AI Referral Traffic
Visitors who arrive from an AI assistant rather than a search engine. Usually small in number and unusually well-qualified, because they clicked after reading a recommendation.
Related terms
Long-Tail Query
A longer, more specific search — “boutique hotel Siem Reap near Pub Street with a pool” rather than “hotel”. Individually rare, collectively most of all searches, and far easier to answer well.
Tool Use
An AI reaching outside itself to do something it cannot do alone: run a search, do arithmetic reliably, read a live page. Nearly every useful assistant depends on it.
Semantic Search
Search that works on meaning rather than exact words, so a page can match a query it never literally contains. It is why writing naturally now beats repeating a keyword.
Agentic Browsing
An AI navigating a website on somebody’s behalf: finding the price, checking availability, sometimes buying. Sites that rely on hover menus and unlabelled buttons are hard for an agent to use.
Transformer
The model architecture behind almost every modern AI system, introduced in 2017. Its trick is paying attention to how every word in a passage relates to every other, which is what made fluent machine writing possible.
Entity SEO
Optimising to be recognised as a specific, real thing rather than for particular keywords. In practice it means consistent naming, structured data, and being mentioned in enough other places to be corroborated.