In Laura’s last blog post, she explored why Share of Voice (SOV) is the PR metric even the CFO will love. It proves value, benchmarks performance, and helps tell a compelling story in the boardroom.
But there’s another reason SOV matters more than ever: the way people buy has changed.
The rise of AI in the buyer journey
It’s no longer just Google search or analyst reports shaping buyer perception. Increasingly, decision-makers are turning to large language models (LLMs), the ChatGPTs and copilots of the world, to get quick, confident answers.
When a potential customer asks, “Who are the leading cybersecurity providers for X?” or “Which SaaS companies are driving innovation in Y?”, the answer they see will be shaped by what’s out there in the public domain on credible sources and that’s your media coverage, thought leadership, social media and digital footprint.
In other words: if you don’t show up in the conversation, you don’t show up in the AI’s answer. This shift makes earned media behave more like performance marketing — directly influencing visibility, consideration, and growth.
Why this makes SOV critical
SOV isn’t just about counting mentions anymore. It’s about ensuring your brand is present, relevant, and credible enough to be surfaced by these new AI-powered intermediaries.
That means your SOV strategy isn’t just about winning headlines. It’s about training the ecosystem that LLMs (and by extension, your buyers) are learning from.
Showing up in the right places
This is where the nuance comes in. Having a 30% SOV number doesn’t mean much if it’s in publications or narratives that don’t influence the buying committee — or worse, if it’s dominated by crisis mentions.
Growth comes when your brand is visible in the right places:
SOV becomes not just a visibility metric, but a growth diagnostic: are you appearing in the conversations, and now, the AI answers, that matter to your buyers?
The growth connection
There’s long been evidence linking excess share of voice (ESOV) to market share growth. Now, in the age of LLMs, that effect is amplified. The more present and credible your brand is across earned media, the more likely you are to shape not just human perception, but machine-driven recommendations too.
And when you start influencing both, that’s when SOV truly becomes a growth lever.
The bottom line
SOV has always been a powerful metric to prove PR’s value. But now, it’s also a critical tool to ensure your brand is findable, credible, and recommended in a buyer journey where AI plays an increasing role.
It’s not just about owning more of the conversation. It’s about owning the conversations that humans, and the machines they trust, are using to make decisions.
Curious what your Share of Voice looks like in this new landscape? We’ll benchmark it for you and make sure you’re showing up where it matters most.
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