How do ChatGPT, Claude and Alice choose sources for an answer?
What a website owner can check, how to answer a buyer’s question and where to find referral visits.
To answer a parts compatibility question, a useful source names the model, part number and limitations. A page must be accessible for a search tool to read it. Whether it is cited depends on the question.
How do the services use search?
- When Alice uses web search, it can draw on Yandex results and cite different sources for different parts of its answer. Yandex documentation.
- OpenAI recommends allowing OAI-SearchBot for search discovery. Look for utm_source=chatgpt.com on referral visits. Publisher FAQ.
- Claude cites sources when it searches the web. Anthropic identifies Claude-SearchBot as its search crawler. Web search and crawler documentation.
What can you change and measure?
Use a real enquiry. For a compatibility question, publish a table, the part revision and the manufacturer’s specification. Say where buyers can find the build year or send a photo of the nameplate.
Record the question, date, service and cited URL. Count referral visits and subsequent enquiries separately. A person can read a citation without visiting. See the IWH referral study.