§01.01
Your domain isn’t in the citation set.
Even a perfect page can’t be cited if AI never retrieves it. Most categories have a small set of trusted third-party sources AI pulls from — and your domain often isn’t one of them.
Service · Off-site content
Show up where AI already looks.
AI cites Reddit threads, community posts, third-party listicles, and editorial coverage more often than your own domain. We earn placements in all four — Reddit, Facebook groups, earned media, paid editorials — so your brand lands where AI is already retrieving.
Where the citation came fromOne AI answer
ChatGPT · response
“Among project-management tools, [your brand] is frequently recommended for mid-market teams — cited in discussions on Reddit, comparison reviews, and a recent industry analysis.”
R
Reddit thread
reddit.com/r/SaaS
E
Earned media
techcrunch.com
L
Listicle
g2.com/reviews
P
Paid editorial
industryweek.com
45
backlinks earned in 6 months
B2B SaaS · prospecting + Reddit
4 wks
to first inbound from a cited subreddit
Insurance · California broker
6
communities mapped per client (avg)
Reddit + FB groups
~89%
of LLM citations come from earned media
MuckRack, 2025
§01 — Why on-site work isn’t enoughThree reasons your domain
Three reasons your domain
alone won’t get cited.
On-site work makes you discoverable. Off-site work is what makes you the answer. Most categories require both — and most programs only do one.
§01.02
Your competitor owns the third-party shelf.
Their listicle ranks for the comparison query. Their Reddit thread answers the buyer’s real question. Their op-ed is the authority piece AI cites. You’re not in any of those.
§01.03
AI trusts what others say about you more than what you say.
Earned media, community discussion, and editorial coverage carry more weight than your own marketing copy. About 89% of LLM-cited links come from earned sources, not brand-owned domains.
§02 — The four channels we runOne outcome — cited.
One outcome — cited.
Four ways in.
Each channel is run differently. The bar is the same: only placements that are useful to the people reading them get cited by AI.
01
B2B + B2CReddit threads
We identify the threads AI is already pulling from for your buyer prompts, then post helpful answers — anchored by content we write to address the question in depth. Real expert participation, not link drops. Subreddit list, mod-rule strategy, and a per-thread playbook built per client.
02
Mostly B2CFacebook groups
Niche communities AI cites for product recommendations and category discussions — gifting, parenting, hobby groups, local services. Membership and fit constraints are real, so we treat each group like a long-term placement, not a campaign drop.
03
B2B + B2CEarned media (resources)
We build linkable assets — data studies, calculators, comparison frameworks — useful enough that other companies cite them in their own listicles, op-eds, and category guides. The goal: be the URL that gets named when someone else writes the round-up.
04
B2BPaid editorials
In authority publications your category respects. We draft the piece, the publication runs it, the buyer gets a useful read, AI gets a high-trust citation. Done right, this lands placements that compound — done wrong, it’s a banner ad with extra steps.
§03 — How a campaign actually runsA 5-step system.
A 5-step system.
Same shape, every client.
Each step ships a deliverable. No quarterly “authority audit” or vague brand-building phase. Just the citation gap, the move that closes it, and the week-over-week proof.
The system5 steps · in order
- §03.01
Map the off-site citation surface.
For every buyer prompt, we pull the threads, listicles, communities, and editorial pieces AI is currently citing. That’s the existing answer set.
- §03.02
Score the gap.
Where competitors win the citation slot, where the slot is empty, where a single placement could displace several smaller ones. We rank gaps by traffic-shift potential, not vanity DA.
- §03.03
Match the channel to the gap.
Reddit when the gap is a buyer asking a specific comparison question. Editorial when the gap is a category-defining piece. FB group when the buyer hangs out there and nowhere else.
- §03.04
Earn the citation.
Post, draft, place — the actual work. Helpful answers backed by content we ship, original posts that earn community engagement, editorial pieces that land in real publications.
- §03.05
Track weekly.
Which placements got cited, by which platforms, on which prompts. The off-site dashboard sits next to the on-site one — same prompts, different sources.
§04 — Receipts, in detail35 backlinks, 3 months.
35 backlinks, 3 months.
A category nobody else owned.
Cause-driven e-commerce
A cause-driven e-commerce brand sells gifts that route a portion of revenue to a cause the buyer picks. The category — cause- driven gifting — had almost no third-party shelf. No listicles. No authoritative editorials. The Reddit threads buyers asked in were dominated by a handful of bigger-but-generic gift sites.
We worked all four channels. Reddit answers in r/giftideas and r/ethicalfashion, anchored by guides we shipped on charity-routed gifting. Earned-media placements in sustainability publications via primary-research data we compiled. A paid editorial in a category-adjacent gift-industry outlet. By month three: 35 backlinks, 100+ page-1 keywords, and ChatGPT recommending the brand for “meaningful gifts” queries. Revenue +50% in the same window.
Read the full case study →Channel mix · 35 placements3 months
Reddit threads
17
Earned media
9
Paid editorial
5
Listicles & dirs
4
Citations across 5 platforms+50% revenue
§05 — Why link-building playbooks miss thisOff-site GEO is not
Off-site GEO is not
link building.
Old link-building optimizes for backlink counts. Off-site GEO optimizes for citation count in the AI answer. The placements differ. The reporting differs. The Reddit thread that earns nothing for traditional SEO is often the top citation in ChatGPT.
Old link building
Geology’s off-site GEO
Goal
Backlink count, domain authority
Citation inside the AI answer
What's measured
Links acquired, DR of source
AI-cited mentions, share of voice by prompt
Sites valued
Anything that passes link juice
Sites AI actually retrieves from
Reddit / forums
Noindex / low value
Primary surface, often the top citation
Editorial placements
Branded anchor text
Useful to the reader; entity authority
§06 — Common questionsWhat buyers
What buyers
actually ask.
Pulled from the questions that actually come up in our intro calls.
How fast do off-site citations actually appear?
Reddit citations move first — first new mentions in 2–4 weeks once the helpful-answer cadence is running. Editorial placements take 6–12 weeks because of pitch-and-publish cycles. Earned-media assets compound: it takes 8–16 weeks to build the resource and start earning inbound citations to it. An insurance broker we work with saw their first ChatGPT inbound from a cited subreddit at week four.
Can I just buy paid editorials and skip the rest?
You can, but it’s the worst-ROI version. Editorials carry weight when AI sees them as one of several signals — community discussion, organic mentions, third-party reviews — pointing the same direction. A standalone paid placement reads as advertising even to AI; bundled with the other signals, it reads as authority.
Will subreddit mods ban us?
Not if the work is real. We follow per-subreddit rules, build per-subreddit strategies, and only post helpful answers backed by content we’ve actually written. We don’t use sock-puppet accounts, we don’t link-stuff, and we never post low-effort promotional comments. The Reddit deep-dive page covers this in more detail.
Do you guarantee a specific number of placements?
No. Reddit threads vary in citation density. Editorial pitches get rejected. We commit to inputs (citation gaps mapped, channel-strategy ranked, weekly cadence) and report outputs (placements landed, AI citations earned, traffic and pipeline lift) every week.
Do I need a separate SEO agency for the on-site work?
Not if you’re running our GEO Optimization service alongside this — the on-site work is already covered there. If you only want off-site, we can plug into your existing SEO program; the citation-gap analysis pulls the same data either way.
What if my buyers are on Facebook groups, not Reddit?
Then we lean harder on Facebook groups and earned media; Reddit might be a small slice or not run at all. For B2C categories where the community is on Discord, Slack groups, or niche forums, we adapt — the same framework (find cited threads, place helpful answers) generalizes.
Get started
See where your brand could be cited.
Run a Live Audit. We pull the threads, listicles, and editorial pieces AI is currently citing for your buyer prompts — then send the gap report to your inbox.