OtterlyAI wins AI search award as visibility tracking gains traction

OtterlyAI’s win in Porto was more than a shiny trophy. The Austria-based company took the Best AI Search Software Solution title at the European Search Awards 2026, a category that did not even exist until 2025, and it did so in a field of eleven finalists. That kind of recognition matters because it shows AI search monitoring is no longer being treated like a side experiment for early adopters. It is now a category with enough buyers, vendors and competitive pressure to stand on its own.

The timing is telling. OtterlyAI said it surpassed 30,000 active users by May 21, 2026, up from 10,000 users in a Sept. 23, 2025 announcement. That jump points to real demand for tools that can measure how brands surface inside ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode, Gemini and Copilot, not just where they sit in traditional blue-link rankings. For marketers trying to explain why a competitor shows up in an AI response more often than they do, that kind of visibility is becoming a budget line, not a curiosity.

OtterlyAI was built around exactly that problem. Founded in 2024 by Thomas Peham, Josef Trauner and Klaus-M. Schremser, the company says the work started with its own need to understand brand and website performance on AI search engines. Its platform now tracks visibility across the major generative systems buyers are testing in real campaigns, and the company’s pitch is blunt: classic rank tracking is not enough if discovery is happening before a click ever exists.

The European Search Awards win also gives the market a clearer signal. OtterlyAI said the judges saw the product as a forward-thinking answer to the black box of AI search and liked its idea of agent analytics, which treats generative responses as fluid, persona-driven outputs that older SEO dashboards cannot capture well. That framing is exactly where the market is heading. Brands are no longer only asking where they rank for a keyword. They are asking which prompts, which models and which personas mention them at all.

The award also lines up with broader industry validation. OtterlyAI said it was one of just five vendors named in Gartner’s 2025 Cool Vendors in AI Marketing report, reinforcing that AI visibility software is moving into procurement conversations, not just conference panels. With eleven finalists in the category and a fast climb in users, OtterlyAI’s latest win suggests AI search analytics has crossed a threshold: it is now being measured, bought and judged like a mainstream marketing tool.