A Citation Audit reviews the actual web pages AI models cite when they mention your brand or your competitors. When AI models like ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude answer a question, they often link to source URLs. The Citation Audit visits each URL and pulls detailed information about the page, so you get a clearer picture of what drives AI recommendations.
Every Gumshoe plan includes Citations (formerly the Sources page), the list of URLs that AI models cited in your Visibility Audit (formerly known as a report). For a walkthrough of that list, see our Citations article. The Citation Audit is a Pro plan upgrade: on top of that list, it scrapes each cited page and pulls out the details below, so you don't have to open every URL yourself.
What does it do?
Your Citation Audit runs with your Project's Subscription on the schedule you set. It provides the following features:
1. Collects every citation URL from the AI-generated answers in your Visibility Audit.
2. Groups variations of the same URL together, so one page does not show up as several separate entries. This covers differences like http versus https, www versus no www, trailing slashes, fragments, and tracking parameters such as UTM codes and ad click IDs.
3. Fetches the full content of each cited page. Gumshoe tries a direct request first, then falls back to a browser-based scraper for pages that need JavaScript to render. If a cited URL redirects, the page details come from the page it lands on, while the Citations list keeps showing the URL the model returned.
4. Analyzes each page to pull out:
- Page title and description (from meta tags, Open Graph data, or the page heading)
- Author information (person or organization, from structured data and meta tags)
- Publication date (so you can see how fresh or dated the cited content is)
- Brands that appear on the page (which brands, including yours and your competitors, show up in the cited article's text and links)
What can I learn from it?
The Citation Audit page (under Monitor) shows the results. For each cited URL, you can see:
- The page title, author, and publication date
- Which brands appear on that page, both in the page content and in the AI answer that cited it
- Whether the source is your own domain, a competitor's domain, or a third-party site
- How many citations that source earned across your Visibility Audit's questions
This helps you understand not just whether AI models cite your brand, but what content they draw from when they do. You can spot the third-party articles influencing AI recommendations, see competitor content getting cited in your space, and find opportunities to create or update content that AI models are likely to reference.
What happens to my Citations if my company moves to a new domain?
Your Citations show the URLs the AI models returned. If your company has rebranded or consolidated onto a new domain, your Citations can keep listing the old addresses for a while, even though those addresses now redirect to your new site. That is expected, not an error.
Citation lists come from the models' own search results, so the old URLs fall away as those search indexes catch up with your new domain. You don't need to fix anything on your side or reconfigure Gumshoe.
One effect worth knowing: when a cited legacy URL redirects to your new site, the page details you see are read from the page it lands on. The title, author, and brands reflect your new site, while the listed URL is still the old one. That combination is expected.
Your visibility measurement isn't affected while this happens. Gumshoe recognizes your brand across multiple domains and spellings, so it still counts mentions of your brand regardless of which address the models use.
Pro tip: If an old URL lingers, publish content on your site that says plainly which domain you want AI models to send buyers to. Being direct about it often nudges models toward citing the address you prefer.
Which plan includes the Citation Audit?
Every plan includes Citations, the list of cited URLs in your Visibility Audit. The Citation Audit, which adds the scraped page details above, is included with the Pro plan. To add the Citation Audit, use the Pro plan. You can compare plans on the pricing page.
Pro tip: Citations show the URL the AI model returned, with one exception: when a model hands back a Google search wrapper link, Gumshoe resolves it to the page it actually points to. Any other redirect is left alone, so a cited URL is not swapped for the address it forwards to. Grouping tidies up variations of the same address so a single page does not split into several entries, and it can take a short time to finish right after a run.