ChatGPT Directs Visitors to Unmanaged Website Sections
A new study reveals that ChatGPT directs nearly a third of website traffic to internal search results pages, areas companies often neglect.
A recent study by Previsible found that ChatGPT sends 28.8 percent of the traffic it refers directly to internal search results pages on websites. This trend remains consistent across various industries, averaging around 25 percent.
Often, AI models decide a company is a trustworthy answer but struggle to pinpoint the exact best page. This results in high-intent visitors being directed to the site's search results page, a feature that companies rarely optimize or actively monitor.
These AI-referred visitors are valuable, showing higher engagement. According to SimilarWeb data, AI-influenced visitors view an average of 12 pages and spend 11.8 minutes on a site, considerably more than the 6.5 pages and 5.6 minutes spent by other visitors.
This pattern suggests businesses need to re-evaluate their website strategies. Marketing budgets are often focused on the homepage, while a significant portion of valuable traffic arrives via internal search, leading to pages that are not designed as purposeful landing pages.