{"id":18947,"date":"2024-11-29T12:15:57","date_gmt":"2024-11-29T12:15:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/?p=18947"},"modified":"2025-11-24T11:35:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T11:35:07","slug":"how-to-measure-ai-traffic-with-google-analytics-4-ga4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/how-to-measure-ai-traffic-with-google-analytics-4-ga4","title":{"rendered":"How to Measure AI Traffic with Google Analytics 4 (GA4)"},"content":{"rendered":"

The launch of Chat GPT by OpenAI in November 2022 marked a radical change in the internet search engine market. In this post, we\u2019ll discuss how it has revolutionized the search market and <\/span>how to measure traffic to our website from AI-based search engines, such as Chat GPT or Gemini<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Evolution of the Search Market Since the Launch of Chat GPT<\/span><\/h2>\n

Before the launch of Chat GPT, Google’s leadership in international market share was indisputable. This chart shows its global market search in 2022, with <\/span>Google capturing 93% of searches.<\/b><\/p>\n

\"search<\/p>\n

In <\/span>November 2022, OpenAI launched the first free version of Chat GPT<\/b>, revolutionizing the way people search on the internet worldwide.<\/span><\/p>\n

This launch kickstarted a wave of similar search engines\u2014some based on Chat GPT and others using proprietary technology.<\/span><\/p>\n

Although Chat GPT’s release made OpenAI a household name, the company had been working on AI since 2015, testing various learning models known as Large Language Models (LLMs), which underpin Chat GPT.<\/span>
\n<\/span>Since then, its growth has been phenomenal, reaching 1 million users in just five days and achieving 100 million users in only two months.<\/span><\/p>\n

Chat GPT\u2019s market debut was very much in the spirit of Silicon Valley<\/b>\u2014a startup launching an open product that could potentially disrupt its entire market, albeit without fully addressing ethical dilemmas related to how it presents information.<\/span><\/p>\n

Google responded swiftly by launching its AI-based search engine, Bard<\/b>, in March 2023, initially accessible only by invitation. Google had to approach Bard’s release more cautiously, given the potential impact on its ad-based business model and its ongoing legal battles in the US and Europe.<\/span><\/p>\n

Following its initial release, Bard evolved into Gemini, which is now publicly available with a subscription model similar to Chat GPT’s.<\/span><\/p>\n

How AI-Based Search Engines Drive Traffic to Websites<\/b><\/h2>\n

For some queries, <\/span>AI-based search engines can provide complete answers within their interface.<\/b> For others, they include <\/span>links to various websites<\/b>, which, if followed by users, generate traffic for those sites. Let\u2019s look at a few examples:<\/span><\/p>\n

If we search for <\/span>inspiration for a New Year\u2019s Eve party dress on Chat GPT<\/b>, using this prompt:<\/span><\/p>\n

“Recommend a color for a party dress for New Year\u2019s Eve 2024”<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n

The search engine provides several color options and recommendations for each, in this case without linking to any sites:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

With a <\/span>charming final recommendation<\/b>:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

From this initial query, if we then ask, <\/span>“Websites to buy black party dresses”<\/span><\/i> it provides <\/span>results with links that can direct traffic to those websites:<\/b><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

How to Measure AI Traffic with GA4<\/b><\/h2>\n

If <\/span>we follow Chat GPT\u2019s links<\/b>, we arrive at various websites with URLs <\/span>tagged using \u201cutm\u201d parameters<\/b>:<\/span><\/p>\n

…?utm_source=chatgpt.com<\/span><\/p>\n

These tags, and others used by similar search engines, <\/span>allow us to identify this traffic<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Currently, <\/span>GA4 doesn\u2019t have a dedicated channel for this type of traffic<\/b>; instead, it is categorized under “referral.” Within referral data, we can see <\/span>traffic with those “utm” tags<\/b>.<\/span>
\n<\/span>Here is an <\/span>example from one of the projects we work on at Relevant Group<\/b>, showing traffic from GPT:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

By identifying all traffic sources, we can create a comprehensive <\/span>report on AI-based search engine traffic<\/b>. This chart shows the evolution of AI traffic throughout 2024 for one of our clients.<\/span><\/p>\n

At present,<\/span> total traffic from AI sources is low but shows an upward trend<\/b>.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The most interesting aspect of identifying this traffic is the <\/span>potential to use these insights to improve our online visibility<\/b>:<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, by expanding this analysis to include the URLs driving this traffic to our website, we can <\/span>estimate the types of searches users are performing on AI-based search engines related to our business<\/b>. This enables us to develop <\/span>strategies to optimize our content for these search engines.<\/b><\/p>\n

And this is just one example of the vast possibilities offered by analyzing this data.<\/span><\/p>\n

Are You Measuring Your AI Traffic? <\/b>If not, at Relevant Group we can help you improve your project’s measurement.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The launch of Chat GPT by OpenAI in November 2022 marked a radical change in the internet search engine market. In this post, we\u2019ll discuss how it has revolutionized the search market and how to measure traffic to our website from AI-based search engines, such as Chat GPT or Gemini. The Evolution of the Search […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":18961,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[337],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18947","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-extra-extra-2"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18947"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18947\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19517,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18947\/revisions\/19517"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/relevantgroup.media\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}