AI Referral Tracking

Track and attribute traffic from AI platforms like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity.

The Rise of AI Traffic

AI platforms are becoming significant traffic sources:

Users ask AI for recommendations
AI cites your content as a source
Users click through to your site

User asks ChatGPT: "What's the best analytics tool?"
         ↓
ChatGPT mentions your product
         ↓
User clicks link to your site
         ↓
Convultra tracks as AI Referral

Supported AI Platforms

Platform	Referrer Detection
ChatGPT	`chatgpt.com`
Claude	`claude.ai`
Perplexity	`perplexity.ai`
Google Bard/Gemini	`bard.google.com`, `gemini.google.com`
Bing Copilot	`bing.com/chat`
You.com	`you.com`
Phind	`phind.com`

Viewing AI Traffic

AI Referrals Dashboard

Dashboard → Analytics → AI Referrals

Metric	Description
Total AI Visitors	Unique visitors from AI platforms
Sessions	Total sessions from AI
Pageviews	Pages viewed from AI traffic
Conversions	Conversions attributed to AI
Conversion Rate	AI traffic conversion rate

By Platform

See breakdown by AI platform:

Platform	Visitors	Conversions	Conv. Rate
ChatGPT	1,200	45	3.75%
Perplexity	800	38	4.75%
Claude	400	18	4.50%

💡

AI referral traffic often converts at higher rates than other sources because users arrive with high intent after specific queries.

AI Traffic vs AI Bots

Important distinction:

Type	What It Is	Counted In
AI Referral	Humans clicking from AI platforms	Main analytics ✅
AI Bot	AI crawlers indexing your site	Bot analytics only

AI Referrals are human visitors who were referred by an AI platform. AI Bots are the AI systems crawling your site for training/indexing.

How Detection Works

Referrer Analysis

The SDK checks the document.referrer:

// AI platform referrers
const aiReferrers = [
  'chatgpt.com',
  'claude.ai',
  'perplexity.ai',
  'bard.google.com',
  'gemini.google.com',
  'you.com',
  'phind.com'
]
 
// On page load
if (aiReferrers.some(ai => document.referrer.includes(ai))) {
  // Track as AI referral
}

Source Attribution

AI referrals get special source attribution:

{
  source: 'chatgpt',      // AI platform
  medium: 'ai_referral',  // Special medium
  channel: 'AI Referral'  // Channel group
}

Conversion Attribution

Conversions from AI traffic are tracked like any other source:

ChatGPT referral → Land on site → Browse → Convert
                                            ↓
                            Attributed to ChatGPT (AI Referral)

In Platform Reporting

AI referrals appear in:

Sources: chatgpt, claude, perplexity, etc.
Mediums: ai_referral
Channels: AI Referral

Analytics Integration

Compare to Other Sources

Compare AI referral performance:

Source	Visitors	Conv. Rate	Avg. Value
Google (organic)	10,000	2.1%	$45
Facebook (paid)	5,000	1.8%	$52
ChatGPT (AI)	1,200	3.8%	$65
Direct	3,000	3.2%	$48

Trends Over Time

Dashboard → Analytics → AI Referrals → Trend

Track AI traffic growth:

Weekly/monthly comparison
Platform distribution changes
Conversion rate trends

Optimizing for AI Referrals

Content Strategy

AI platforms prefer:

Clear, factual content
Structured data (lists, tables)
Authoritative sources
Recently updated content

Monitor What AI Sees

Use the Bot Analytics → AI Bots view to see:

Which pages AI is crawling
How often AI indexes your content
Content changes AI might pick up

Landing Page Optimization

AI referral traffic often has:

High intent (specific query led them)
Context from AI conversation
Higher expectations for relevance

Optimize landing pages for:

Quick value delivery
Clear CTAs
Fast load times

API Access

Query AI referral data via API:

// Get AI referral overview
GET /v1/analytics/ai-referrals?date_from=2024-01-01
 
// Response
{
  "total_visitors": 2400,
  "total_conversions": 101,
  "conversion_rate": 4.21,
  "by_platform": [
    { "platform": "chatgpt", "visitors": 1200, "conversions": 45 },
    { "platform": "perplexity", "visitors": 800, "conversions": 38 },
    { "platform": "claude", "visitors": 400, "conversions": 18 }
  ]
}

Future of AI Referrals

AI referrals are expected to grow significantly:

More users using AI for research
AI platforms adding more web citations
Voice assistants integrating AI responses

Convultra will continue adding detection for new AI platforms.

Next Steps

Bot Detection Conversion Recovery