"How did you find us?"
A one-question survey added to your intake form or first phone call that asks new customers where they heard about you — the simplest and most honest form of attribution available to a local business.
What it is
A "How did you find us?" question is the most underrated measurement tool a local business has. Added to an intake form, a phone-greeting script, or a post-booking confirmation email, it asks new customers — in their own words — what brought them to you. Best practice is to offer a short list (Google search, AI assistant, friend referral, social media, repeat customer, other) plus a free-text "other" so unexpected answers can show up.
Yes, the answers are imperfect — people misremember, conflate channels, or pick the most recent touchpoint. That's fine. The goal isn't perfect attribution; it's a floor of truth that the platforms can't lie about and that catches signals analytics never sees: word-of-mouth, podcasts, AI assistants, offline ads, the truck wrap.
Why it matters for your business
This single question is often the only direct visibility you'll get into whether AI tools (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini) are sending you customers — none of those tools yet expose comparable analytics on their end. If "AI assistant" starts appearing as an answer, you have evidence to share with your team, your investors, or yourself that the AEO/GEO work is paying off. Without the question, that signal stays invisible.
Example
A movers company added "How did you hear about us?" with five preset options plus "other" to their booking form. After eight weeks, the data was 38% Google search, 22% repeat or referral, 14% Yelp, 11% AI assistant (ChatGPT was the most-named), 9% Nextdoor, 6% other. The 11% from AI was the first hard evidence they'd seen that two years of AEO work was actually moving the needle — and it became the foundation for a budget conversation about doubling down on AI-search visibility.
Related
- Related terms: Attribution, Impressions, CTR, Branded vs non-branded