 mentions across 672 qualified observations, a raw mention presence rate of 21.43%, yet its valid recommendation coverage was 16.67%. That gap between being mentioned and being recommended is the central finding of this report.

Sentiment is not the problem. Public recorded 117 positive mentions, 27 neutral mentions, and zero negative mentions, producing a net sentiment score of 0.8125. AI systems frame Public positively when they surface it. The issue is placement and frequency, not tone.

The strongest cluster signal comes from the single measured cluster, Best IRA Accounts and Top Providers, where Public holds 16.67% valid recommendation coverage against a category leader at 84.52%. The strongest platform signal is Google AI Overviews, where Public recorded a 19.66% valid recommendation coverage rate and 35 valid recommendations, the highest platform-level totals for the brand.

The weakest platform signal is Copilot, where Public recorded an 18.52% valid recommendation coverage rate but zero top-three placements and zero rank-one placements across 81 observations. Gemini shows a similar pattern: 11.11% valid recommendation coverage with two top-three placements and no rank-one placements.

The clearest gap is recommendation conversion. Public appears in roughly one in five qualified observations but earns a top-three placement in only 1.34% of them and a rank-one placement in 0.15%. Competitors like Fidelity and Charles Schwab convert presence into recommendation credit at rates above 70% on top-three placement. Public's challenge is not being seen. It is being chosen.

What Public Is Winning

Questions This Section Answers

• Where does Public perform strongest across the AI platforms tracked?
• Is Public's sentiment profile actually a competitive advantage in the Online Stock Brokers category?

Public's clearest win is its sentiment profile. Across 144 mentions, the brand recorded zero negative mentions and a net sentiment score of 0.8125. This places it in positive framing territory alongside every other tracked brand, and it means AI systems are not surfacing Public as a cautionary example or a comparison anchor.

The brand's second win is its Google AI Overviews performance. Public recorded 35 valid recommendations on that platform, a 19.66% valid recommendation coverage rate, and a 19.66% positive visibility rate. That is the strongest platform-level recommendation signal in Public's data. Google AI Overviews also produced the highest monthly AI authority value for Public among all platforms.

Public's third win is its Perplexity presence. The brand recorded a 26.44% valid recommendation coverage rate on Perplexity, its highest platform-level coverage rate, along with one rank-one placement. The sample is smaller than on other platforms, but the signal is directionally positive.

These wins are real but narrow. Public does not hold a dominant position in any cluster, and its top-three and rank-one rates remain in the low single digits across the benchmark.

Where Public Has the Clearest AI Visibility Gaps

Questions This Section Answers

• Why does Public's mention presence not convert into recommendation placement?
• Which competitors take the recommendation slot when Public is displaced?

Public's most significant gap is recommendation conversion. The brand appears in 21.43% of qualified observations but earns a valid recommendation in only 16.67% of them. That 4.76-point gap between presence and recommendation means AI systems are mentioning Public without placing it on the shortlist.

The gap widens further when placement is considered. Public's top-three rate is 1.34%, meaning it appears among the top three recommended options in just 9 of 672 qualified observations. Its rank-one rate is 0.15%, meaning it is the first recommendation in a single observation. By contrast, Fidelity holds a 74.55% top-three rate and a 48.21% rank-one rate. Charles Schwab holds a 71.73% top-three rate and an 18.90% rank-one rate.

The displacement pattern is clear. When AI systems recommend online stock brokers, they consistently place Fidelity, Charles Schwab, Interactive Brokers, and Robinhood ahead of Public. Interactive Brokers holds a 50.45% top-three rate, and Robinhood holds a 23.96% top-three rate. Public's 1.34% top-three rate places it closer to Merrill Edge at 0.15% than to the mid-field.

Platform-level gaps reinforce the pattern. On Copilot, Public recorded zero top-three placements and zero rank-one placements across 81 observations, despite an 18.52% valid recommendation coverage rate. On Gemini, Public recorded two top-three placements and zero rank-one placements across 72 observations. These platforms are surfacing Public as a reference but not as a recommendation.

The cluster-level picture is equally concentrated. All 672 qualified observations in October 2026 fell into the Brand Recommendation cluster. Public's 16.67% coverage in that cluster trails the category leader by 67.85 points. The benchmark does not yet contain qualified observations in the Pricing and Value or Multi-Brand Comparison clusters, so Public's performance in those buyer-intent stages cannot be measured from this dataset.

Biggest Opportunity

Questions This Section Answers

• What would it take for Public to move from being mentioned to being placed in the top three on high-intent brokerage prompts?

Public's biggest opportunity is converting its existing mention presence into recommendation credit within the Brand Recommendation cluster. The brand already appears in 21.43% of qualified observations. The gap is not awareness. It is shortlist eligibility.

The prompts driving this cluster are high-intent recommendation queries such as "What brokerage account is the best?" and "What is the most trusted stock broker?" These are the questions where AI systems form the buyer shortlist. Public is being mentioned in these answers but not being placed in the top three.

Closing this gap requires targeted work on the prompt, page, and citation layers that shape how AI systems evaluate and rank broker options. The opportunity is specific: move from reference to recommendation in the prompts where Public already appears.

Competitive Landscape

Questions This Section Answers

• How does Public's top-three and rank-one performance compare to Fidelity, Charles Schwab, and the mid-field brokers?
• What does Public's average recommended rank of 6.34 say about where it typically lands when it does receive rank credit?

Fidelity and Charles Schwab hold dominant recommendation-stage strength in the Online Stock Brokers category, with Interactive Brokers and Robinhood forming a strong second tier. Public sits in the lower cohort, ahead of only Merrill Edge on top-three placement.

Average recommended rank covers rank-eligible recommendations only.

Public's 1.34% top-three rate places it ninth of ten tracked brands, ahead of only Merrill Edge. Its average recommended rank of 6.34 is the second-lowest in the field, meaning that when Public does receive rank credit, it typically appears near the bottom of the recommendation set. The brand's sentiment score of 0.8125 is competitive with the mid-field, but sentiment alone does not convert to shortlist placement.

Prompt Evidence

Questions This Section Answers

• Which high-intent prompts does Public appear in, and on which platforms does it receive recommendation credit?

Google AI Overviews / Brand Recommendation Prompt: "What brokerage account is the best?" Result: Public received a valid recommendation in this prompt type, contributing to its 19.66% platform-level coverage rate on Google AI Overviews.

Copilot / Brand Recommendation Prompt: "What is the most trusted stock broker?" Result: Public was mentioned but received zero top-three placements on Copilot across 81 observations, indicating presence without recommendation conversion.

Gemini / Brand Recommendation Prompt: "What trading platform is the best?" Result: Public recorded two top-three placements on Gemini across 72 observations, with no rank-one placements.

Perplexity / Brand Recommendation Prompt: "What are the best online brokerages?" Result: Public recorded a 26.44% valid recommendation coverage rate on Perplexity, its highest platform-level coverage, with one rank-one placement.

What CiteWorks Studio Would Do Next

Phase 1: AI Visibility Market Discovery Audit Map the specific prompts where Public appears but is not recommended, and identify which competitors take the recommendation slot when Public is displaced.

Phase 2: Recommendation Readiness Plan Prioritize the prompt themes and platform surfaces where Public has the clearest path from mention to shortlist placement, starting with Google AI Overviews and Perplexity.

Phase 3: Owned Answer Layer Buildout Strengthen Public's owned pages and structured content so AI systems can retrieve clear, recommendation-ready answers about the brand's positioning, account features, and differentiators.

Phase 4: Citation and Authority Layer Development Build the third-party source footprint that AI systems cite when forming broker recommendations, focusing on the review and comparison sites that dominate the citation layer.

Phase 5: Monthly AI Visibility and Recommendation Tracking Track Public's top-three rate, rank-one rate, and valid recommendation coverage month over month to measure whether presence is converting into shortlist placement.

Why This Matters

AI presence alone is not enough. Public appears in one in five qualified observations about online stock brokers, but it earns a top-three recommendation in only 1.34% of them. That gap represents the difference between being part of the conversation and being part of the buyer shortlist.

The next move is targeted correction of the prompt, page, and citation layers that shape how AI systems evaluate and rank broker options. Public does not need to fix its sentiment or its visibility. It needs to fix its recommendation conversion.

Core Metrics

Sentiment Score

Sentiment Score = (positive mentions × 1 + neutral mentions × 0 + negative mentions × -1) / total mentions

Public's sentiment score is 0.8125. This is calculated from 117 positive mentions, 27 neutral mentions, and zero negative mentions across 144 total mentions.

This matters because unclassified mention counts are misleading. A positive recommendation, a neutral reference, a cautionary mention, and a competitor-displaced mention are not equal. Counting all mentions as wins is bad measurement. Public's zero negative mentions are a genuine strength, but its 27 neutral mentions represent observations where the brand was referenced without a clear positive recommendation. Classified sentiment is required before interpreting AI visibility, and Public's sentiment profile is positive but does not by itself indicate recommendation strength.

Share of voice is a diagnostic metric, not a business KPI. Public's 21.43% presence rate tells you the brand is being seen. It does not tell you whether the brand is being chosen.

Sentiment by Platform

Methodology

1. This report is a benchmark-based analysis of Public's AI visibility and recommendation performance in the Online Stock Brokers category for October 2026. It is not a client implementation case study.
2. The reporting window is October 2026. The benchmark series began in July 2026.
3. Six AI and search surface families were tracked: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and Google AI Mode.
4. The October 2026 benchmark produced 672 qualified observations after qualification from 800 raw prompt-surface observations.
5. The competitor universe includes ten tracked brands: Charles Schwab, E*TRADE, Fidelity, Interactive Brokers, Merrill Edge, Public, Robinhood, Tastytrade, Vanguard, and Webull.
6. One public high-intent cluster was measured: Best IRA Accounts and Top Providers (C01). Two additional clusters, IRA Provider Comparisons (C02) and IRA Fees, Costs and Contribution Limits (C03), returned no qualified observations in this reporting period.
7. Stage 0 extraction retained the query, AI or search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and, where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources.
8. A mention is defined as any qualified observation where Public appeared in the AI-generated answer, whether or not it was recommended.
9. A valid recommendation is defined as a qualified observation where Public received one or more valid, non-placeholder recommendations. Negative, neutral, cautionary, comparison-anchor, and listed-only mentions are not counted as valid recommendations.
10. Top-three rate and rank-one rate are calculated against the 672 qualified observations, not the raw collection.
11. Average recommended rank covers rank-eligible recommendations only. Public's average recommended rank of 6.34 reflects its position when it receives rank credit.
12. The benchmark records which sources appeared alongside answers, not whether those sources caused the recommendation. Source presence is evidence about the information environment, not automatic proof of causation.
13. Unique question count for October 2026 was 582. The public benchmark does not expose the full prompt-level dataset.
14. All 672 qualified observations in October 2026 fell into the Brand Recommendation buyer-intent class. Pricing and Value and Multi-Brand Comparison classes returned zero qualified observations.

See How AI Is Recommending Your Brand

The public benchmark shows where Public stands in AI-generated broker recommendations. A company-level AI visibility audit maps the specific prompts, platforms, and competitor displacement patterns that explain why. It answers the questions this benchmark raises, with the specificity needed to act.