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Citation is a clickable link to a source URL provided by an AI platform in its generated response. When Perplexity answers a question and includes numbered source links in a sidebar, each of those links is a citation. A citation is distinct from a mention — a mention is the appearance of a brand name in the response text, while a citation is a link to that brand’s domain.

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Why it matters

Citations drive traffic. A mention creates brand awareness — the customer sees the name. A citation creates a click-through pathway — the customer can visit the domain directly from the AI’s response. For brands optimizing for AI visibility, the gap between mention rate and citation rate is diagnostic: it tells you whether the AI considers your own domain a trustworthy source or relies on third-party sources about you.

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How Cited uses it

Cited tracks citations by parsing source URLs from AI responses, primarily from Perplexity where citations are explicit and structured. Citation data feeds the citation rate metric. See Citations vs mentions for the full distinction between the two signals.