How to track sales from ChatGPT and other AI assistants on Shopify
ChatGPT tags its links with utm_source=chatgpt.com. How to find AI assistant visits and orders in Shopify, and what referrers other assistants leave.
Short answer: ChatGPT adds utm_source=chatgpt.com to the links it shows, so in Shopify you can find those visits and orders by filtering sessions and orders on that UTM source. For other assistants, look at the referring domain, such as perplexity.ai, claude.ai, gemini.google.com or copilot.microsoft.com, and group them into one AI assistants channel in your reports.
Where AI assistant visits show up
| Assistant | How to recognise the visit |
|---|---|
| ChatGPT | utm_source=chatgpt.com on the landing URL, documented by OpenAI |
| Perplexity | Referring domain perplexity.ai, when the browser sends a referrer |
| Claude | Referring domain claude.ai, when the browser sends a referrer |
| Gemini | Referring domain gemini.google.com, when the browser sends a referrer |
| Copilot | Referring domain copilot.microsoft.com, when the browser sends a referrer |
Only ChatGPT documents a UTM parameter. For the others, the referrer depends on the app and the browser, so some visits arrive without one and are counted as direct.
Finding them in Shopify
- In Shopify analytics, open the sessions or sales reports and break them down by UTM source, then look for
chatgpt.com. - Break the same reports down by referring domain and look for the assistant domains above.
- On an individual order, the conversion details show the visit sources Shopify recorded for that customer, when it has them.
Making your store readable to assistants
Assistants can only send visitors to pages their search crawlers may fetch. For ChatGPT that crawler is OAI-SearchBot, separate from GPTBot, which OpenAI uses for training. Check your robots.txt and your CDN or firewall rules do not block the search crawlers of the assistants you care about.
Questions
Does ChatGPT add UTM parameters to links?
Yes. OpenAI states that ChatGPT automatically includes utm_source=chatgpt.com in referral URLs.
Why do some AI visits show as direct traffic?
When an assistant opens a link without a UTM parameter and the browser sends no referrer, analytics tools cannot tell where the visit came from, so it lands in direct.
SOURCES
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