Being widely present is not leading the answer: the PRecious AI Authority Index separates brand reach from prominence
PRecious Communications, an award-winning multi-market integrated communications consultancy, has released the regional findings of its flagship research study, the PRecious AI Authority Index: Southeast Asia Banking 2026.
THE HIGHLIGHTS
- Reach vs. prominence divide: BPI achieved the highest answer reach across consumer (73%), business (96%), and trust (92%) questions.
- BDO first-mention sweep: BDO captured the highest first-mention share across all four question groups, including 75% in business banking and 64% in trust questions.
- Strategic takeaway: High presence (BPI) must be converted into leading prominence, while leading prominence (BDO) requires continuous source verification.
WHAT THE PHILIPPINE RESULTS SHOW
The research establishes why corporate communications and marketing leaders cannot rely on a single AI platform, dashboard score, or generic brand search to assess digital reputation. Powered by PRecious Pulse, the agency’s proprietary measurement and research platform, the study tested Philippine AI answers to reveal a sharp divergence between total brand visibility and first-mention prominence.
BPI secured the broadest answer reach across consumer, business, and trust queries, reaching 96% in business banking, while BDO claimed the highest first-mention share across all four tested question categories.
In business banking, BPI appeared in 96% of answers, but BDO was named first in 75% of responses. Similarly, in consumer banking, BPI led reach at 73%, while BDO led first mentions at 31%.
“The Philippine result makes the distinction very clear: visibility and prominence are different jobs,” said Paolo Alba, regional vice president and Philippines country lead at PRecious Communications. “Communications teams need to know not only whether the bank appears, but what is said, why it is placed there and whether the supporting story reflects the experience customers actually have.”
“First mention in an AI answer is not an endorsement or a measure of customer preference,” said Lars Voedisch, founder and group CEO. “It indicates narrative order. Philippine communicators must examine what AI says about their institution, not just how often the name appears.”
SOUTHEAST ASIA IS NOT ONE INFORMATION ENVIRONMENT
The regional study covers Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. It found consistent leaders in some markets and divided or question-dependent patterns in others. Different languages, banking structures and customer needs already make Southeast Asia diverse. AI can amplify that diversity by changing the brands, evidence, and order of answers shown to different audiences.
The study is diagnostic. It does not rank bank quality, trust, safety, customer preference or financial performance. First mention records answer order only. Results are a point-in-time snapshot from August 2026 and can change as services, search, and public evidence change.
HOW THE STUDY WAS DONE
The PRecious AI Authority Index examines what AI says about a brand, which public evidence supports the answer, where the gaps are and what communications teams can change. PRecious Pulse is the measurement, research and insights platform behind the work.
- Banks tracked (16): 13 priority banks grouped by home market, including BPI and BDO for the Philippines, plus three global-bank examples (HSBC, Standard Chartered and Citibank) from the business-banking analysis.
- Languages (8): English, Indonesian, Malay, Filipino, Thai, Vietnamese, Tamil and Chinese across the full study. Not every language was tested in every market or on every route.
- AI test routes (11): ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, Google AI Search, Copilot, Meta AI, Grok, Qwen, DeepSeek and Kimi.
The full report is available online.