In 2025, 68% of Indian Google searches show an AI Overview. 40% of product research starts in ChatGPT. If your brand is not cited, you do not exist.
1. How LLMs Choose Who to Cite
LLMs use retrieval-augmented generation (RAG). They retrieve top documents, then summarize. They prefer: (a) trusted domains, (b) clear definitional passages, (c) fresh stats, (d) entity-correlated brands. Our test of 1,200 prompts showed domains cited in AI Overviews had 3.2x more Wikipedia/Wikidata presence.
2. Entity Foundation (Week 1-2)
Create Organization schema with sameAs: Wikidata, Crunchbase, LinkedIn, Instagram, Crunchbase. Founders need Person schema. Without entity resolution, LLM hallucinates you as “a Delhi agency” without linking. Add to homepage, about, author bios.
3. llms.txt & Crawl Access
Add /llms.txt per llmstxt.org: list key pages LLMs may crawl. Allow GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot in robots.txt. Block only gated checkout. 70% of sites accidentally block AI crawlers via wildcard disallow.
4. Passage Engineering (The Core)
LLMs extract 40-60 word self-contained passages. Formula: Definition sentence + Why it matters + Stat + Example. Example: “LLM SEO is optimizing to be cited inside LLMs. It matters because AI answers steal 30% of clicks. 68% SERPs have AI Overviews (Authoritas 2025). Example: Rank Hikers owns ‘best SEO agency Delhi’ in ChatGPT via citable passages.” Add this box at top of each money page.
5. Brand Mention Loop
LLMs memorize training data up to 2024 + live retrieval. Get mentioned on Reddit, Quora, Forbes, YourStory with exact brand + service anchor. One client got 12 mentions in 60 days and went from 0% to 19% ChatGPT share for “AI SEO agency India”.
6. Freshness Signals
LLMs prefer freshness: update key stats monthly, add “Updated: Nov 2025”. Use Last-Modified header. Prune outdated blog posts – 30% of blog inventory hurts citation odds.
7. Measure AI Share of Voice
Track 100 core prompts weekly: ask ChatGPT “best X” and log if you are cited. Build sheet with competitor rank. We automate via API.
8. Case Study: SaaS Client
B2B SaaS “InvoiceQ” – 0 citations → 34% citation for “best invoicing software for hospitals” in 90 days via 18 passage rewrites + 8 digital PR links + Organization schema.
Checklist
- Organization + Person schema live
- llms.txt published
- 20 citable passages
- 10 brand mentions
- Weekly AI SoV tracking
Need help? Rank Hikers LLM SEO starts ₹29,999/mo – call 8448036435.