Where Does AI Actually Get Its Answers From? A Business Owner's Guide to Getting Cited by ChatGPT & Co.

More of your customers are skipping Google and asking ChatGPT or Perplexity instead. “What’s a good beauty clinic near Orchard Road?” “Which aircon servicing company should I use?” The AI doesn’t invent that answer on the spot. It pulls from a small, specific set of sources it already trusts for that kind of question.

A recent analysis of 107 million AI answers across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google AI Overviews mapped out exactly where those sources come from. The mix turns out to depend almost entirely on what you sell, and it’s worth fifteen minutes to understand where your business fits.

The half every industry shares

Across every industry in the study (software, consumer goods, telecom) community and user-generated content (Reddit, YouTube, forums, Quora) made up roughly half of the sources AI leans on. Not high in one sector and low in another. Close to 50% everywhere.

Reddit specifically landed in the top three sources for every industry, and was the single most-cited source more than half the time. If people aren’t talking about your brand in a real, honest thread somewhere, you’re invisible to about half of what AI is reading before it answers.

The other half depends on what you sell

Selling software or B2B services? Your own website barely registers. Third-party proof carries the weight instead. Review directories (G2, Clutch, and similar platforms) and trade press dominate. AI doesn’t take a vendor’s word for it; it goes looking for outside validation first.

Selling physical products? The opposite is true. Your product listings, marketplace pages, and on-page reviews are the answer AI gives. Titles, bullet points, specs, and Q&A get read almost like answer copy, not just product copy.

In telecom, media, or a well-known consumer brand? Your Wikipedia entry and press coverage do a lot of the talking, often more than anything you publish yourself.

Every AI engine plays a different game

Even within the same industry, the engine you’re asked about changes the picture. Google AI Overviews leans heavily social: YouTube and Reddit can be four-fifths of its top sources. ChatGPT is the most editorial, favouring Wikipedia and trade media. Perplexity sits in between, mixing community chatter with directories. Gemini swings depending on the category: editorial for services, retail-heavy for physical products.

There’s no single “optimise for AI” move. It depends on what you sell and which engine your customers actually use.

What to do about it this month

You don’t need a huge budget to start closing the gap. A short, honest audit gets you most of the way:

Find your brand in the conversation. Search the subreddits and forums where your category gets discussed. See what people are already saying, good and bad.

Complete every listing that matters. Google Business Profile, marketplace pages, directory profiles: fill every field. A half-empty listing gets skipped by AI the same way it gets skipped by a human scrolling fast.

Ask for reviews, steadily. A regular trickle of current, specific reviews beats one big batch that goes stale. Prompt happy customers while the experience is fresh.

Ask AI the questions your customers would ask. Try “best [your category] in [your city]” in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google. See who gets mentioned, and whether it’s you.

A closing thought

This is the part of marketing that used to be optional and is quickly becoming table stakes: not just ranking on Google, but actually getting named inside the answer someone reads before they ever visit your site. It’s a newer discipline, often called AEO or GEO, and we’re building it into how we track performance for the SME clients we work with, alongside the SEO and paid media we’ve always done.

If you’re not sure where your brand shows up (or doesn’t) in AI answers right now, that fifteen-minute audit above is the honest place to start. Or book a free review of your website and ads and we’ll take a look with you.