Connect to your AI (MCP)

AskThis speaks the Model Context Protocol (MCP), so AI clients — Claude Desktop, ChatGPT connectors, Cursor, or any MCP-capable agent — can call AskThis as tools and read your data as resources. You connect with a scoped API key you already control. Publisher MCP is a Business+ feature and read-only.

It’s a thin proxy: your API key is forwarded to the AskThis API unchanged, so the AI can only read what your key is scoped for, always limited to your own sites. See the feature overview for the plain-English version.

Endpoints

Connect

First create a key under Developers → API keys (see API keys) with the scopes you want to expose — e.g. analytics:read, sites:read, prompts:read.

Then add AskThis to claude_desktop_config.json (Claude Desktop → Settings → Developer → Edit Config) and restart:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "askthis": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "mcp-remote",
        "https://mcp.askthis.io/mcp/publisher",
        "--header",
        "Authorization: Bearer ak_your_key_here"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Any client that supports a remote MCP server over HTTP with a bearer header works the same way — point it at https://mcp.askthis.io/mcp/publisher and send Authorization: Bearer ak_your_key_here.

What you can ask

Once connected, ask in plain language — the AI picks the right tool:

• “What are people asking AI about my site this week?” → get_top_questions
• “How did my AI-share buttons perform over the last 30 days?” → get_ai_share_analytics
• “Which pages get the most AI clicks?” → get_page_performance
• “Show my Cited Ask prompt for the site.” → get_cited_ask_prompt

Publisher tools are read-only, and the API enforces your key’s scopes on every call.

Data partners

If you buy data, the same pattern applies at https://mcp.askthis.io/mcp/data with your partner: key: browse the segment catalog, check intent signals, and run pseudonymous enrichment from your own agents. Your scopes, signed DPA and k-anonymity are enforced exactly as on the REST API. Feed and activation writes require an explicit confirmation.

The open protocol

https://mcp.askthis.io/mcp/protocol needs no key. It exposes the open Ask Protocol: build_cited_ask turns a page’s AI Graph fields into a deterministic, source-citing prompt, and the Ask Targets registry describes how to open each AI engine.