Zene vs Profound
Profound is the best-funded company in this category: a $180M Series D at a $1.8B valuation (September 2026), over 1,000 enterprise brands, and a product that now calls itself "the AI platform for marketing teams" rather than an analytics dashboard. It has agents that draft and publish content, licensed prompt-volume data, bot rendering at the edge and fact-checking.
The short version: Profound is bought; Zene is started. Profound's pricing page now shows a 7-day trial or custom Enterprise - the earlier self-serve tiers are gone. If you have budget and a procurement process, Profound earns its seat. If you want to see your AI visibility today and act on it this week for $19 a month, that's the job Zene is built for.
Choose Zene if…
- You want to start now, self-serve, free, without a sales call
- You need a published price - free plan, Pro $19/mo, Growth $49/mo, Agency $99/mo
- You want Grok tracked - Profound's pricing page no longer lists it
- One person owns the outcome and needs prioritized fixes, not a platform rollout
Choose Profound if…
- You're an enterprise brand that needs agents publishing to your CMS behind an approval step
- You want licensed prompt-volume data (1.3B+ conversations) to decide which questions matter
- You need Google AI Overviews, AI Mode, Copilot and DeepSeek next to ChatGPT and Claude
- You want edge bot rendering, agent analytics from 8+ log sources and FactCheck in one contract
Weighing more than two tools? See 7 Profound alternatives, with prices.
The comparison, in one table.
| Zene | Profound | |
|---|---|---|
| Engines tracked | ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, Grok | 9 on the pricing page: ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Mode, Gemini, Copilot, DeepSeek, Claude, AI Overviews, Exa Search. Grok is no longer listed |
| Free plan / trial | Free forever: 1 brand, 10 questions, ChatGPT + Gemini, scans on demand, no card | 7-day trial: 50 prompts daily on ChatGPT, Gemini and AI Overviews; no Shopping, Agent Analytics or API |
| Entry price | $0; Pro $19/mo (2 brands, 15 questions, all 5 engines) | Custom Enterprise (no published self-serve tier) |
| How you buy | Self-serve, start free in minutes | Trial, then a sales-led Enterprise contract |
| Fixes / content | Pro: prioritized action plan, content drafts (brief, FAQ, schema, llms.txt), outreach list | Agents that research, write and publish to 8+ CMSs after human approval |
| Demand data | Question discovery from People Also Ask, related searches and autocomplete (Pro) | Prompt Volumes: 1.3B+ licensed conversations, 35 countries |
| AI crawler data | Log drains (Vercel, Cloudflare, JSON) | Agent Analytics from CloudFront, Cloudflare, Fastly, Vercel, Akamai and more; Dynamic Bot Rendering |
| Integrations | Read-only MCP server from Pro; Slack, Teams and webhook alerts from Growth; the REST API, Zapier, Looker Studio and MCP write tools on Agency | MCP, REST API with SDKs, Tableau and Looker connectors, GA4 and Adobe Analytics |
| Best for | Startups, SMBs, lean agencies | Enterprise brand, comms and SEO teams |
Facts as of October 4, 2026, from Profound's public pages (sources below). Both products ship fast - verify current details at tryprofound.com and on our pricing page.
Where Profound is stronger
Almost everywhere an enterprise buyer looks. Profound tracks nine engines including Google AI Overviews, AI Mode and Copilot. Its agents run content workflows end to end and publish to CMSs such as WordPress, Webflow, Contentful and Sanity after a human approves. Prompt Volumes gives demand data from licensed panels, Dynamic Bot Rendering serves a rendered page to AI agents at the edge, FactCheck checks answers against your knowledge base, and there's a hosted MCP server. Customers named in its funding announcement include Walmart, Figma and MongoDB.
Where Zene is different
Zene is for the team where one person owns AI visibility and the budget is a line item, not a contract. Signup is self-serve, the free plan never expires, and Pro at $19/month covers 2 brands and 15 questions shared across them on all five live engines - including Grok, which Profound's pricing page no longer lists. Each gap becomes a prioritized action with drafts you can ship. You're not buying a platform rollout; you're starting a weekly loop of scan, fix and re-scan.
Pricing
Zene's pricing is public and flat: Free, Pro $19/month, Growth $49/month, Agency $99/month ($190/$490/$990 yearly), in USD. Profound's pricing page shows a 7-day trial and custom Enterprise pricing; an agency plan gives 400 credits per client workspace. A third party reported that Profound dropped its earlier self-serve tiers in mid-September 2026, which matches what the live page shows.
Can you outgrow Zene into Profound?
Yes, some companies will. When several departments need the same AI-search data, CMS publishing and licensed demand data, evaluate the enterprise tier of the market. The question sets, competitor lists and fix habits you built with Zene carry over.
Sources · facts as of October 4, 2026
Every Profound fact on this page comes from these public pages, checked on October 4, 2026. Zene's side comes from our pricing page and methodology. Spot something outdated? Tell us and we'll fix it.
Common questions.
For startups, SMBs and lean agencies, yes - both track how AI engines talk about your brand. Profound is an enterprise platform with a 7-day trial and custom pricing; Zene is self-serve, has a free plan, and turns visibility gaps into a prioritized action plan.
Zene publishes flat pricing: free plan, Pro $19/mo, Growth $49/mo, Agency $99/mo. Profound's pricing page shows only a 7-day trial and custom Enterprise pricing (checked 2026-10-04).
Profound's pricing page lists nine engines - ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Mode, Gemini, Copilot, DeepSeek, Claude, AI Overviews and Exa Search - and no longer lists Grok. Zene tracks Grok on Pro, alongside ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity.
Usually Zene, because the operating model fits: no procurement, a free start, and fixes one person can ship. Profound's agents, licensed prompt volumes and edge rendering earn their cost when several teams use them.
Zene vs Peec AI
Zene vs Otterly.AISee the difference on your own brand.
Run a free Zene audit on ChatGPT and Gemini (all five engines on Pro) - then make the call with your real data.
