An October 28 Peec AI case study draws attention to SIXT researcher Hadeer ElMalah’s work on external partner listings. The underlying paper was presented at SEASON 2026 in September, rather than describing a newly conducted October experiment. Case study: https://peec.ai/blog/how-sixt-increased-ai-citations-of-its-partner-listings-by-320
The study tracked 24 prompts across four partner domains and 11 listings. It reports a 320% increase in citation frequency for the full-treatment group versus 12.2% for the unchanged control. The initial comparison used two-week periods. The paper calls the findings preliminary: no significance testing was performed and later observations lacked a concurrent control. Original paper: https://reposit.haw-hamburg.de/bitstream/20.500.12738/20008/1/SEASON2026_paper_49.pdf
AudioSlave analysis: A percentage increase needs a starting value, observation period, prompt set and comparison group to be interpretable. Partner-listing citations require separate evidence before they can be described as visits, inquiries or sales. The study establishes neither expected returns for another business nor which individual change caused the movement. The case study and paper concern the same experiment, not independent replications.