How do you get cited in Google AI Overviews?

What Google says

Google’s guidance is short. To be shown as a supporting link in an AI Overview, “a page must be indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet”. There are “no additional technical requirements”, “no other special optimizations necessary” and “no special schema.org structured data that you need to add” (Google Search Central, updated 10 December 2025).

When we asked Google’s AI how to get cited, its answer went further. It told us to add FAQPage and HowTo schema and write 45–75 word “answer capsules”. 12 of its 13 sources were SEO agency and tool blogs, and the 13th was a link to Search Console. None showed what cited pages actually look like, so we checked.

What the cited pages had in common

We fetched the 153 web pages Google’s AI Overviews cited across 25 answers. 119 were readable.

What the page had	Cited pages	Share
Any JSON-LD structured data	107	90%
An Organization in its markup	88	74%
A published or updated date in its markup	89	75%
At least one heading phrased as a question	92	77%
Article or BlogPosting markup	77	65%
BreadcrumbList markup	74	62%
A named person in its markup (usually the author)	70	59%
An FAQ section in the text	64	54%
FAQPage markup	27	23%
A table	21	18%
An embedded video	13	11%
HowTo markup	2	2%

The typical cited page was a long article: about 2,300 words of text and 8 second-level headings. It said who wrote it and when, and it was marked up as an article with breadcrumbs.

FAQ schema, the tactic most guides recommend, was one of the least common features. 64 pages had an FAQ section, but only 27 marked it up with FAQPage. Just 2 used HowTo.

This doesn’t mean schema never helps. It means cited pages manage without it. If your page is indexed, readable and answers the question, missing FAQ markup isn’t what keeps you out.

What to copy from cited pages

From the pages that were cited, and from what Google says, four things look more useful than markup.

1. Answer the exact question, early. 77% of cited pages had at least one heading phrased as a question. Put the question in a heading, answer it in the first two sentences under it, then explain.

2. Say who wrote it and when. 75% of cited pages carried a date in their markup and 59% named a person.

3. Add something the other pages don’t have. Most cited pages repeat the same checklist. Pages with their own numbers, examples or method give Google, and other writers, something to cite that the rest don’t.

4. Make sure Google can read it. Indexed, eligible for a snippet, and not hidden behind scripts or logins. 34 of the 153 cited pages either blocked our script or showed almost no text without running JavaScript. Google could read them, since it cited them. Other AI crawlers often don’t run JavaScript, so keep your main text in the HTML, and use URL Inspection in Search Console to see what Google sees.

Don’t ignore the other quarter

Pages are only part of it. Across 36 AI Overviews we captured in October 2026, 83 of 331 citations were videos or social posts, and YouTube was the most-cited site of all, with 57. For “how to get your brand mentioned in chatgpt”, 4 of the 8 sources were YouTube videos.

For a travel brand, video may matter more than markup. Ask Google’s AI how to market a hotel on TikTok and the first source is a TikTok video, made by a marketer, not a hotel. If you want to be cited for the questions your guests ask, a clear video answer on YouTube or TikTok can be the citable source. More on this in what sources Google’s AI Overview uses.

A quick checklist

• The page is indexed and shows a snippet in normal search.
• The question is in a heading, and the first two sentences answer it.
• A named author, with a role, and a visible updated date.
• Article and BreadcrumbList markup. Add FAQPage only if the page really has an FAQ.
• At least one fact, number or example that no other page has, with its source and date.
• A video answer to the same question, if your customers search on YouTube or TikTok.