---
id: "question-web-analytics-replacement"
type: "open-question"
source_timestamps: ["§ What Comes Next: Competing for an AI Customer's Preference"]
tags: ["metrics", "analytics", "kpis"]
related: ["concept-human-present-mode"]
speakers: ["Kartik Hosanagar"]
resolution_path: "Developing new metrics that track API queries, agent inclusion rates in consideration sets, and ANN conversion rates."
sources: ["geo"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-geo"
originDay: 3
articleStem: "hbr-tier2-05-market-to-ai-customer"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/06/how-do-you-market-to-an-ai-customer"
sourceTitle: "How Do You Market to an AI Customer?"
---
# What replaces web analytics as the measure of success?

**Open question:** As human visits to traditional websites fall — because AI agents conduct research and evaluation in the background (see [[concept-human-present-mode]]) — traditional web analytics (**pageviews, bounce rates, time on site, heatmaps**) become obsolete or misleading. What replaces them?

**Why it's unresolved:** The human approver never sees the site, so the classic instrument panel measures the wrong audience.

**Resolution path:** Develop new metrics that track **API queries**, **agent inclusion rates in consideration sets**, and **ANN conversion rates**. *(Enrichment: practitioners already split "visibility" — how often a brand appears in AI outputs — from "conversion" — actual selection; new KPIs will likely formalize that split. Connects to [[concept-ai-engine-optimization]].)*


## Related across articles
- [[question-measuring-ai-mentions]]
- [[concept-agentic-observability]]