Attributing Traffic from Google AI Mode: A Solution

[sumaharavu]

When we search for a product related to our client's website, we receive options through Google's AI mode. When the AI presents links related to our client's site, we click on one and are navigated to the site. If an order is placed, this conversion is currently attributed to the 'Organic' channel. However, when users click on those AI-generated answers in Google search, the referrer only shows as google.com.

Could anyone suggest how we can distinguish between 'AI overview' clicks and standard search clicks? Instead of attributing this traffic to 'Organic,' is there a way to attribute it specifically to 'AI Mode clicks'?

[Jennifer_Dungan]

At this time, there is no way to distinguish the information that I am aware of... 

I did notice that AI Mode added a #:~:text= into the URL (however, I don't know if this hash is unique to AI Mode... I was thinking that you might be able to identify this particular hash usage in conjunction with google as a referrer... but while I can read normal hash values fine (#something), this newer designation hash seems to be invisible (#:~:something).

So unless Google starts adding a UTM or something to distinguish these referrals, we are probably out of luck.

[Vinay_Chauhan]

@Jennifer_Dungan  is absolutely correct!

The only workaround would be exploring server logs or experimenting with referrer patterns, but even those won’t guarantee accuracy today.

[JustinCollins]

As mentioned, as far as I am aware, there are no reliable means to obtain the breakout. Link to Text fragments (#:~:text=) introduced in 2020 by Google can occur in both traditional Google organic search, Google AI Overviews as well as in Google AI mode so are therefore not unique to AI referral.