Influence Sources: what AI cites when it talks about your brand
The answer ChatGPT, Gemini or Google gives about your brand rests on specific pages. This module shows you which ones, who publishes them, and whether they name you or link to you.
Short answer
An AI engine answers from what the model learned in training and, when it searches the web, from the pages it finds at that moment. Those pages are the sources it cites. Influence Sources lists the domains each engine cites when it talks about your brand, separates your own site from third-party media, and flags whether each source names you and links to you. In Refractia's data, a brand's own site is 0.5% to 2.8% of what AI cites: the answer about you is written mostly by others.
Where AI gets what it says about your brand
An AI engine has two sources of information. One is its memory: what the model learned during training, which changes when the provider updates it and which you cannot edit. The other is the web at the moment it answers: the engine searches, reads a few pages, summarizes them and sometimes cites them. AI search features such as Google's AI Overviews work mostly the second way.
Citations are the visible part of that second path, and it is where concrete work shows up: every cited domain is a page someone published, and a page can be updated, corrected or complemented.
That is why it pays to look at the sources AI cites about your brand in each market, not only the ones you publish.
What the module shows
- Domains cited by engine: which sites appear as sources in each engine's answers to the scan's questions, and how often.
- Own site vs. third parties: how much of the citation share goes to your domain and how much to media and other third-party sites.
- Relationship matrix: for each source, whether it names you and whether it links to you.
A limit to keep in mind
Citations show what the engine read when it searched the web. When a chat engine answers from memory, without searching, there is no source to show even if the answer talks about you. That is why this module is read together with AI Perception, which analyzes how each engine describes you.
The relationship matrix: does the source name you? Does it link to you?
Not every citation is worth the same to your brand. The matrix crosses two questions about each source, and each case calls for a different action:
| The source… | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Names you and links to you | An earned source: AI reads it and finds your brand with a path to your site. | Look after it: keep the facts about you up to date. |
| Names you, without a link | AI finds you there, but the source sends no one to your site. | Ask for the link, and correct anything outdated it says about you. |
| Doesn't name you | AI used that page to answer about your category, and you're not in it. | If it's a comparison or a ranking, it's a concrete place where you could be. |
Your site is a small minority of what AI cites
In Refractia's corpus, a brand's own site accounts for 0.5% to 2.8% of the sources AI cites. The rest are third-party pages. When someone asks AI about your category, the answer is built mostly from what others have published about you, about your competitors or about the topic.
That doesn't make your site useless. It is still the source of your official facts, and a site AI cannot read is a separate problem that GEO Optimization checks. But a strategy that only publishes on your own blog works on the smallest share of what AI cites.
What to do with this information
- 01
Start with the sources that repeat
A domain cited by several engines shows up in more answers than one that appears once. Those come first.
- 02
Work with your category's media
The industry publications AI already cites are where it pays to appear. Bring them specific, verifiable facts, not a generic press release.
- 03
Get into the comparisons
If AI cites "best options in your country" articles where you are missing, that is the gap. Offer information so they can evaluate you, and publish your own comparison with clear, honest criteria.
- 04
Look after your reviews
Review sites and marketplaces where your customers leave opinions can end up summarized in an answer. Replying, correcting facts and asking real customers for reviews changes what there is to summarize.
- 05
Measure again
A new scan shows whether new citations appeared. Scans are started by a person, so plan one after each action and follow the result in Evolution.
Frequently asked questions
Where does ChatGPT get its information about my brand?
From what the model learned in training and, when it searches the web, from the pages it finds while answering. Those pages are the sources it cites, and most of them are not the brand's own website.
What sources does AI cite when it talks about a brand?
Mostly third-party pages: media and other sites that write about the brand or its category. In Refractia's data, the brand's own site is 0.5% to 2.8% of what gets cited.
Does my website matter if AI barely cites it?
Yes, because it is the source of your official facts. But it is not enough, since most of the answer is built from what others publish.
How can I get AI to cite sources that mention my brand?
You cannot ask an engine to cite something. What you can do is be present in the sources it already cites in your category, with correct facts and a link to your site.
Keep reading
See what AI answers about your brand
Your customers already ask AI about your category; today you don't know what it tells them, or which sources it relies on. In the free diagnostic we show you what ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Google and Meta AI say about your brand and your competitors. No commitment: we reply within one business day.