Mentioned vs MailScout: AI Visibility for Trade Contractors
If you're a contractor looking to track visibility in AI (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, Gemini), you've probably run into both Mentioned and other reputation tools. Here's what's actually different.
What MailScout does well
MailScout focuses on email reputation and deliverability—keeping your outreach messages out of spam folders. If you're running email campaigns to leads, that's useful. It tells you if your domain is on blacklists, gives you authentication scores, and monitors bounce rates.
That's a real problem. Bad email deliverability kills lead flow. MailScout solves for that.
Where Mentioned is different
Mentioned doesn't care about email reputation. It measures AI visibility—whether homeowners find you when they ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, or Gemini for a contractor recommendation. That's a different problem entirely.
Email deliverability assumes you're already reaching leads. AI visibility assumes you're being found by leads. These are upstream and downstream of the same funnel.
Here's the gap: 87% of trade contractors are invisible in AI systems. That means when a homeowner asks ChatGPT "who's a good electrician near me," your competitor shows up and you don't. Not because your email bounces. Because you never appear in the AI's training data or sources to begin with.
Mentioned tracks your presence across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini. It scores you out of 100. Median contractor scores 32/100. Top contractors score 79/100. The gap is almost entirely mechanical—schema markup, citation patterns, content distribution. Fixable in 30-90 days.
We've audited 137 contractors so far. Free 90-second audit at mentionedinai.com. See your actual score. See your gap vs competitors.
Best fit comparison
| Use MailScout if... | Your email campaigns are bouncing or hitting spam. You're already getting leads and need to fix deliverability. |
| Use Mentioned if... | You want to know if homeowners can find you in AI. You're not showing up in ChatGPT/Perplexity and want a playbook to fix it. |
| Use both if... | You're building a complete lead funnel: AI visibility upstream (Mentioned) + email authority downstream (MailScout). |
Why the distinction matters
The contracting market has been trained by Google—search for a plumber, get results. But homeowners are shifting. They're asking AI first. "Hey ChatGPT, I need a reliable electrician. Who should I call?"
If you're not in that answer, no email campaign fixes it. You're not in the game.
Email deliverability is table stakes. AI visibility is the new lever.
What Mentioned gives you
- Your AI Visibility Score (0-100). Baseline against 137 audited contractors. See your gap.
- Specific playbook to move the needle. Not "write better content." Actual steps: schema markup patterns, citation velocity, publication strategy, keyword positioning.
- Open dataset. All 137 audits CC-BY-4.0. No hidden proprietary secret. You can verify the methodology yourself. Compare your trade. See if the top scorer is your neighbor or across the country.
- Real-world validation. Early implementations are moving scores +3 to +6 points per phase. Not +16 point overnight claims. Honest signal.
Next step
Run your free 90-second audit. Takes less time than a text message. Get your AI Visibility Score. See where you rank against other contractors in your trade and region.
Founder offer closes July 4: $297/month or $1,497 lifetime. After that, standard pricing.
Methodology is open. All findings, all scripts, all data is public CC-BY-4.0. No black box. You can audit the auditor.
See your MailScout AI visibility score in
Enter your business below. We run live queries across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini. You get your score in under 90 seconds.
Common questions about AI visibility for MailScout contractors in
Google ranks pages. AI search engines like ChatGPT and Perplexity name specific businesses in answers. A MailScout contractor in can rank #1 on Google and still be invisible in ChatGPT, because the signals are different (schema, citations, structured data, training-data presence).
Most MailScout contractors see meaningful score lift within 30-60 days of implementing the three core fixes: Google Business Profile completion, consistent industry directory listings, and schema markup. The 47-point gap between median (32) and top performers (79) is closeable.
Yes. Roughly 40% of homeowner searches now start in ChatGPT or Perplexity instead of Google. Even with strong Google rankings, you can be completely invisible in AI answers, which means losing calls you don't even know about.
Your AI visibility score across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini. Specific gap analysis against top performers in . Three highest-leverage fixes prioritized by impact. Takes 90 seconds, no card required.