Thrivng Tech

Brand mentions correlate 3x more strongly with AI citations than backlinks do ✋🏻

Ahrefs ran the analysis across 76 million Google AI Overviews to confirm it.
That’s quite the shift. Backlinks built Google rankings for two decades and built an entire industry around earning them. AI engines aren’t reading the web the same way. They’re tracking which brands get talked about in trusted sources, even when those mentions aren’t linked.

A trade publication mentioning your name in passing now carries weight for AI citation, even without a do-follow link. Entity recognition matters more than link equity.

What changes in practice: PR, podcast appearances, partner content, and unlinked mentions in trusted publications are now strategic GEO assets. The old “earn the link or it doesn’t count” rule no longer applies when you’re optimising for AI visibility.

Source: Ahrefs analysis of 76 million AI Overviews, 2025 to 2026.

Are you tracking unlinked brand mentions, or are they still falling outside your reporting?

Installing agent skills from GitHub is great but "Skillifying" your own repetitive tasks is a game changer.

If you find yourself repeating the same sequence of steps, turn it into a skill and run it when you need it /mycustomskill

Example: One of my skills runs an SEO/AEO/GEO audit on a piece of content, It produces an ADHD-friendly report that serves both me and the client: coloured, branded, technical scores, what works, what doesn't, issues by priority, SEO/AEO/GEO checklist, content accuracy checks, fix list, and JSON-LD schema status. Then it drafts the client email in my tone and structure to go alongside the report.

Every piece of content created, every schema I build, every AI citation check feeds back into the skill. The skill improves, the output gets sharper and client blogs are being cited and recommended by AI engines.

To finish off, I'll run another custom skill that captures what we learned from the session, what Claude learned about me, and how we can improve the skill going forward. Those updates are made to the relevant files automatically. Build a system that knows you and how you work 🚀

📸 Screenshot from the Claude code update which is kinda cool