The raw score
Each answer earns points:
A Weak answer earns the same 50 as a Mentioned one, even when it names you to criticise you. The score measures whether the engines put you in front of buyers. What they say about you is how AI describes you, shown next to the score and not part of it.
Averaged the same way as Mentioned and Recommended, the points come to the mean of the two, so the raw score is (Mentioned + Recommended) ÷ 2.
Why the score is calibrated
Raw scores bunch up at the bottom. Most brands are named in a small share of answers, so a raw score of 15 can already put a brand among the real contenders in its category. Shown as-is, the scale would make nearly every brand look like a failure and hide real progress. Heralded places the raw score on a calibrated scale, where each number marks a measured position:
Between these points the scale is a straight line, with one addition at the bottom: a single named answer always reads at least 1. So 0 means that across the prompts that don’t name you, no measured answer named you.
How the scale was measured
In September 2026 Heralded took the latest Snapshot of 47 brands and ranked the brands each one named. It found the raw score of a weak contender, a typical contender, a typical top-three brand and a typical category leader, and pinned the calibrated scale to those four points. Two caveats apply. The sample is small, and it was measured with an earlier version of the answer reading. Heralded plans to refit the scale on a much larger set of brands.The score bands
Next to the score, Heralded names the band it falls in. Five bands cover the scale:
A Strong score sits between a typical top-three brand and a typical category leader. The band names a range of the score. It is not Recommended, the share of answers that recommend you.
The API serves the 50 to 69 band as
Recommended in heralded_score_band, score_bands and the band of a score, as it always has, and the names never change within v1. The app, the emails and the share cards show it as Strong.