---
title: Reddit citations fell 98% in ChatGPT
---

Skale August data shows where those citations went instead. ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­    ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­  

| View in browser Hi there,   In August, ChatGPT changed how it builds an answer. It started citing far more sources for each answer, and began pulling different content categories more regularly.   Kristina Pantelic, our Organic Growth Lead, noticed this change and analyzed citation data for Skale clients. In addition to the changed citation mix, she found that Reddit's share of ChatGPT citations had collapsed by 98%. Reddit citations remain stable on every other AI engine we track.   Below: What our data shows about where those ChatGPT citations went, answering the attribution questions we ran out of time for in the webinar, and a Google change that might impact your next report.  FROM THE WEBINAR Where your pipeline actually came from Last week I ran a session on measuring and attributing the real impact of AI search. I promised to answer the questions we didn't get to. Most of them were versions of this problem: you can see that something is working, but you can't pinpoint the what and the why.   I've answered them all, including: How to avoid crediting branded paid search for demand that other channels created How to find out what your branded paid conversions cost once you exclude the ones you'd have won anyway Whether self-reported attribution is accurate enough to act on, given that people forget and journeys have many touchpoints What five things you need to check when your AI visibility rises without demos following How to build a forecast from visibility to demos, and how to improve it as your own data builds The webinar recording and key takeaways are there too. READ THE ANSWERS GOOGLE UPDATE Google is rewriting its result links Google has confirmed it's rolling out google.com/goto as a passthrough URL in search results, so links now run through a redirect rather than pointing straight at the destination. It has been testing since July and is reportedly close to full rollout.   Google says this is a technical measure against abuse. In practice, it makes its results much harder to scrape, which is how third-party tools and AI companies collect them. The redirects can't be decoded, so anything harvesting the results page now has to follow every link individually to find out where it goes, and there are hundreds on a single results page. Google is already suing one scraping provider.   Nothing changes on your site. But you may see some of your visibility and AI tracking products behaving oddly. The data these tools provide is mostly built from scraped results. If numbers look off, first check in with your provider before assuming a dip in performance.  PARTNER WITH US Agile plans, engineered from your revenue goal AI search and Google will keep changing how they find the best answers. This is why your organic growth partner should never work from assumptions.  We start from the revenue number you're chasing, work backwards to the inputs that will get there, then test whether those inputs still deserve a place in your roadmap. Skale works in three-month sprints, and roadmaps usually ship as planned. But when there’s a major industry shift, we'll reprioritize our efforts to keep you on track to meet your growth goals. You see every change, and the reason we’re dropping or adding something in, all reported against SQLs and pipeline. BOOK A STRATEGY CALL SKALE RESEARCH Where ChatGPT citations went in August ChatGPT started behaving differently in August. So Kristina Pantelic, our Organic Growth Lead, went looking for what changed. She pooled citation data from 11 Skale client accounts and compared two matched 16-day periods either side of the shift. Here's what she found.   On 8 August, ChatGPT began citing roughly 2.8 times as many sources per answer. It also started going straight to first-party pages on brand websites, rather than relying as heavily on third-party material from the web. Documentation and support pages rose 122%, and were the only category to gain coverage across every account we looked at Listicles and comparison pages fell 39% in share, but still remain the largest citation category by some distance First-party landing pages rose overall, though accounts vary enough that we're treating this as an early signal Then, on 14 August, Reddit's share of ChatGPT citations fell 98%. It's specific to ChatGPT. Reddit citations haven't fallen in any other engine we track, including Google AI Overviews, AI Mode and Perplexity. OpenAI hasn't commented. What this means    ChatGPT is reading more sources per answer, and more of them are your pages.    Documentation and support pages gained the most citations, and we believe this is because they hold concrete facts a buyer needs verified: what your product does, what it connects to, and what it costs to run. That detail can be difficult to find anywhere else, at that depth, and kept current.   Third-party sources still do most of the work of getting you into an AI answer. Listicles remain the biggest citation category even after a heavy dip in ChatGPT.   But ChatGPT is pulling from your own documentation to a greater degree, which means what you say about yourself carries more weight than it did a month ago.   Those pages usually belong to product or support. They get updated when a feature ships, and rarely otherwise. And very few growth teams look at them.   Where we'd put effort now: Audit your documentation and support content first. It's the biggest opportunity right now. Keep your listicle and comparison placements running. They still earn more citations than anything else, though we’d slow new investment there. If you're aiming for ChatGPT inclusion, deprioritize Reddit. But keep in mind that Reddit citations are steady or rising in every other engine we track. Monitor landing page performance. It’s also worth testing optimization and link building to them. Documentation is where I'd start this month. Everyone in your category is fighting over the same listicles, and nobody is looking at this.   If you want to know how your own citation mix moved, reply to this email and we'll take a look.   Best, Jake Skale, 727–729 High Road, London, London N12 0BP, United Kingdom Unsubscribe Manage preferences |
| --- |