# **📊 Why This Matters**

Search Atlas's own research team analyzed how content published through the Link Laboratory network gets cited by AI chatbots and search engines. This is directly connected to the **LLM Visibility** column you see in the Site Catalog when browsing publishers — it's not a marketing abstraction, it's based on real citation tracking across major AI platforms.

# **🔍 What the Study Covered**

The study tracked **2.67 million citations across 11,136 Link Laboratory network domains**, drawn from a larger dataset of 179 million citations across more than 6 million domains, collected over a three-month window. It measured citation activity across six AI platforms: **ChatGPT (OpenAI), Gemini, Copilot, Perplexity, Grok, and Google AI Mode**.

# **📈 Key Findings**

- About **31% of network domains** picked up at least one AI citation during the study window — coverage varies a lot by site authority and niche.
- **Different platforms reward different things:** Grok generated the highest raw citation volume but the lowest quality/authority score; Copilot had the strongest quality metrics (best average citation rank and score); Gemini had the highest share of voice; Perplexity balanced solid rank with strong authority scoring.
- **Technology, Computers, and Business** categories accounted for the largest share of cited domains — sites in these niches tend to see the strongest AI citation activity.
- Across the whole network, the average domain ranked around 11th position in citation results with a citation score near 33 — the top-performing domains in the network scored meaningfully above that baseline, showing that strong individual placements can outperform the network average by a wide margin.

# **✅ What This Means for Your Placements**

- AI citation performance isn't uniform — a placement on a strong, topically-relevant publisher in Technology, Computers, or Business is more likely to pick up AI citations than an equally-priced placement in a less AI-visible category.
- The **LLM Visibility** filters and columns in the Site Catalog (covering Gemini and OpenAI, among others) let you check a specific publisher's AI-citation status before you buy a placement, rather than guessing.
- Since different AI platforms behave differently (some reward raw volume, others reward authority and rank), it's worth treating AI-search visibility as an ongoing metric to track across placements, not a one-time check.

If you need further assistance, open the chat widget in the bottom-right corner of the platform and type **human teammate** to be connected with a member of our team.