Referrer string
A referrer string is the address a browser passes to your site to say which site sent a visitor, like chatgpt.com.
A referrer string is the address a browser sends to your website when someone clicks a link, saying which page they came from. If someone clicks through from an answer on chatgpt.com, the referrer says chatgpt.com. Your analytics tool reads it to tell you where your visitors come from.
It's the main way you can count the visitors AI assistants send you. It's also often missing, which means your AI traffic almost always looks smaller than it is.
How it works
The browser sends the referrer in a part of the request called the Referer header. Yes, it's spelled with one r, a typo from the early web that stuck. Your analytics reads it and files the visit under a source, such as a search engine, a social site or an AI assistant.
Why it goes missing
Plenty of visits arrive with no referrer, or with one that doesn't say much:
- Links opened from a desktop or phone app, rather than a browser, often carry no referrer
- Sites can tell browsers to send only their domain, or nothing at all
- Someone copies an address from an answer and pastes it into a new tab
- Someone reads your name in an answer and searches for you later
Analytics tools usually file those visits as direct traffic. For example, say ChatGPT names Kestrel Roasters in an answer and 50 people go on to visit. Twelve click the link in a browser and show up as ChatGPT. The other 38 type the name into Google or open the link from the app, and show up as search or direct. The report says 12.
So read your AI traffic as the smallest it could be, and watch the trend more than the number.
In AnswerOrbit
The AI traffic tab in Website and AI traffic shows the people AI assistants sent to your site, from your Google Analytics, broken down by assistant, landing page, country and device. Like any analytics, it can only count the visits that arrive saying where they came from.