Citation
A citation in an AI answer points to an external source, usually with a link or a footnote. It shows which material the answer refers to.
Citation vs. brand mention
AI can name a brand without citing any source. It can also cite a brand’s guide without recommending the company itself. That’s why mentions and citations are worth analyzing separately.
What you can check in Heuriso
Saved links help you find the roundups, publications, forums and pages of your own site that keep coming back in answers. Their presence is a pointer for analyzing content and what is said around your brand.
The list includes the citations we could read from the answer and the interface. A missing link doesn’t prove the AI system didn’t use the web at all.
Why you need to open the cited source
A link next to an answer doesn’t prove that the page supports every sentence around it. Check which part of the material answers the question and whether it is current. A source may cover only one feature of a product, while the rest of the description comes from elsewhere. For an important claim, go from the citation to the specific paragraph, not just the domain.
Where something is published also matters for your brand. A chatbot may cite a competitor’s website, an independent roundup or a user forum. A source that keeps recurring shows where part of the information in those answers comes from. It is a starting point for analysis, not an automatic list of sites where you need to buy a placement.
Record the full URL of the cited page, because the domain alone is often too general to plan a fix. Two articles on the same site can describe different versions of an offer. The publication date and scope of the article help you judge whether the source reflects your company’s current situation.
Common mistake: treating a citation as a recommendation
AI can cite your article and then recommend another company’s product. It can also name your brand without linking to your site. These are different kinds of presence and worth measuring separately. And don’t take a lack of detected citations as proof that the app used no sources: whether links are shown depends on how the answer is presented and whether they can be collected.
Example
A chatbot recommends three companies and links to a comparison article. The article is the cited source; the three company names are mentions.
Key takeaway
Open the source and check the context. A link alone doesn’t confirm that the whole answer is correct or that the page caused a particular brand to be chosen.