What does HDYHAU stand for?

HDYHAU stands for "How did you hear about us?", the most common wording for a self-reported attribution question. Marketers use the abbreviation to refer to the field and to the data it produces. Some teams use alternative wording, such as "What made you reach out today?", to capture the trigger for the visit rather than the first place the buyer heard of the company.

Should I ask the question after signup instead of on the form?

You can, through an onboarding screen, a welcome email or the first sales call. Response rates are usually lower than on the form, and answers come later, but it removes all friction from the conversion step. For demo-led B2B companies, the form is usually the best place. For product-led signups, an optional question during onboarding often works better.

How do I handle answers like "Google"?

Bucket them as search, but remember that "Google" can mean a branded search after the buyer heard about you elsewhere. If many answers just say Google, add a second optional question like "What did you search for?" or have sales ask on the first call. Over time you'll learn whether those buyers were searching your category or your name.

Is a self-reported field GDPR compliant?

Asking how someone heard about you is ordinary business data, and collecting it on a form the buyer chooses to submit is generally low risk. Treat it like the rest of the form: cover it in your privacy notice, store it in your CRM with the other contact data, and don't use it for anything you haven't disclosed. Check specifics with your own counsel.

Can I add the field in Webflow or Framer forms?

Yes. Both platforms support dropdown and text fields in their native forms, and both can pass submissions to a CRM through their integrations, webhooks or tools like Zapier (check each platform's current form documentation). Make sure the field name maps to a matching property in HubSpot or Salesforce. Custom Next.js forms can send the value straight to the CRM's API along with UTM data.

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SEO & AI search

Self-Reported Attribution: How to Add "How Did You Hear About Us?"

Self-reported attribution, step by step: field type, wording, placement and the dropdown options that get honest answers without hurting form conversion.

By Mehdi HassanOct 29, 20267 min read

The short answer

Self-reported attribution is asking buyers directly how they found you, usually with a "How did you hear about us?" field on your demo or contact form. To set it up, add one open-text or hybrid field near the end of the form, avoid a default answer, store the response in your CRM, and group answers into buckets monthly.

Key takeaways

One field near the end of the form costs little and catches AI tools, podcasts and referrals analytics can't see.
Open text gives the most honest answers. A short dropdown plus "Other" gives the cleanest reports.
Never pre-select an option. A default answer quietly becomes your top channel.
Put the field on demo and contact forms, not on every newsletter signup.
Store the raw answer in the CRM and bucket it monthly, so you can follow it to closed deals.

Part of Marketing Website Analytics: What B2B Teams Should Actually Measure

What is self-reported attribution?

Self-reported attribution is a method of learning where leads come from by asking them. Instead of inferring the source from cookies and referrers, you add a question to the form, usually "How did you hear about us?", and record the buyer's own answer. It's often abbreviated HDYHAU.

It matters more in 2026 because so much B2B research now happens where analytics can't see: in ChatGPT and Perplexity, in podcasts and in private communities. A buyer who found you through an AI answer often arrives as Direct traffic. The form field is the cheapest way to catch that. It complements, rather than replaces, the tracking described in our hub on marketing website analytics.

This guide focuses on the form itself: the field type, the wording, where to put it and how to keep it from costing you conversions. For the strategic case, read B2B attribution when buyers research in ChatGPT.

Open text gets the most honest and detailed answers; a dropdown gets the cleanest data. For most B2B sites, a hybrid works best: a short dropdown of the channels you care about, plus an "Other" option that reveals a text box, or a dropdown followed by an optional "Anything else?" field.

Field type	Answer quality	Reporting effort	Best for
Open text	High: buyers name the exact podcast, prompt or person	Needs manual bucketing	Low-volume, high-value demo forms
Dropdown only	Lower: buyers pick the nearest option, sometimes at random	Easy, already bucketed	High-volume forms where you need counts
Dropdown + "Other" text	Good: clean counts with room for detail	Light cleaning of "Other"	Most B2B demo and contact forms
Dropdown + optional detail field	Good, with extra context from motivated buyers	Light	Teams that want both counts and quotes

If your form gets fewer than a hundred qualified submissions a month, start with open text. You can read every answer, and the words buyers use are often more valuable than the counts. Move to a hybrid once volume makes reading everything impractical.

How do you set up a self-reported attribution field?

Setting up a self-reported attribution field takes an afternoon: choose the forms, write the question, add the field, connect it to your CRM and agree how you'll report it. The steps below work on HubSpot, Webflow, Framer and custom Next.js forms.

Pick the forms
Add the field to demo requests, contact sales and trial signups with a sales follow-up. Skip newsletter and content download forms, where the lead's value doesn't justify the friction.
Write the question
Use "How did you hear about us?" for a simple first-source answer, or "What made you reach out today?" to capture the trigger. Pick one and keep it fixed so answers stay comparable.
Choose the options
If you use a dropdown, keep it to six to eight options, include AI tools by name, and always add "Other (please specify)". Randomize the order or list them alphabetically.
Remove any default
Start the field on a neutral placeholder like "Select one" so no answer is pre-chosen.
Place it last
Put the field after name, email and company, just before the submit button. Buyers who've filled everything else rarely abandon over one more question.
Map it to the CRM
Create a contact property, such as "Self-reported source", and map the form field to it. Keep the raw text even if you also store a bucketed version.
Agree the buckets
Decide with sales how answers will be grouped (for example AI tools, Google, referral, social, podcast or event, other) before the first monthly report.

Include the channels you actively invest in, the channels you suspect are undercounted, and a catch-all. Six to eight options is the right size: enough to separate the channels you care about, short enough that buyers read them all.

AI assistant (ChatGPT, Perplexity, etc.): name the tools so buyers recognise the option.
Google or other search engine: kept separate from AI so you can tell them apart.
Colleague or friend recommended you
LinkedIn or other social media
Podcast, newsletter or event
Review site or comparison article
Other (please specify): reveals a text box.

Avoid options that mean the same thing to a buyer, like "Organic search" and "Google", or internal labels like "Outbound". Buyers don't think in your channel names. If you run a podcast or a well-known content series, it can earn its own option.

How to clean and bucket open-text answers

Once a month, export the raw answers and add a bucket column. Most answers fall into an obvious group within seconds: "ChatGPT", "asked Perplexity for agencies" and "AI" all go to AI tools. "Google" goes to search, unless the buyer adds "AI Overview", in which case note it separately.

Keep a short rules list so different people bucket the same way, and leave genuinely unclear answers as "Unclear" rather than guessing. Save the most specific answers, like a named podcast episode or a quoted prompt, in a separate tab. Those are often the most useful thing the field produces, because they tell you exactly what to repeat.

Does a self-reported field hurt form conversion?

One well-placed optional field rarely hurts conversion on a high-intent form, because buyers asking for a demo have already decided to reach out. The risk grows when the form is already long, the field is required and awkwardly placed, or the question is asked on low-intent forms where any friction loses signups.

Keep the form short overall. If you add this field, consider removing one you don't use, like phone number or job title.
Make it optional on long forms, required on short ones where answers matter most.
Test before and after. Compare the form's completion rate for a few weeks either side of the change, on the same traffic.
Watch the mobile layout. A dropdown that opens off-screen or a text box that's hard to tap does more damage than the question itself.

Form friction is usually a design problem, not a question problem. A clear form with good spacing, visible labels and a single column handles one extra field fine. A cluttered one struggles with any change.

How do you use self-reported data once you have it?

Use self-reported data to find the influences your analytics can't see and to decide where to invest. Report it monthly next to your tracked sources, follow it to closed deals in the CRM, and treat specific answers as research for content and positioning.

Compare self-reported buckets with tracked original source for the same leads. Large gaps show where analytics undercounts.
Follow each bucket to pipeline and closed-won in the CRM, using the property you mapped. See connecting website analytics to your CRM.
If AI tools appear often, check what they say about you. Our guide to checking what ChatGPT says about your company covers how.
Feed specific answers back into strategy: a named podcast is a channel to repeat; a quoted prompt is a page to write.

Self-reported data is one input to your attribution model, not a replacement for it. For how it fits with first-touch and last-touch models, read what an attribution model is.

Frequently asked questions

What does HDYHAU stand for?: HDYHAU stands for "How did you hear about us?", the most common wording for a self-reported attribution question. Marketers use the abbreviation to refer to the field and to the data it produces. Some teams use alternative wording, such as "What made you reach out today?", to capture the trigger for the visit rather than the first place the buyer heard of the company.
Should I ask the question after signup instead of on the form?: You can, through an onboarding screen, a welcome email or the first sales call. Response rates are usually lower than on the form, and answers come later, but it removes all friction from the conversion step. For demo-led B2B companies, the form is usually the best place. For product-led signups, an optional question during onboarding often works better.
How do I handle answers like "Google"?: Bucket them as search, but remember that "Google" can mean a branded search after the buyer heard about you elsewhere. If many answers just say Google, add a second optional question like "What did you search for?" or have sales ask on the first call. Over time you'll learn whether those buyers were searching your category or your name.
Is a self-reported field GDPR compliant?: Asking how someone heard about you is ordinary business data, and collecting it on a form the buyer chooses to submit is generally low risk. Treat it like the rest of the form: cover it in your privacy notice, store it in your CRM with the other contact data, and don't use it for anything you haven't disclosed. Check specifics with your own counsel.
Can I add the field in Webflow or Framer forms?: Yes. Both platforms support dropdown and text fields in their native forms, and both can pass submissions to a CRM through their integrations, webhooks or tools like Zapier (check each platform's current form documentation). Make sure the field name maps to a matching property in HubSpot or Salesforce. Custom Next.js forms can send the value straight to the CRM's API along with UTM data.

Mehdi Hassan · CEO & Design Director

Copywriter, designer and developer, and founder of Designify Studio. Over five years, 60+ projects across 14+ industries, for startups that have raised $300M+.

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