Which sources do AI answers quote?

When an assistant searches the web before it answers, it lists the pages it read. We sorted every one of them by kind, question by question, to see where the answers come from.

How we read them

We asked the same fifteen buyer questions every week in ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and Gemini, and kept every answer in full with its sources in order. Each quoted page was sorted into one of eight kinds: the company’s own site, a competitor’s site, a ranking or directory, a forum, a review site, social media, a Google listing, or a video.

What turns up

[The share of quotes for each kind, from the eight-week read, goes here.]

Some patterns hold whatever the numbers say. Lists are quoted again and again, because a “best of” page answers a “which company should I choose” question in one go. Forums are quoted when the question sounds like a person asking for advice. And a company’s own pages are quoted when they answer the question plainly, in the first lines.

The same few sites, question after question

A handful of outside sites come back for many questions at once. Those are worth the most effort: being on one of them can put you in front of the assistants for a whole group of questions, not just one. aeoo calls them key sources and lists them on Where AI looks.

What to do with it

• Lists and directories: ask to be listed, with a short note that says who you serve.
• Forums: answer where people ask, and say who you work for.
• Review sites and Google listings: keep the profile complete and current.
• Your own pages: answer the question in the first lines, the way buyers ask it.

Then ask the same questions again next week. Answers move, and the only way to know whether a change helped is to read them again on a schedule.