Profound’s own research into how Singapore consumers use AI assistants is the backdrop for its Singapore expansion, and it should make every global brand ask a hard question: do AI assistants recommend us in markets where we never checked? That is the backdrop for Profound’s Singapore expansion, and it should make every global brand ask a hard question: do AI assistants recommend us in markets where we never checked?
What Profound actually announced
Profound has set up its Asia-Pacific headquarters in Singapore. According to Marketing Tech News, the hub will support brands across Southeast Asia, Japan, Australia and New Zealand, and will house regional leadership, sales and customer teams. The office is planned for Singapore’s Central Business District in the fourth quarter of 2026.
Hiring is part of the story. ContentGrip reports that Profound plans more than 15 local roles over the next 12 months, with some New York staff relocating for a year to help establish operations.
A vendor opening an office is not proof that your category has shifted. It is a signal about where a well-funded AI visibility vendor expects demand. Profound also says it is used by 16% of the Fortune 500, which suggests large enterprises are a core part of its customer base. The question is whether yours measures beyond its home market.
The numbers, and what they do not prove
According to Marketing Tech News, Profound’s analysis of 1.8 million anonymised ChatGPT and Gemini conversations found that the share about researching, comparing or buying products and services rose 23% between January and September 2026. Read that carefully. It measures the proportion of conversations with commercial intent, not completed purchases, and Profound did not disclose how many led to transactions.
Adopters are plentiful. The same Marketing Tech News report cites Stanford’s AI Index estimating Singapore’s AI adoption at 61% in the second half of 2025, second globally and first in Asia-Pacific.
Then there is the revenue angle. Adobe’s data, as summarized by Marketing Tech News, shows AI-referred visitors to US retail sites converting at a 90% higher rate than non-AI visitors. The same summary puts revenue per visit for those AI-referred visitors 83% higher. Useful, but it covers US retailers, and it does not show the same pattern in Singapore.
Treat vendor and platform data as a reason to run your own test, not as a forecast for your category. Discovery signals are not sales.
Why a home-market score hides regional gaps
Here is the finding that matters most for your audit. Semrush’s October AI Visibility Index, covered in the same article, found that fewer than half of the 100 most-mentioned brands also appeared among the 100 most-cited domains. It also found differences in brand visibility between AI platforms and between geographies, though it studied the UK and US, not Asia-Pacific.
Translation: being mentioned is not the same as being cited, and a strong showing in one assistant or country tells you little about another. A brand with a healthy US score can be invisible in Tokyo or Sydney. Nobody would notice, because nobody was looking.
The brand reach audit: five steps
You do not need a new vendor to start. You need a disciplined, repeatable process.
- Pick markets by revenue and ambition. List your top five current markets and two you want to enter. Singapore, Japan and Australia are obvious Profound-adjacent candidates, but your own sales data decides.
- Build a query panel per market. Use local phrasing and local languages, not translated English prompts. Our guide on query panels over third-party scores explains why a fixed, auditable prompt set beats a black-box number.
- Test across platforms. Run the same panel in ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Mode and AI Overviews. Log mentions, citations, sentiment and competitors named.
- Separate mention from citation. For every gap, ask which domain the assistant trusted instead of yours. Entity clarity often explains it, as covered in entity clarity and citations.
- Check for false or stale claims. Regional answers can carry outdated pricing, wrong availability or invented claims. A chatbot brand audit catches these before customers act on them.
Repeat monthly. AI answers shift, so a one-off snapshot is a screenshot, not a measurement.
Where creators fit in
Influencer programs are not a side note here. Assistants lean on third-party evidence, and creator content with clear claims and credentials can supply it. If you run regional programs, brief creators on the facts you want surfaced, in the local language, with proof. See creator proof over follower counts for how to evaluate partners on that basis.
Local creators also know how people in their market actually phrase questions. That is free query research, and it feeds your panel.
Buying a tool: pilot first
If the audit shows real gaps, you may want a platform. Profound is one option among several, and tracker outputs differ more than vendor demos suggest. Compare options in Otterly, Peec and Profound compared, and run a paid pilot on two markets with your own prompts. Ask each vendor about language coverage, local data collection and how often panels refresh. Regional headcount is nice. Regional measurement quality is what you are buying.
A new Asia-Pacific office tells you where a vendor is investing. Only your own query panel tells you where your brand is visible.
FAQs
What did Profound announce in Singapore?
Profound established its Asia-Pacific headquarters in Singapore to serve Southeast Asia, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. The office will host regional leadership, sales and customer teams, and is planned to open in the fourth quarter of 2026.
Does the Singapore expansion prove AI search drives sales in Asia-Pacific?
No. No. Profound’s analysis measures the share of conversations involving product research, comparison or purchase, not completed transactions, and Adobe’s conversion data covers US retailers only, as Marketing Tech News notes. Adobe’s conversion data covers US retailers only.
Why do brands need market-level AI visibility checks?
Visibility varies by platform and by geography. Semrush found that fewer than half of the most-mentioned brands also ranked among the most-cited domains, so a single global score can hide regional gaps.
Do I need Profound to run a brand reach audit?
No. A manual query panel across ChatGPT, Gemini and Google’s AI surfaces can reveal most gaps. Consider a tool when you need scale, scheduling and competitor benchmarking, and pilot before committing.
How often should I repeat the audit?
Monthly is a sensible start. AI answers change often, and trend lines are more reliable than single snapshots.
Next step: pick two priority markets this week, write 25 local-language buying queries for each, and run them across ChatGPT and Gemini to establish your first baseline.
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