63% of Websites Receive AI Traffic (New Study of 3,000 Sites)

We studied the postulation of 3,000 websites to amended recognize the size and make-up of AI traffic—including however overmuch of it is being sent, the astir communal referral sources, and however that differs depending connected the size of the site.

We analyzed the postulation differences betwixt sites driving greater than 10,000 visitors, betwixt 1,000 and 9,999 visitors, and beneath 999 visitors per month, crossed the pursuing 7 AI chatbots: ChatGPT, Claude, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, Jasper, and Mistral.

Thanks to our information idiosyncratic Xibeijia Guan for aggregating each of the information down this study.

We analyzed full postulation information from an anonymized illustration of 3,000 sites.

Across the full sample, 1,900 sites received astatine slightest 1 sojourn from an AI source.

Looking astatine it different way, 63% of the sites successful our survey had astatine slightest 1 visitant get via an AI chatbot.

According to the information we tin accurately attribute, you person astir a 2 successful 3 accidental of receiving a tract sojourn via AI.

This information relies connected the referral root being trackable successful analytics, but it’s important to enactment that immoderate AI postulation volition propulsion done arsenic “direct”.

In different words, this information represents conscionable the visible AI traffic—the minimum magnitude of AI visitors a website receives.

While there’s surely much to the story, you tin inactive larn a batch astir your AI visibility from the information you can track.

Monitoring your AI postulation tin amusement you which sources nonstop users your way, which pages connected your tract enactment arsenic AI postulation magnets, and however that postulation is changing oregon increasing over time.

Knowing this, you tin optimize your AI referral pages and paths, separating pages that thrust vanity postulation from those that really prosecute oregon convert.

In my article connected LLM optimization, I discovered a fewer techniques that tin assistance you enactment your marque into AI answers.

But, I’d besides urge speechmaking the pursuing posts:

• AI optimization: How to optimize your contented for AI hunt and agents by Jed White
• Guide wherever LLMs crawl [LinkedIn post] by Jes Scholz
• What Drives Brand Mentions successful AI Answers? By Christina Blake and Nick Haigler
• Decoding LLMs: How to beryllium disposable successful generative AI hunt results by Olaf Kopp

We studied 7 of the astir fashionable AI chatbots, and determination was a precise wide trinity starring the way.

ChatGPT sent implicit fractional of each AI traffic, followed by Perplexity which sent conscionable shy of a third, and past Gemini which referred ~18%.

The remaining AI chatbots—Claude, Copilot, Mistral, and Jasper—passed connected little than 2% of AI postulation betwixt them.

Copilot’s deficiency of referral postulation amazed maine fixed that it’s connected to the unfastened web, and has real-time retrieval capabilities—not to notation a market share that exceeds adjacent Gemini oregon Perplexity.

It’s wide that if you privation postulation from AI, you request to absorption your attraction connected the “big three” chatbots driving 98% of AI traffic: ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini.

ChatGPT, successful particular, should beryllium your main focus, since it drives fractional of each AI referrals.

As a percent of mean monthly traffic, 0.12% of a site’s views, and 0.17% of its visitors travel from AI.

This aligns with what galore different marketers are seeing successful early-stage LLM postulation studies…

Your analytics whitethorn amusement akin oregon adjacent higher AI postulation numbers.

Across each 3 cohorts, we noticed the apical sites picking up astir 6% of their full postulation from AI, with 1 tract earning arsenic overmuch as 18%.

While ~0.17% mightiness look negligible, existent figures are apt northbound of this, since AI visits tin get bundled successful with “direct” traffic.

With these kinds of reporting quirks, uncovering different ways to property your AI postulation and conversions is a must.

One avenue you tin spell down is mounting up qualitative tracking methods similar “How did you perceive astir us?” forms, to drawback what analytics might miss.

For example, we cod qualitative feedback connected registration, and to day we’ve seen 14K+ self-attributed caller users from ChatGPT.

Now that we’ve analyzed mean AI postulation crossed our full sample, let’s excavation deeper into idiosyncratic cohorts.

Predictably, the sites earning much visits were besides the ones picking up the astir AI traffic.