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LLM Citations: The New Local SEO Signal

LLM citations — mentions of your business inside ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews — are the new local pack. Here's how to win them.

January 28, 20268 min read

What is an LLM citation?

An LLM citation is when a large language model (ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude) mentions your business by name in response to a user query — usually with a link or attribution.

Why they matter

Google's traditional 10 blue links are losing share. AI Overviews now appear on 30%+ of local queries. ChatGPT and Perplexity answer "best near me" questions millions of times a day. If your business isn't being cited, you're invisible to the next wave of search.

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How LLMs pick who to cite

  • Authority signals: mentions on Wikipedia, news sites, industry publications
  • Consensus: consistent NAP and reviews across the web
  • Recency: Perplexity especially favors recent content
  • Structured data: Schema.org markup helps LLMs parse your business
  • Direct training presence: being in Common Crawl, GitHub READMEs, large public datasets

The 5-step plan

  1. Audit current LLM mentions (SearchRush AI Visibility)
  2. Build authoritative third-party mentions
  3. Optimize Schema.org markup site-wide
  4. Publish content that exactly matches LLM prompt phrasing
  5. Track weekly and iterate

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