Link bait
Link bait is content made to attract links and mentions from other sites, like original research, free tools or a strong opinion.
Link bait is content made mainly to get other websites to link to it. Original data, a free calculator, a striking chart, a list people argue about: anything that writers and bloggers want to point their readers to. The name sounds sly, but the good version is just making something worth citing.
For marketers, it's a way to earn links and mentions at scale, without asking for each one.
What tends to work
Things other writers need and can't easily make themselves. Fresh numbers they can quote. Tools that save their readers time. Guides that become the standard reference on a narrow subject. Strong, well-argued takes that people want to agree or disagree with.
What tends to fail is clickbait: a headline that promises more than the page gives. It may get shares for a day, but few people link to it, and fewer trust it.
Link bait for AI answers
The same content earns something else in AI search: citations. AI platforms that search the web look for pages with clear, specific facts they can quote. Original research is exactly that, and when other sites cite your numbers too, the platforms see the same fact from several sources, with your name attached.
For example, Fernhill Coffee surveys 1,000 coffee drinkers and publishes "1 in 4 UK coffee drinkers now buys decaf at least once a month," with the method and the full table. Food sites quote it, and an AI answer to "is decaf getting more popular?" cites Fernhill's survey. That's a link, a mention and a citation from one piece of work.
Put the headline findings in plain sentences near the top of the page, so they're easy to lift.
In AnswerOrbit
Sources shows which of your pages the AI answers use and cite, and the Pages tab shows each page's type. If a piece of research is cited in answers about your topic, you'll see it there. See Sources.