The finding: The vast majority—86%—of citations from AI-generated responses come from sources that brands either directly control or strongly influence, according to an analysis by Yext. That includes their own websites, listings, and reviews.

Why it matters: Generative engine optimization (GEO) is fast-becoming a priority for brands and retailers seeking to stay discoverable amid rising use of AI chatbots for shopping and search. However, figuring out which channels to prioritize can be challenging given the wide array of sources that AI models draw from.

• According to Yext’s analysis, which examined 6.8 million citations from over 1.6 million AI-generated responses across Perplexity, Gemini, and OpenAI, brand websites are the most popular source, accounting for 44% of citations. That figure was slightly higher for retailers, at 47.6%.
• Listings—which include third-party and industry-specific directories and product pages on ecommerce aggregators—were the second most-cited source, at 42%.
• Reviews and social media accounted for just 8% of citations, followed by news and forums at 6%.

Our take: The data spotlights brands’ substantial influence over how they appear in AI search results. It’s imperative for companies to act quickly to optimize their websites, product listings, and other content for AI-driven discovery.

• That means rewriting content to be clear and easily digestible for large language models, while ensuring it answers common queries.
• Context also matters. Yext’s notes that all AI models take location into account, giving retailers and brands with local landing pages or regionally specific content a visibility advantage.

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