1Scope and parties
1.1 These terms apply to every use of the Stead platform and the services around it (the Service). The Service is offered only to businesses, that is to persons acting in the course of their trade, business or profession (Section 14 of the German Civil Code, BGB). It is not offered to consumers (Section 13 BGB).
1.2 The Service is provided by Stead Network, Inc., a Delaware corporation with its place of business at Wuhlestraße 7a, 12683 Berlin, Germany (Stead, we, us). The business using the Service is the Customer (you).
1.3 Only these terms govern the contract. Your own general terms do not apply, even where we do not object to them in a specific case, unless we have agreed to them in text form (Section 126b BGB).
1.4 A paid plan is ordered in the checkout of our payment provider Stripe. The contract for it is concluded when you complete that order; before you confirm, you can review and correct your entries. You confirm there that you order as a business. You can save and print these terms from this page at any time; we do not keep a separate copy of the contract text for you. The contract language is English. Section 312i (1) sentence 1 nos. 1 to 3 and sentence 2 BGB does not apply.
1.5 Creating an account is free of charge. Measurements and the dashboard are available only with a plan, during the free trial (section 7) or paid. These terms apply to an account without a plan too, except where they concern fees.
2What we provide
2.1 Measurement. Stead is software provided as a service over the internet. It measures how a brand appears in answers given by AI services. To do so, we put questions (prompts) to publicly available AI services on a recurring schedule and evaluate the answers. We show, among other things:
- whether and in which position your brand and your competitors are named;
- the tone in which brands are described;
- which sources and web pages the answers draw on, and which searches were run to reach them;
- suggestions for prompts, topics and competitors to track.
2.2 Recommendations and drafts. Depending on your plan, the Service also suggests what to publish (for example titles for new web pages) and, based on facts you give us, drafts texts for such pages, including drafts written by the assistant (Section 2.8). These are proposals. You decide whether and in what form anything is published, and publishing it is your act. We do not publish anything on your website on our own. Drafts are generated with AI models and may be marked as such.
2.3 What the Service does not do. We do not promise that your brand will be named more often, in a better position or in a better tone. We do not control AI services, search engines or third-party websites. We do not give legal, strategic or business advice, and we do not check whether a prompt, a recommendation or a draft is suitable, accurate or effective for your purposes.
2.4 Nature of the results. AI services answer the same question differently from one call to the next. Results are measurements of a sample, not a complete or constant picture, and they depend on the prompts and data you provide (Input). What the Service returns (Output) may be incomplete or wrong. Input and Output together are Content.
2.5 Scope per plan. The features, quotas and prices of each plan are described on our website at the time you order. We provide the current version of the Software.
2.6 Changes. We may change the Service where this is reasonable for you, for example to improve it, to keep it secure or to comply with the law, as long as the core of what you ordered remains. We will tell you in good time about material changes.
2.7 Third parties. The Service depends on AI services, data providers and other third parties outside our control. We may, at our reasonable discretion, change which AI services we measure. If a third party stops providing something the Service needs, we will tell you and look for a reasonable replacement. If a change removes an AI service that your plan names and no comparable replacement is available, you may terminate the contract with effect from the change, and we refund fees already paid for the time after it.
2.8 The assistant. The dashboard includes an assistant based on an AI model. It explains your measurements, reads pages of your website and pages that AI services cited in your measurements, and drafts texts. It may propose changes to your prompts, brand prompts and facts; nothing changes until you accept a proposal, and an accepted proposal is subject to the same plan limits as a change you make yourself. The assistant's answers are generated automatically and may be incomplete or wrong. Use of the assistant is limited per calendar month depending on your plan; once the limit is reached, the assistant pauses until the next month, and the rest of the service is not affected. Conversations are kept for 30 days after the last message and then deleted; you can delete them earlier yourself.
3Availability and maintenance
3.1 We aim to keep the Service available and working, but promise no fixed availability unless agreed with you in text form. Time the Service is unavailable because of announced maintenance, events beyond our control, or something you or a third party outside our sphere caused, is not a failure on our part.
3.2 We maintain the Software regularly and, where maintenance restricts your use, tell you in good time.
3.3 Because the Service relies on AI services we do not operate, individual measurements can fail or be delayed. We will make commercially reasonable efforts to fix material problems quickly.
4How you may use it
4.1 You may use the Service for your own business purposes. If you are an agency, you may also use it to measure and advise brands of your own clients. You may not otherwise make the Service available to third parties or resell it without our agreement in text form.
4.2 You use the Service lawfully. You keep your sign-in links, question-sheet links and credentials confidential and prevent unauthorised access. You are responsible for your Input, in particular for the prompts, brand and competitor names, and facts you give us, and for making sure you have the rights to provide them. Facts you give us for drafts must be true; we rely on them without checking.
4.3 You are responsible for what you do with the Content, in particular for checking any draft before you publish it and for what you publish. Using the Content must not infringe the law or third-party rights. Do not put personal data into the Service unless you are entitled to do so.
4.4 Do not decompile or reverse-engineer the Service, try to get around its limits, overload it, or access it by automated means other than those we provide. Where you break these rules, we may block or limit your access for as long as needed, after a warning where that is possible. Our right to terminate for cause remains.
4.5 Anyone can report content they believe is unlawful using our reporting form. If Content in your account is unlawful or breaks these terms, we may remove it or restrict the account. Such decisions are taken by a person, not automatically. We tell you in text form what we did and why, and you can contest the decision by writing to hello@atstead.com; a person will look at it again.
5Rights and data
5.1 Our rights. All rights in the Service, including the software, methods and documentation, remain ours. For the term of the contract you receive a simple, non-transferable right to use the Service as set out in these terms.
5.2 Your data. Data you provide to the Service remains yours (Customer Data). You allow us to process it only as far as needed to provide the Service and fulfil the contract. We handle it in line with data protection law and our privacy notice, and do not use or pass it on for other purposes without your consent.
5.3 Drafts and reports. You may use, change and publish the drafts and titles the Service produces for you without restriction. Reports also show text written by third parties, such as answers of AI services and excerpts of web pages. We have no rights in that text and grant you none; it is shown for your own analysis, and any further use is your responsibility.
5.4 Aggregated knowledge. We may use insights derived from measurements in a form that identifies neither you nor any person (for example how AI services classify a name, or which kinds of searches they run) to operate and improve the Service for all customers.
5.5 At the end. We delete your Customer Data when you delete your account (Section 10.6) and after a move under Section 11.2, unless the law requires us to keep it, for example invoices.
5.6 Confidentiality. Both parties keep confidential what they learn about the other's business through the contract and is not public, such as your prompts, facts and measurements. This does not prevent us from using the service providers named in our privacy notice, or from disclosing information where the law requires it. The obligation continues for three years after the contract ends.
6Fees and payment
6.1 You pay the fees of the plan you order, as shown on our website when you order. Prices are net; value added tax is added where the law requires it.
6.2 Fees are charged in advance for each billing period, monthly or yearly as you choose. Payment and invoicing run through our payment provider Stripe, using the payment method you set up there. Your invoices are available in the billing portal.
6.3 If a payment fails or is late, we may charge statutory default interest (Sections 288 (2) and 286 BGB). After a reminder and a reasonable grace period, we may suspend access until the overdue amount has been paid.
6.4 We may change the fee for a renewal period by telling you in text form at least thirty days before it begins. The new fee applies only if you do not cancel before the renewal.
6.5 If you change to a higher plan, it applies at once and the difference is added pro rata to the next invoice. A change to a lower plan applies from the next billing period.
6.6 With Grow and Scale you can add packages to your subscription, such as additional prompts or countries. A package is billed together with your plan for the same billing period. You can add or reduce packages at any time; the change applies at once and is settled pro rata on your next invoice. Packages end with your plan, and when you change to a plan that does not offer them.
6.7 You may set off only claims that are undisputed or confirmed by a final court decision. You may withhold payment only on the basis of claims from this contract that are undisputed or confirmed by a final court decision.
7The free trial
7.1 A business that has not had a trial before can use the Start plan free of charge for seven days (the trial). The other plans are charged from the first day. You order the plan in the checkout as described in 1.4, choose the plan and the billing period and give a payment method. Before you order, the checkout shows when the trial ends and which fee applies after it. The contract for the plan is concluded with the order; the trial is its first seven days.
7.2 You can cancel during the trial in the billing portal or in text form, for example by email. Nothing is then charged, and the plan ends when the trial ends. If you do not cancel, the paid plan begins on the day after the trial, the first fee is charged on that day, and Sections 6 and 10 apply. If that first payment fails, Section 6.3 applies.
7.3 Each business gets one trial. All accounts whose email addresses share the same domain count as one business, except for domains of public email providers. If that domain has had a trial already, the checkout shows no trial and the plan starts as a paid plan right away. We also recognise a payment method that has been used for a trial before. As we can only do so once you have entered it, the trial then ends as soon as we recognise the payment method, usually within minutes of your order, and the first fee is charged at that moment; the checkout points this out before you order, and we tell you by email. This also applies to an email address, a domain or a payment method whose account has been deleted.
7.4 During the trial the Service is provided free of charge; no fee can therefore be reduced. Sections 8 and 9 apply unchanged.
7.5 We may end a trial early for cause, in particular for misuse under Section 4. Section 10.5 then applies.
8Warranty
8.1 The statutory rules on rental contracts (Sections 535 et seq. BGB) apply to the provision of the Software and storage space.
8.2 Please report defects and disruptions without undue delay and describe them so that we can understand them. Where we could not remedy a defect because it was reported late, you cannot claim a reduction of fees or damages for that reason.
8.3 A merely insignificant impairment does not entitle you to reduce the fee (Section 536 (1) sentence 3 BGB). Strict liability for defects that already existed when the contract was concluded (Section 536a (1), first alternative, BGB) is excluded.
8.4 Drafts and answers of the assistant are proposals. We owe no particular quality of content beyond what is described in Section 2, and you check them before publishing.
9Liability
9.1 We are liable without limitation for intent and gross negligence, for injury to life, body or health, under the German Product Liability Act, and where we have given a guarantee.
9.2 For slight negligence, we are liable only for breaches of essential contractual obligations, meaning obligations whose fulfilment makes proper performance of the contract possible in the first place and on which you may regularly rely. In that case our liability is limited to the damage that was foreseeable and typical for this kind of contract when it was concluded.
9.3 Otherwise we are not liable for slight negligence.
9.4 For loss of data we are liable, within 9.1 to 9.3, only up to the effort it would have taken to restore the data had you kept your own export of it.
9.5 Where our liability is excluded or limited, this also applies to the personal liability of our officers, employees, representatives and subcontractors.
9.6 You indemnify us against claims of third parties that arise from your unlawful use of the Service, from your Input or from what you publish, to the extent you are responsible for it.
10Term and termination
10.1 A paid plan runs for the billing period you chose, monthly or yearly, and renews by the same period unless it is cancelled.
10.2 You can cancel at any time in the billing portal, effective at the end of the current billing period. We can cancel with thirty days' notice to the end of a billing period. Cancellation must be in text form at least, for example by email or in the billing portal.
10.3 Where a yearly plan ends early under Section 11, you are refunded the part of the yearly fee that exceeds the monthly price of the same plan for each month used so far; a month that has begun counts in full.
10.4 Either party may terminate for cause without notice where the law allows it. Cause for us includes in particular a serious breach of these terms that is not remedied after a warning, or persistent non-payment. If we terminate for cause, we may block access at once.
10.5 When the contract ends, including when a trial ends without a paid plan, we stop the measurements and close the dashboard, including the measurements taken so far. Your data stays in your account, so that you can continue where you left off by ordering a plan again, until you delete the account or we delete it under 10.7. While you have a plan, you can export measurements from the dashboard at any time. After the end, we send you your prompts, projects, settings and measurements as JSON and CSV files within thirty days of a request in text form; Section 11 remains unaffected, and so do your rights under data protection law. If the contract ends early, fees paid for the time after the end are refunded pro rata, except in the cases of 10.3 and 10.6; where we ended it for cause, less any damage you caused us by the breach. What by its nature is meant to outlast the contract, such as liability, governing law and confidentiality, stays in force.
10.6 You can delete your account in the application. This also cancels your plan, effective at the end of the current billing period or, during the trial, at its end. The account and its data are deleted fourteen days after your request; until then you can undo it, and no measurements run. Fees already paid are not refunded.
10.7 If an account has had no plan for three months, counted from the end of the last plan or trial or, for an account that never had one, from its creation, we delete it together with its data. We tell you by email thirty days before; ordering a plan before then keeps the account.
11Switching providers
11.1 You can tell us in text form that you want to move your data to another provider or to systems of your own (Regulation (EU) 2023/2854, the Data Act). You can do so while the contract runs or within thirty days after it has ended. Two months after your notice at the latest, a transition period of up to thirty days begins, in which we carry out the move with you.
11.2 We export your prompts, projects, settings and measurements, with the information needed to understand them, as JSON and CSV files. After the transition period you can retrieve them for at least thirty more days. We then erase the exported data and confirm this to you.
11.3 The contract ends once the move is complete. Until 11 January 2027 we may charge no more than our direct costs for it; from 12 January 2027 the move is free of charge. Where these terms fall short of the Data Act, the Data Act applies.
11.4 Exportable data comprises all Customer Data and the measurements taken for you, with their metadata. Aggregated insights under 5.4 are not exportable. On request we describe the data structures and formats used.
12Law and jurisdiction
12.1 German law applies, excluding its conflict-of-laws rules and the UN Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of Goods (CISG).
12.2 If you are a merchant within the meaning of the German Commercial Code, a legal entity under public law or a special fund under public law, the exclusive place of jurisdiction is Berlin, Germany. Either party may still seek interim relief in any competent court.
13Reference use
We name you as a customer, with your name and logo, only if you have agreed to it in text form. You can withdraw that agreement at any time, and we then stop. We never disclose your measurements or other confidential information in this context.
14Final provisions
14.1 We may change these terms for the future where changes in law, in case law, in technology or in the third-party services we rely on make it necessary, or to close a gap, as long as the balance between us is not shifted to your disadvantage. The main obligations and the fees are not changed this way (for fees, see 6.4). For running contracts, we will tell you about changes in text form at least six weeks before they take effect. They are deemed accepted if you do not object in text form before that date; we will point this out in the notice. If you object, either party may terminate the contract with effect from the date the changes would take effect.
14.2 These terms, together with your order, set out what we have agreed on the Service. Agreements made with you individually take precedence (Section 305b BGB).
14.3 If a provision is or becomes invalid, the rest remains valid. The invalid provision is replaced by the statutory rules.
14.4 This English version is binding. Any translation is for convenience only.
14.5 Questions about these terms go to hello@atstead.com. Our imprint and privacy notice are on our website.