ChatGPT referral traffic to websites is increasing, but not as dramatically as some reports suggest
A second-rack bagel that's nearly first-rack. Tasty stuff.
Summary
The article examines a claim that ChatGPT began sending significantly more referral traffic to websites starting May 7, 2025, after surfacing more prominent links to brands in its answers. While the original data from Adelle Kehoe showed up to 150% increases, the author's own analysis of client data confirms traffic increases but at much lower levels. The article presents three client examples showing modest gains, suggesting the impact varies widely depending on the site and context.
Key quotes
· 4 pulledI recently saw a post on LinkedIn from Adelle Kehoe that posited that ChatGPT started sending a lot more traffic to websites beginning on May 7
Her reasoning was that ChatGPT 'started surfacing more prominent links to brands in its answers', which indeed seems to be true
their data shows that referral visits from ChatGPT have increased by as much as 150%!
I did some digging with our clients and found that traffic from ChatGPT has indeed gone up quite a lot, but nowhere near the 150% that they're seeing
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