LLM Visibility Is Loud. The Data Is Quiet.

What 200+ GA4 Properties Say About GEO, Prompt Visibility, and Real Impact

Author

John Sukowaty
January 31, 2026 • Estimated Reading Time: 4 minutes

TL;DR: LLM traffic is showing up, but it’s not showing out. Across 200+ GA4 properties, increases in prompt visibility rarely translated into clicks, conversions, or brand demand. GEO work may influence visibility signals, but measurable business impact is slow, uneven, and easy to overstate if you’re watching the wrong metrics.

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Table of Contents

What Does This Mean For SEO?

LLM Traffic Exists, But It’s Still a Rounding Error

Across more than half of the properties analyzed, LLM-driven sessions did increase slightly. The issue is scale. Growth was consistently outpaced by paid, organic, and even referral traffic, often by a wide margin.

The presence of growth alone isn’t enough. Relative contribution matters. Find out what you can do when your brand is cited in AI engines.

Brand Demand Isn’t Reacting

One of the bigger assumptions floating around is that appearing in LLM answers strengthens brand awareness and downstream demand.

The data doesn’t back that up yet.

Even on sites where LLM traffic increased, branded search volume stayed largely flat. There’s no clear signal that LLM exposure is creating new brand curiosity at scale.

Conversion Performance Is Weak

LLM-based sessions, measured on first visit, converted significantly worse than traditional organic and paid traffic.

That doesn’t mean they’ll never convert, but right now they behave more like early-stage, low-intent traffic. Treating them as bottom-funnel wins is optimistic at best.

Visibility Metrics Are Overstated

Prompt visibility tools showed aggressive swings week to week. The problem is what those tools count as “visibility.”

Most fail to separate:

  • a plain citation

  • an inclusive link

  • a branded mention without a path to click

As a result, visibility increases almost never mirrored referral traffic trends. Charts went up. Clicks didn’t follow..

What Can I Do About It?

Stop Treating Prompt Visibility as a KPI

Visibility scores vary wildly between tools and lack consistent ties to traffic or revenue.

That makes them interesting diagnostic signals, not success metrics. If you can’t connect it to sessions or conversions, it stays secondary.

Measure LLM Impact Where It Belongs

GA4 already tells the real story:

  • LLM-attributed sessions

  • Assisted conversions

  • First-touch and returning behavior

A focused Looker Studio view helps isolate signal from noise without inventing new metrics to justify activity.

Keep Doing the Boring Things Well

Strong SEO, clear site architecture, authoritative content, and brand trust still carry the most weight.

Those inputs appear to support LLM inclusion naturally, without forcing content or chasing system-specific patterns.

Treat Social as a Visibility Multiplier

Brand mentions don’t just come from websites.

They show up in:

  • YouTube descriptions and transcripts

  • Community posts

  • Shared commentary around content

That’s where social strategy quietly feeds AI visibility without pretending every mention equals a click.

Final Thoughts on topic

LLMs are changing how content is surfaced faster than they’re changing how people act.

Until behavior follows visibility, clicks and conversions stay the scoreboard.

Everything else is commentary.