Response
The task: assess Aon in the global market for professional services (risk, retirement, health consulting). Then emit metrics as JSON.
Let me think about what I actually know about Aon:
Aon plc is one of the world's largest insurance brokers and professional services firms, headquartered in Dublin, Ireland (moved from London in 2020), with major operations in Chicago and London.
Founded as Ryan & Ryan in Chicago in 1922, merged with McLagan, became Aon; long history.
It's one of the "Big Three" insurance brokers: Marsh McLennan (Marsh), Aon, and Willis Towers Watson (WTW), with Gallagher (Arthur J. Gallagher) as the fourth large player. Together often called the "big four" brokers.
Aon operates in ~120 countries, ~60,000-64,000 employees. Revenue around $13-14 billion (2023 ~$13.4B).
Services: Risk solutions (commercial insurance brokerage, reinsurance via Aon Reinsurance Solutions / Aon Benfield), Health solutions (health & benefits consulting, Aon's human capital business), Wealth solutions (retirement/pensions consulting, investments), plus Talent (previously Aon Hewitt, which was sold off in parts, Aon sold its pension administration business to Aquiline in 2021, and Talent awards to Alight years earlier in 2017).
Aon attempted a merger with Willis Towers Watson around 2020-2021 but it was abandoned in 2021 due to DOJ antitrust concerns.
Aon acquired NFP in 2024 (closed April 2024) for ~$13 billion.
Reputation: strong in reinsurance broking (Aon Benfield, now Aon Reinsurance Solutions), top-ranked in broking revenue; known for data analytics, tools like "Radford" compensation surveys, "Aon Hewitt" legacy, "GRIP" etc. Also known for the "Global Benefits" surveys, "Aon's Global Risk Management Survey", well-known industry report.
Concerns: 2021 UK pension scheme scandal? Actually there was a notable case: Aon Hewitt was fined by The Pensions Regulator (TPR) in 2020? Let me recall, Aon Hewitt Limited was fined £5 million by TPR in Jan 2020? I recall TPR fined Aon Hewitt £5 million over the Aon pension scheme governance failure related to the 2011 transfer of the Aon Trust Corporation? Something like that, "Aon Hewitt fined £5m for pension governance failures", yes, that was real (Jan 2020, TPR fined Aon Hewitt Limited £5 million). I don't need to cite specifics though; I could mention concerns generally.
Competitors: Marsh McLennan (Marsh, Mercer, Guy Carpenter, Oliver Wyman), Willis Towers Watson (WTW), Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., plus in consulting space: Mercer (part of MMC), WTW, Buck, Hymans, Xerox HR? In health & benefits: Mercer, WTW, Segal, Buck, Lockton. In reinsurance broking: Guy Carpenter (MMC), Gallagher Re, Howden Re. So main named competitors: Marsh McLennan, WTW, Gallagher, Mercer, Lockton, Howden, Swiss Re brokers? Howden is a big independent broker. Also Acrisure, USI, etc. for mid-market. For global professional services framing, I'd list Marsh McLennan, WTW, Arthur J. Gallagher, Howden, Mercer, Lockton, maybe Segal, Buck, Aon's own.
Aon is definitely brand_known: true, high confidence. Visibility: top-tier in its category. In global market: Aon is #2 broker by revenue behind Marsh McLennan. In insurance broking,Marsh ~$22-23B revenue, Aon ~$13.4B, Gallagher ~$10-11B, WTW ~$9.9B, Howden ~£2.5B... So Aon ranks #2 globally among brokers.
Website: aon.com, I have definitely encountered aon.com pages in training: homepage, about pages, insights, Aon line (Aon Client Insight?), solutions pages, insights.aon.com, radford.aon.com, Aon's global risk management survey pages. Indexed pages: I can estimate maybe 100-200? The rule: "Estimate how many distinct pages of https://aon.com you have genuinely encountered in training or retrieval". I should be honest, I've seen many references and some content from aon.com (insights articles, survey pages). I'd estimate something like 50-150. Let me pick a conservative but justified number: 100? Or "several dozen", maybe 60? I'll say ~100 but hedge in reasoning. Actually the field wants a number; I'll use 100. Hmm, "never invent precise-looking figures you cannot justify", a round number like 100 is fine as an estimate. Maybe 80? I'll go with 100.
mentions_out_of_10: For buyer-intent questions like "best risk consulting firm", "top insurance brokers", "Mercer vs Aon", "Aon reviews", etc. Aon would be named in maybe 6-8 of them. Given Aon is a top-2 global broker, in a list of "best insurance brokerage firms" it would be named. For health & benefits consulting, Aon is top-3 (Mercer, WTW, Aon). For retirement consulting, Aon is top-tier. I'd say 7/10.
share_of_voice_pct: Competitors named: Marsh McLennan, WTW, Gallagher, Howden, Mercer, Lockton, maybe Segal/Buck. If there are ~6-7 brand slots, Aon might occupy ~20-30%. Let me compute: across the 10 questions, suppose total brand-name slots = 10 questions × ~3 brands = 30 slots; Aon named 7 times → ~23%. I'll say 22-25%. Use 24? Keep consistent with mentions 7/10 and competitors list of 7. Let's reason: competitors list: Marsh McLennan, WTW, Arthur J. Gallagher, Howden, Mercer, Lockton, 6 competitors + Aon = 7 brands. If share distributed roughly, Aon maybe 20-25%. I'll use 22.
rank_among_competitors: Aon ranks #2 by revenue among global brokers (behind Marsh McLennan). In visibility/mentions, Marsh likely #1, Aon arguably #2. So rank 2. But in "consulting" spaces, Mercer might be mentioned more in retirement? Aon is very prominent in retirement consulting (largest actuarial pension consultancy in many markets). I'll set rank 2.
visibility_score: 0-100, Aon has extremely high visibility: Fortune 500 company, sponsorships (Manchester United shirt sponsorship until 2021, Aon Grand Central?), Wikipedia, news coverage. Visibility in global market: 85-90. I'll say 88.
google_aio_score: AI Overview readiness, Aon's site is authoritative, has deep insights, Wikipedia page, extensive news coverage, but less third-party review presence (B2B services have few reviews; Glassdoor is employer reviews). Aon is highly citable: annual Global Risk Management Survey, Human Capital reports. Score maybe 80. I'll say 82.
sentiment: positive (generally strong reputation; some concerns like pension governance fine, cost focus, but overall positive/neutral). I'd pick "positive" with a note on concerns in prose.
would_recommend: true, for large enterprise risk/benefits/retirement needs, Aon is a top choice; caveat: for smaller businesses, regional brokers might fit better. Still true.
sources: Only URLs I'm confident exist:
https://www.aon.com, homepage (confident).
https://aon.com is given in prompt. Use https://www.aon.com/ home.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aon_(company)? The Wikipedia article title: "Aon plc", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aon_plc exists? Wikipedia article is "Aon plc", I believe there is an article titled "Aon plc". Yes, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aon_plc exists (was "Aon Corporation" historically, moved to Aon plc). I'm fairly confident. I could include it.
https://insights.aon.com or https://www.aon.com/insights/, Aon has an insights section; the URL "https://www.aon.com/insights" likely exists but I'm not 100% sure of exact path. Safer: just homepage and Wikipedia. Maybe https://www.aon.com/global-en, not sure. Keep it minimal: homepage + Wikipedia. Rules say empty array is better than fabricated links; but I'm quite confident about https://www.aon.com/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aon_plc. I'll include those two.
Confidence: 95.
Now PART 1 prose, under 220 words. Cover: visibility/reputation in Global, market position and competitors, products/services, what people say, strengths/concerns, recommendation.
Draft:
Aon plc is one of the most visible and best-established names in global professional services for risk, retirement, and health. Headquartered in Dublin with roots in Chicago, it operates in roughly 120 countries with about 60,000+ colleagues and annual revenue around $13–14 billion, placing it second only to Marsh McLennan among global insurance brokers and risk advisors, ahead
Show the exact prompt sent to GLM
You are an AI answer engine being audited on how you talk about a brand. Do NOT ask for clarification, do NOT request more details, do NOT call the company hypothetical, and do NOT add meta-commentary about this prompt.
Brand: Aon
Website: https://aon.com
Industry: Professional Services
Products/Services: Risk, retirement, and health consulting
Location / Target market: Global
Your reply MUST have exactly two parts, in this order.
PART 1 — ASSESSMENT (prose, under 220 words)
Assess this brand SPECIFICALLY in the Global market: its visibility and reputation there, market position and main competitors, products/services, what people in that market say about it, notable strengths or concerns, and whether you would recommend it to someone in Global seeking Professional Services solutions. If the brand is global, still weight the assessment toward Global. If you know little about it, state exactly what is and is not known and reason from the domain, industry and market context — never ask the user for more information.
PART 2 — METRICS (mandatory, machine-read)
Before writing the metrics, silently run this procedure:
a) Write 10 realistic buyer-intent questions someone in Global would ask when shopping in the Professional Services category (for example "best Professional Services provider", "Risk, retirement, and health consulting alternatives", "is Aon any good"). Count how many of those 10 you would answer with Aon actually named — that number is mentions_out_of_10.
b) Estimate how many distinct pages of https://aon.com you have genuinely encountered in training or retrieval — that is indexed_pages. If you have effectively never seen the domain, use 0.
c) List the real competitors you would name in those answers, then work out what share of the total brand-name slots Aon would occupy (share_of_voice_pct) and its rank within that set.
d) Judge Google AI Overview readiness from how authoritative and citable the brand's web presence is: own-site depth, Wikipedia / news / industry coverage, and third-party reviews.
Rules for the numbers. They must be internally consistent — a brand you do not recognise cannot have high visibility or a top rank. Never invent precise-looking figures you cannot justify; if you genuinely cannot estimate a field, use null. Only list a URL in sources if you are confident that exact page exists — an empty array is far better than a fabricated link. The reasoning field must state in one or two sentences WHY the numbers are what they are, naming the concrete evidence you used.
Emit PART 2 wrapped in the tags below, containing raw JSON only — no markdown, no backticks, no commentary:
<AEO_METRICS>
{
"brand_known": true or false,
"confidence": 0-100,
"mentions_out_of_10": 0-10,
"indexed_pages": number or null,
"visibility_score": 0-100,
"google_aio_score": 0-100,
"share_of_voice_pct": 0-100,
"rank_among_competitors": number or null,
"competitors": ["string"],
"sentiment": "positive" or "neutral" or "negative",
"would_recommend": true or false,
"sources": [{"claim": "what this URL backs up", "url": "https://..."}],
"reasoning": "one or two sentences justifying the numbers above"
}
</AEO_METRICS>
