When AI Links to Your Company Instead of Your Answer
Sometimes an engine names the page that answers the question. Sometimes it just names the company. One of the three major engines does the second far more often than the others.
Key Takeaways
- Google AI Overview links to a bare website on 13.0% of citations, against 4.1% for ChatGPT and 3.8% for Perplexity.
- That is roughly three times more likely to point at a company than at the answer.
- Those readers land at your front door holding a question, and have to go looking.
- It also breaks reporting: 13% of your Google citations name no page to attribute.
- All three engines agree on depth. The median citation points two levels into a site.
Why we looked into this
When an AI engine shows its sources, it does one of two things. It links to the specific page that answers the question, or it links to the website itself with nothing after the domain.
Those look similar in a report and behave completely differently for the reader. A link to the page drops someone directly onto the answer. A link to the home page drops them at the front door and leaves them to find it. Same citation, very different outcome.
It also matters for measurement. If you are trying to work out which of your pages earns AI visibility, and the engine never names a page, your reporting has a blind spot it may not be telling you about.
How we tested it
For all 61,536 citations we recorded how deep into a website each one pointed. A citation with nothing after the domain is a link to the site itself. A citation with a path is a link to a specific page.
We then split that by engine, because the whole point was to find out whether the three behave the same way. They do not.
What we found
Google AI Overview links to a bare website on 13.0% of its citations. ChatGPT does it on 4.1% and Perplexity on 3.8%. Google is roughly three times more likely to point at a company than at the page that answers the question.
Everything else about citation depth is remarkably consistent. The median citation across all three engines points two levels into a site, which is where most substantial content sits. The engines agree about depth. They disagree about whether to name a page at all.
Why this happens
The likely explanation is that Google AI Overview is doing something slightly different from the other two in these cases. Rather than citing a document that contains the answer, it is identifying an organisation that belongs in the answer, the way a directory entry would.
That fits with what we found separately about brand recognition. An engine that knows a company belongs in a category can name it without needing to read a specific page, and a link to the home page is the natural way to reference a company rather than a document.
It is not a defect. It is a different kind of citation, serving a different purpose in the answer. But it is one that behaves differently for everybody downstream.
What this means for your business
There are two consequences and they pull in different directions.
The first is about traffic quality. A citation that points at your home page sends someone who has just read a partial answer and wants the rest, and then makes them go looking. The intent is high and the path is bad. If a meaningful share of your AI citations are to your home page, your home page is receiving traffic that arrived expecting a specific answer, and it is almost certainly not designed for that. Making sure the home page routes clearly into your main answer content is a cheap fix with a direct return.
The second is about measurement, and it is the one that quietly corrupts reporting. If you are analysing which of your pages earn AI citations, thirteen percent of your Google citations contain no page to attribute. Any tool that maps citations to pages either drops those or assigns them to the home page, and neither is right. Before drawing conclusions about which content performs, check how your reporting treats them.
The wider point for anyone doing this analysis seriously is that engine differences of this size make blended reporting unreliable. Pooling three engines that behave this differently produces a number that describes none of them. Report each engine separately, and when comparing yourself against a competitor, make sure it is on the same engine.
We keep engine level reporting separate for this reason at Novastacks.
Methodology
89 questions agreed with chief executives and business owners as ones their companies need to monitor, put to ChatGPT, Google AI Overview and Perplexity every day through August 2026, producing 61,536 citations.
Every citation was normalised and classified by how many levels deep it points. A citation with no path is counted as a website level citation. Perplexity coverage spans a subset of the question set, so its figure rests on a smaller sample than the other two. All brands are anonymised.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does Google AI Overview link to homepages?
It appears to be identifying an organisation that belongs in the answer rather than a document containing it. A link to the home page is the natural way to reference a company rather than a page.
How often does AI link to a homepage instead of a page?
Across all engines, 7.8% of citations point at a bare domain. Google AI Overview does it on 13.0% of its citations, against 4.1% for ChatGPT and 3.8% for Perplexity.
Why does this matter for reporting?
Because 13% of your Google citations name no page to attribute. Any tool mapping citations to pages either drops those or assigns them to the home page, and neither is accurate.
How deep into a site do AI citations point?
The median citation across all three engines points two levels into a site, which is where most substantial content sits. The engines agree on depth and disagree on whether to name a page at all.
How was this measured?
Every one of 61,536 citations was normalised and classified by how many levels deep it points, then split by engine.
Do You Know Which Pages Earn Your AI Citations?
We map every citation your brand earns to the page behind it, engine by engine, so you can see what is genuinely working instead of an average that hides it.