Something fundamental has shifted in how audiences encounter and evaluate information. When someone asks an AI assistant a question about a brand, a market, or a topic your clients care about, the answer doesn’t come from a single authoritative source.

Experts talk about ‘authentic’ story telling and communications. But how are those perceptions indexed by AI engines. With the ability to find and process ginormous volumes of information, the conversation a brand is having in one place, needs not only to be consistent across the channels it uses, but among the social communities where those brands are mentioned.

More directly said, your brand’s reputation is now shaped not just by what you publish as part of its media push, but by what the surrounding source ecosystem says about you. And that ecosystem looks very different than the traditional media landscape.

Finding the Conversations

Partnering with Semrush, a LLM Citations Study analyzed prompt-level citation data across 34 weekly reporting periods from October 2025 through May 2026. The research covered ChatGPT Search, Gemini, Google AI Mode, and Perplexity not only from an aggregated worldwide perspective, but also did a deep dive across eight global markets including Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Indonesia, Singapore, South Africa, the United Arab Emirates, and the United States. The findings reframe the visibility challenge in practical, actionable terms.

What’s Inside This Report

Where Trust Lives: Sources for Credibility in Local Markets draws on prompt-level citation data from the Semrush LLM Citations Study that covers 34 weekly reporting periods from October 2025 through May 2026. This data shows communications professionals exactly how AI systems are assembling answers, and what that means for how brands build credibility today.

• How the AI Source Ecosystem is Reshaping Brand Reputation
• Why There’s no Universal AI Playbook
• How Local Context Changes Everything
• A Practical Framework for Action
• 5 Key Takeaways for Communications Teams

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