Daily Copilot Citations
Citations spiked in early December, then declined sharply through January and February
Dec 7 spike (5,804 citations): Likely corresponds to the AI SEO Tracking Tools 2026 analysis post gaining traction in Copilot's retrieval index. Citations dropped 80% by late January.
Top 10 Cited Pages
One page accounts for 69% of all citations — AI search has extreme winner-take-most dynamics
Citation Concentration
Top 4 pages capture 90% of all Copilot citations
Top Grounding Query Themes
Queries clustered by topic — what Copilot retrieves our content for
Query Fanout: Same Question, Multiple Retrieval Queries
Copilot rewrites user questions into multiple retrieval variants — one conversation generates several citation events
What this means: "Grounding queries" are Copilot's internal retrieval queries, not what users typed. One user question generates 3–5 retrieval variants (query fanout), so raw citation counts overstate actual user conversations. The query themes, however, accurately reflect real demand.
Average Daily Citations by Period
Citation volume shifted dramatically across the 91-day window