Add 'where did you hear about us' to your forms

Understand what analytics cannot see

When an AI model recommends you, many people never click the link. They read the answer, then search your name, type your domain, or remember you and come back a week later. That visit arrives as direct or branded search, so the AI models that did the work are invisible in Analytics. The referred sessions on your Traffic page are real, and they are the floor, not the total.

You should see: You can see AI-referred sessions on the Traffic page and read them as a floor.

Add the question to every lead and signup form

Add one optional question, How did you hear about us, to your demo request, contact, quote and signup forms. Keep the options short and name the AI models directly: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, another AI model, Google search, social, a friend or colleague, other. Optional matters: a required field costs you conversions, and you only need enough answers to see the shape.

You should see: Every form that creates a lead or an account carries the same question and the same options.

Store the answer where you can count it

Send the answer into your CRM or database as a field on the record, not into a notification email nobody aggregates. If your forms already push to a CRM, add it as a custom field on the contact. The only thing that matters is that you can count answers per month without reading them one at a time.

Compare the two numbers and get your own multiplier

Each month, count the self-reported AI answers and read the AI-referred sessions for the same window on your Traffic page. The ratio between them is your workspace's own dark-chat multiplier: how much AI influence you get for every session your analytics can attribute. It is measured from your own two sources, so it beats any published figure about somebody else's site.

You should see: You have two counts for the same month and a ratio between them.

Use the multiplier, and watch it move

Apply the multiplier when you value AI visibility work, and recompute it every month rather than freezing it. It moves when the AI models change how they link, when your own brand search grows, and when you win or lose the prompts you track. A multiplier that moves is telling you something; a multiplier you set once is a guess.