VercatusEvidence on earned-media sources in AI citations
Across more than 25M links cited by ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini (17 industries, May 2026 edition), Muck Rack found 84% of citations went to earned media and 0.3% to paid or advertorial content; journalism alone was 27%. Across three editions since July 2025 the earned share ranged 82–89% and journalism 25–27%. The report does not give a brand-owned share, but the earned majority leaves at most about a sixth of citations for everything else, brands' own sites included.
Sources
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- 2Cognizo · 2026Why 84% of AI citations come from third-party sites and how to earn them (2026)cognizo.ai
CGrade C: reputable industry data or observation. A grade describes the provenance of the sources above; it is not a probability that a change will work. The effect basis says how the size of the effect is known: measured by a study, taken from an industry report, only documented without a size, or not quantified.
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