How to measure sentiment in AI search responses about your brand in 2026

Key takeawaysAI brand sentiment measures the tone AI engines use when describing your brand — endorsement, neutral, cautious, negative, or hallucination — and it's a different signal from social listening. The standard metric is a Net Sentiment Score (NSS) from −100 to +100, but the raw number matters less than the trend and your position versus competitors.**Most of your AI sentiment is shaped by third-party sources the model cites, not your own website, so fixing bad sentiment means fixing or earning coverage on the pages AI actually reads.**Hallucinations (fabricated pricing, features, or controversies) need a separate remediation playbook from ordinary negative mentions.Don't use the same model to classify sentiment that you're auditing — use a different model or keep a human in the loop.## Why sentiment in AI answers is its own problemHere's something that took me a while to internalize: when someone asks ChatGPT