Domain citation
A domain citation is an AI answer using or linking to a page on your website. Counting them shows how often the platforms rely on your site.
A domain citation is an AI answer using or linking to a page on your website. Count them up and you know how often the platforms rely on your own site when they answer the questions you care about.
It's a different thing from being named. An answer can name you without reading your site, and it can read your site without naming you. Both happen more than you'd expect.
Counting by domain
Counting at the level of the domain, your whole site, saves you from chasing single pages. If your pricing page drops out of the answers and your delivery page comes in, your domain citations hold steady, and that's often the more useful picture.
Tools count this in different ways. Some count every link, so one answer that links to your site three times counts three times. Others count answers, so the same answer counts once. Check which one you're reading before you compare numbers across tools.
An example
For example, say Kestrel Roasters tracks 10 prompts on two platforms, which makes 140 answers a week. If 28 of those answers used at least one page from kestrelroasters.com, Kestrel's own site was used in 20% of its answers.
Now say 7 of those 28 didn't name Kestrel at all. The platform read Kestrel's page and then recommended someone else. That's worth a look: the page is being found, but it isn't making the case for the brand.
Domain citations in AnswerOrbit
Our Citations number is the share of answers that used a page from your website. Under it you'll see citation share, your site's share of all the links in the answers, and citations per answer. Cited, not named is the share of answers that used your site but didn't name you. All of these are explained in What the numbers mean.