Competitor tracking in AI search compares a brand with its rivals across the same monitored questions and the same answers, so visibility is read relative to the alternatives rather than in isolation. The core comparison is mention count and mention rate over a period; the competitor set is usually a mix of brands saved deliberately and brands detected in the answers themselves.
In plain terms
Saved competitors provide the comparison set used during answer analysis; additional brands mentioned in answers may be surfaced as detected competitors.
The competitive landscape ranks brands by mention rate by default, or by a supported market-weight sort when requested.
GetCited.me does not calculate the same per-run sentiment and mention-position fields for every competitor that it calculates for the monitored brand.
Why it matters
The monitored brand's mention rate is easier to interpret when the same answer set shows which alternatives appear instead.
Saved and detected competitor data identifies observable gaps without claiming market share, search impressions, or competitor sentiment that the backend does not measure.