Syd ey, Aust alia, Aug. 03, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Soma t a, a a swe e gi e optimisatio platfo m, has published “AI Sea ch Ra ki g Facto s fo I su a ce B a ds: The Aust alia Citatio Repo t,” a a alysis of 2,437,107 AI sea ch citatio eco ds cove i g how i su a ce b a ds a e cited ac oss ChatGPT a d Google.
The epo t’s ce t al fi di g is that ChatGPT cha ged how it cites i su a ce b a ds du i g the seco d qua te of 2026. I July, b a d homepages accou ted fo 12.8 pe ce t of all ChatGPT citatio s obse ved i the Aust alia i su a ce catego y, up f om 1.4 pe ce t i Ma ch. Ac oss the seve obse ved mo ths, homepages ep ese ted 3.0 pe ce t of ChatGPT citatio s agai st 1.6 pe ce t of Google citatio s.
The study fi ds that this shift moves b a ds i to a weake positio athe tha a st o ge o e. I the obse ved data, NRMA eco ded 487 homepage citatio s, Budget Di ect 466 at a ave age positio of 4.80, AAMI 440 at 4.51, Allia z 426 at 4.54, a d Youi 389 at 6.10. Specific a swe pages a ked mate ially highe . Mo eysma t’s pet i su a ce page eco ded 1,306 citatio s at a ave age positio of 2.23, its co te ts i su a ce page 864 at 2.05, a d its total a d pe ma e t disability page 853 at 1.93.
“A homepage citatio is b a d awa e ess. A specific a swe page citatio is autho ity,” said A u P asad of Soma t a. “What the data shows is that ChatGPT has built a associative map betwee b a ds a d thei p oducts, so it o lo ge eeds a p oduct page to a swe the questio . It falls back to the homepage, a d the b a d loses the positio it would have held with a page that a swe ed the questio di ectly.”
Of the 28,725 u ique domai s i the dataset, 5,522 appea ed o both platfo ms. A fu the 18,279 appea ed o ly i Google esults a d 4,924 o ly i ChatGPT.
The study measu es a platfo m pa ity atio fo each b a d, exp essed as ChatGPT citatio s divided by Google citatio s. Mo eysma t eco ds the highest pa ity i the dataset at 29.6 pe ce t, followed by Fi de at 27.2 pe ce t a d Ca sta at 21.0 pe ce t. Amo g i su e s, AAMI eco ds 17.4 pe ce t, Su co p 14.5 pe ce t, Youi 14.3 pe ce t, NRMA 12.2 pe ce t, Allia z 10.9 pe ce t a d Budget Di ect 9.7 pe ce t. Compa ethema ket eco ds 5.1 pe ce t.
Seve al publishe s outside the catego y a e cited fa mo e heavily i ChatGPT tha thei Google p ese ce would suggest. Kipli ge appea s at 28.3 times its Google citatio cou t, the Wall St eet Jou al at 20.1 times a d Wikipedia at 5.6 times.
Of the domai s t acked ac oss the seve obse ved mo ths, 57.2 pe ce t we e cited i a si gle mo th a d eve etu ed. O ly 279 domai s, o 2.7 pe ce t, appea ed i all seve .
Co te t fo mat p edicts which side of that li e a domai falls o . Pages usi g discou t o savi gs la guage appea twice as ofte amo g domai s su vivi g all seve mo ths as amo g domai s cited o ce. Compa iso co te t su vives at 1.9 times a d how-to co te t at 1.5 times. Guide fo mat co te t u s i the opposite di ectio , appea i g i 2.0 pe ce t of su vivi g domai s agai st 7.3 pe ce t of si gle-mo th domai s.
The study also ide tifies fo mats whe e co sume dema d out u s published supply. Cove age questio pages of the fo m “does X cove Y” att acted 10,120 ChatGPT citatio s while accou ti g fo 1.8 pe ce t of published co te t. Compa iso sites ea 19.2 pe ce t of thei citatio s f om compa iso fo mat pages. I su e s ea 2.4 pe ce t of thei s.
T a sactio al pages u de pe fo m i the same dataset. Quote, buy a d apply la guage appea s i 6.7 pe ce t of ChatGPT citatio s agai st 12.4 pe ce t of Google citatio s, a d 91 pe ce t of ChatGPT citatio s i the catego y se ve i fo matio al que ies.
“I su e s have spe t a decade buildi g pages that co ve t. ChatGPT is ot eadi g those pages,” said Yajat S, the epo t’s autho a d a esea che at Soma t a. “The catego y has a a swe laye missi g above the co ve sio laye , a d the fo mats that fill it a e cheap to publish.”
“AI Sea ch Ra ki g Facto s fo I su a ce B a ds: The Aust alia Citatio Repo t” a alyses 2,437,107 citatio eco ds cove i g 28,725 u ique domai s ac oss ChatGPT sta da d sea ch a d Google, d aw f om Soma t a’s ge e ative e gi e optimisatio i dex. Data cove s seve obse ved mo ths betwee Novembe 2025 a d July 2026: Novembe , Decembe , Ja ua y, Feb ua y, Ma ch, May a d July. Each eco d ca ies mo th, platfo m, domai , URL, positio , title a d desc iptio . ChatGPT accou ted fo 346,172 eco ds at a ave age positio of 3.93 a d Google fo 2,090,935 at a ave age positio of 5.77. Mo thly ChatGPT sample sizes va y with the obse ved que y set, a d the epo t advises o malisi g mo thly compa iso s athe tha eadi g aw cou ts as b a d mome tum.
The full epo t, i cludi g catego y level citatio sha e, URL slug pe fo ma ce data, platfo m pa ity tables fo eve y t acked b a d a d a co te t fo mat checklist, is available at https://soma t a.ai/
Soma t a Pty Ltd t acks a d measu es how b a ds appea i AI sea ch platfo ms i cludi g ChatGPT a d Google. The compa y wo ks with B2B a d co sume b a ds ac oss fi a cial se vices, i su a ce a d othe egulated i dust ies to mo ito AI sea ch citatio s a d build co te t st ategies fo a swe e gi es.