We traced 12,000 citations across six assistants and nine industries to see which pages they lean on when they recommend a brand. The pattern is steadier than most people expect.
Reviews beat brand sites
In consumer categories, review sites and comparison pages made up 41% of citations. The brand's own site made up 14%. Assistants prefer a source that looks independent.
Reference pages punch above their size
Glossaries, standards bodies, public datasets and encyclopaedia entries are cited far more often than their traffic would suggest. One accurate reference entry can outweigh a year of blog posts.
It differs by industry
- Software: documentation, comparison sites and developer forums
- Health and local services: review platforms, directories and practice pages with clear opening hours
- Retail: specialist reviewers, buying guides and forum threads with real use
- Finance: regulators, reference sites and long-standing publishers
Fresh beats famous
Pages updated inside the last twelve months were cited at nearly twice the rate of older pages on the same sites. A dated page is a risk a model avoids.
Assistants do not trust your brand. They trust the places that have already written about it.
What to do with this
List the ten sources most cited in your category, then check how each one describes you today. Fix what is wrong, fill what is missing and give each of them something new to say: a number, a study, a named expert. The work is slow and it compounds, because every assistant reads the same handful of pages.
