# Mentions: Reddit and Digital PR

> Review Sphen's drafted Reddit replies and Digital PR outreach emails. Sphen never posts or sends anything — you do.

Canonical URL: https://sphen.ai/help/mentions/
Last updated: 2026-08-14

## What it does

**Mentions** covers the off-site half of AI visibility. The **Reddit** tab monitors threads where your store should be part of the answer and drafts a reply for each. The **Digital PR** tab finds review sites, blogs and industry pages that AI assistants cite when recommending products, and drafts the outreach email. Sphen never posts and never sends — you review, edit and publish from your own accounts.

### Why it matters

AI answers cite third-party sources far more often than they cite shop pages. The **Sources** deep dive, opened from the **AI visibility deep dives** dropdown on **Analytics**, shows exactly which domains beat you to the citation. Getting mentioned on those domains — and in the Reddit threads the engines read — is what moves your citation share once your own catalog is clean.

## Setup

1. Open **Mentions**. Monitoring is set up for your store as part of onboarding — it does not switch itself on at install. Once it is running, the first qualified threads and drafts take a few days to accumulate.
2. On the **Reddit** tab, open a thread's **Response draft**. Check **Relevance**, **Google position** and whether it is one of the **AI-cited threads** before spending time on it.
3. Edit the draft to sound like you and press **Save edits**. Saving resets the approval, so approve afterwards with **Approve** — or **Reject** if the thread is a bad fit.
4. Press **Open Reddit thread**, post the reply yourself from your own account, then paste the link into **Posted comment URL** and press **Mark as posted**.
5. On the **Digital PR** tab, review each opportunity's **Subject** and **Outreach draft**, adjust them, and press **Save draft**. Use **Open target** to check the site first.
6. Send the email from your own inbox, then press **Mark contacted**. When coverage goes live, paste the link into **Live coverage or proof URL** and press **Mark live**.

## Reading the results

The counters at the top of each tab are your pipeline. On Reddit: **Opportunities**, **Drafts**, **Approved**, **Posted** and **AI-cited threads** — the last one is the number to grow, because those threads already feed AI answers. On Digital PR: **Opportunities**, **Ready**, **Contacted** and **Live wins**.

Digital PR opportunities are typed: **Review**, **Editorial**, **PR portal** and **Reclamation** — the last meaning someone already mentions your brand without linking to it, which is the cheapest win on the list. Work reclamations first, then reviews.

The realistic rhythm is slow and compounding: a handful of posted replies and one or two live placements per month, checked against the **Sources** deep dive to see whether the domains you worked start citing you.

## Troubleshooting

### There are no drafts at all.

Give it a few days first — qualified threads and opportunities accumulate slowly. If both tabs are still empty after that, monitoring has most likely not been switched on for your store yet: contact support and ask for it. If the tab reports a load failure instead, press **Retry** and check **Activity**.

### Marking something posted or live is rejected.

Both actions need a valid proof URL. **Mark as posted** only accepts a link on reddit.com, so paste the permalink of your own comment. **Mark live** accepts any http or https URL. Paste the complete link, not a shortened or partial one.

### An item's status changed while I had the page open.

The entry was updated elsewhere since the page loaded. Reload to see its current status, then repeat your action.

## Frequently asked questions

### Will Sphen ever post or email on my behalf?

No. Both workspaces are draft-only by design. Reddit replies are posted from your account, outreach emails from your own inbox.

### How do I find the right outreach targets?

Start with the **Sources** deep dive on **Analytics**, which ranks the external domains AI answers cite when your prompts are checked, and flags the ones that cite a source but not you. That is your target list.

### Is off-site work worth it before my catalog is fixed?

Rarely. Fix the catalog first via [Recommendations](/help/recommendations) — a citation that leads to a thin product page converts badly and won't be repeated.

## Still stuck?

Support answers installation, catalog sync, audit, billing, privacy, and account questions for the SPHEN.AI Shopify app. https://sphen.ai/support/