B
Evidence Grade B
Graded
accuracy verified by the review judge
Safe to Cite
Current
0.218x
0.218x -- correlation with ai citation frequency for backlinks (2026)
Backlinks correlate with AI citation frequency at 0.218 according to the Ahrefs 75,000-brand study.
Attribution:
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Lighthouse Research Team
Last verified:
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Source verified
Evidence graded
Value
0.218x
Unit
Ratio
Data Vintage
2026
Entity
Sample Size
75,000
Evidence Quality
B
Strong, reliable evidence
Sourced from a well-regarded research firm or industry leader with transparent methodology and a reasonably large sample.
Single source - not yet corroborated
Score breakdown
Extraction
75
Source Trust
60
Citation Chain
20
Independence
30
Methodology
45
Freshness
95
Source
Ahrefs
Primary
Tier B
https://www.lawrencehitches.com/ai-seo-consultant/ ↗
Source Article
Lawrence Hitches | AI SEO Consultant
AI SEO Consultant Melbourne and AI Search Consultant
Get your brand cited in the AI answers your customers already trust, before your competitors claim the spot.
14+ years SEO · Chief of Staff at StudioHawk (Australia's most awarded SEO agency, 45+ industry wins) · Speaker at SEO Mastery Summit, SEO…
Original Research
Ahrefs
· Original study ↗
Methodology
Ahrefs 75,000-brand correlation study
Methodology documented
Segmentation
Industrymarketing
Cite this stat
Plain Text
backlinks: 0.218x correlation with ai citation frequency. Source: Ahrefs (2026). Via Lighthouse Intelligence -- https://lighthousedata.io/data/backlinks-ai-citation-correlation
HTML Embed
<blockquote cite="https://lighthousedata.io/data/backlinks-ai-citation-correlation" style="border-left:3px solid #2563eb;padding:12px 16px;margin:16px 0;font-family:system-ui,sans-serif;background:#f0f4ff;"><strong>0.218x</strong> -- correlation with ai citation frequency for backlinks<br><small>Source: Ahrefs (2026) · <a href="https://lighthousedata.io/data/backlinks-ai-citation-correlation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lighthouse Intelligence</a></small></blockquote>
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