How presence and citation are detected

Detection is deliberately conservative. A query is only marked as having an answer surface when Google actually returns an AI Overview block or an answer box for it; nothing is inferred from the shape of the results. Cited sources are read straight from the fields that surface exposes, so the list is what Google showed rather than a reconstruction. Your domain counts as cited when it appears in those sources or anywhere in the top ten organic results, which means the citation figure includes ordinary ranking as well. Read the two rates together.

Reading the two rates

The scan reports an overview presence rate and a citation rate, both as percentages of the queries that returned usable data. Presence tells you how much of your query set Google is now answering itself. Citation tells you how much of that set you are visible for. The interesting number is the gap. Queries where an answer surface exists and your domain does not appear are the ones costing you clicks today, and they are the ones the recommendations lead with.

• ›High presence, low citation: the answers are being written without you
• ›Low presence: no overview yet, so a well-structured page can become the source
• ›Already cited: worth defending, because overview sources rotate
• ›Top organic domain per query: a quick read on who Google trusts here

Choosing queries worth tracking

Fifteen queries is a small budget, so spend it on questions rather than head terms. Answer surfaces cluster around definitional, comparative and how-to phrasing, which is also where the long-tail traffic that converts tends to sit. Mix queries you already rank for with ones you do not, keep the exact wording a person would type, and re-run the same list on a schedule. Overviews are volatile: one scan is a snapshot, and the value is in comparing snapshots over time.