Getting Started

Quick Start

Get Citatra up and running and start monitoring your AI Overview visibility in under 5 minutes.

Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have the following installed and ready:

• Node.js 18+ — download from nodejs.org
• MongoDB — a running MongoDB instance or a MongoDB Atlas cluster
• SerpApi key — required for fetching AI Overview results
• Gemini API key (optional) — enables AI-powered recommendations and semantic analysis

Installation

Clone the repository and install dependencies:

git clone https://github.com/your-org/citatra.git
cd citatra

npm install

Environment Variables

Create a .env.local file in the project root with the following variables:

# MongoDB connection string
MONGODB_URI=mongodb+srv://user:password@cluster.mongodb.net/citatra

# SerpApi key for AI Overview tracking
SERPAPI_KEY=your_serpapi_key_here

# NextAuth authentication
NEXTAUTH_SECRET=your_random_secret_here
NEXTAUTH_URL=http://localhost:3000

# Gemini API key (optional — enables AI recommendations)
GEMINI_API_KEY=your_gemini_key_here

First Run

Start the development server:

npm run dev

Open http://localhost:3000 in your browser. You should see the Citatra landing page.

Set Up Your Workspace

1. Sign up — create an account using your email or an OAuth provider.
2. Create a workspace — give it a name and enter the primary domain you want to monitor.
3. Add prompts — enter the search prompts (queries) you want to track in AI Overviews. Citatra will begin fetching results automatically.
4. Add competitors — list competitor domains so Citatra can compare their visibility against yours.
5. Connect Google Analytics (optional) — link your GA4 property to enable traffic attribution.

Once your first batch of results comes in, head to the Dashboard to see your visibility metrics.

Next Steps

You're all set! Explore these features to get deeper insights:

• Dashboard — your central analytics hub with key metrics at a glance
• Prompts — manage and organize the prompts Citatra monitors
• Semantic Map — visualize topical relationships and discover content gaps