You may already be familiar with Google’s penchant for a disruptive update, but throughout 2024 Google has been rolling out a feature that has completely changed the look of its search results pages.
What are AI Overviews?
Are AI Overviews the new featured snippets?
What do Google’s AI Overviews mean for businesses?
What are Google’s AI Overviews?
Google’s AI Overviews are a feature integrated into its search engine, leveraging generative AI to provide users with concise, blended responses at the top of search results. These overviews summarise key information from various web sources and offer direct links for deeper exploration. They are designed to handle more complex queries, making it easier to research topics efficiently.
The system is powered by Google’s advanced Gemini AI model, which combines multi-step reasoning, planning, and the integration of multiple content types with Google’s search algorithms. This approach aims to enhance user satisfaction and diversify the sources people access for their information needs. AI Overviews are particularly useful for queries where users need quick answers but may also want detailed follow-ups.
While they provide convenience, AI Overviews have sparked concerns among content creators. Publishers worry about reduced website traffic since these summaries may fulfil user needs without requiring further clicks, potentially impacting ad revenues and the visibility of smaller businesses online. Nonetheless, Google emphasises that these overviews complement traditional search by encouraging exploration and interaction with more diverse web content.
Are AI Overviews the new featured snippets?
Currently featured snippets are still appearing on the search results pages too. So it doesn’t look like Google has any plans of phasing them out.
Sometimes they are interchangeable (meaning you’ll either get an AI overview or a featured snippet appear for your search term), but depending on the search query, there is a chance both can appear on the same results page. Here’s an example for the the search query “What is on page SEO?”:
As you can see, this is quite an in-depth topic, and the SERP includes both an overview and a featured snippet to help give the user the best chance of finding the information they’re searching for.
What do Google’s AI Overviews mean for businesses?
As with anything search-related, Google’s AI Overviews could have both positive and negative impacts for you business. It will depend on your current SEO strategy and the content that sits on your website. As this is a particularly drastic change to the SERPs it might be a while before we see the true impact of this feature being rolled out. Let’s take a look at some of the positives and negatives AI Overviews could bring:
Positive impacts that AI Overviews could have on businesses:
1. AI Overviews could provide increased visibility and traffic
Overviews are designed to summarise and highlight relevant information. These overviews are displayed at the top of the SERP (search engine results page). When your business’s content is selected and used to form an overview, you will be credited in a ‘sources’ panel that is positioned to the right of the AI-generated summary.
One of the key advantages of appearing in an AI overview is the potential for increased click-through rates. AI summaries appear at the top of search results, a prime position that could drive traffic to your website and potentially increase customer acquisition. Additionally, being included in these overviews lends credibility to your business, as the content is sourced from reliable and authoritative information.
Google’s AI also enables better targeting and personalisation of search experiences. By tailoring results based on user behaviour and preferences, it ensures businesses that focus on aligning their content with search intent, are more likely to capture the attention of their ideal audience. This not only improves visibility but also increases engagement and conversion rates.
Businesses focused on attracting local customers could particularly benefit from AI Overviews, as Google aims to use AI to enhance searches for location-based searches.
To fully leverage the advantages of Google’s AI overviews, it’s import that your business utilises SEO best practices and that you address common user queries effectively. Claiming and maintaining a Google Business Profile and encouraging reviews from existing customers can also significantly enhance your chances of being featured.
2. AI Overviews encourage user engagement
AI Overviews might encourage users to explore content in more detail, benefiting businesses with comprehensive resources or niche expertise. They also create opportunities to showcase thought leadership by aligning content with Google’s criteria of E-E-A-T (Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness, and Experience).
AI Overviews also offer a more interactive experience for users. Images are often included, and multiple website sources are cited, helping users explore a topic and find the relevant solution with more ease than having to scroll through the search results, or click the ‘images’ or ‘shopping’ tab. This can help users, particularly those who are considering making a purchase, explore their options and reach a decision more quickly than if they’d explored the topic without AI overviews.
3. Encourages complex queries
With AI making complex searches more manageable, businesses offering specialised services or products may see increased inquiries as users become more adventurous in their questions.
4. AI Overview adverts give businesses a new opportunity to attract potential customers
In the US, Google has recently started providing the option for AI Overview ads, with this feature expected to be available in the UK shortly. These ads provide a fresh way of reaching an audience that is actively looking for your service, here’s how the ads integrate into the overviews:
Negative impacts that AI Overviews could have on businesses:
1. Potential reduction in traffic
Whilst AI Overviews have the potential to bring an increase in traffic, it doesn’t mean that they can’t lead to a reduction in traffic too.
AI Overviews often provide enough information to satisfy the user’s query without requiring further clicks. For example, if someone asks a question about “how to bake a cake,” the AI Overview might include the key steps or ingredients directly in the search results. This type of search behaviour is referred to as a ”zero-click” search. It’s likely that searches for topics with a lower complexity will likely become zero-click searches.
Websites might also see a decrease in traffic because AI overviews provide topic summaries that draw information from multiple websites, often without driving proportional traffic back to those sources. Publishers and creators contribute content but may not receive the corresponding benefit of increased visibility or clicks, especially if their brand is not explicitly mentioned in the summary. Google has aimed to remedy this with a “sources” panel in the overview, but only the top 2 websites get guaranteed, immediate visibility, with the rest being visible only when “show more” is clicked.
However, early studies do show that AI Overviews can often have a positive impact on website traffic, so if you haven’t seen an incredibly significant drop in traffic, then you should follow Google’s advice and resist the urge to make radical changes to your web pages.
2. The impact on content ownership
AI Overviews use content from external websites to train and generate summaries, effectively shifting the value of that content from publishers to the platform itself. This dynamic can be seen as a “transfer of wealth,” particularly disadvantaging independent content creators and smaller businesses who may have relied on one or two web pages that were ranking well for them.
3. Greater Competition for SEO
Businesses may need to heavily invest in SEO optimisation. You will need to focus on structured data, keyword relevance, and authoritative content to meet AI Overviews’ criteria. Bigger businesses that already have robust SEO strategies in place will have an advantage over smaller businesses who may not have the time or resources required to regularly review and optimise the performance of their content.
The competition for featured snippets will intensify too. Businesses should focus on crafting content that is authoritative, well-structured, and designed to provide direct answers. This means using effective formatting, such as bullet points and concise headers, while also addressing specific informational or transactional user intents.
Conclusion
Whilst AI Overviews might provide mixed results, it is worth remembering that Google’s priority doesn’t lie with boosting the visibility of businesses. It’s core objective has always been providing the most accurate and helpful search results for its users. Your business should focus on creating quality, helpful content that answers common questions related to your industry and products/services. It’s also a good idea to create web pages that address common customer pain points,
You should focus on long-tail keywords and more conversational keywords. Think of how you use Google personally, often you’ll type in a question (or use voice search); your customers are doing the same.
If you feel like your business is struggling to appear in search results then an SEO agency could help. At LOCALiQ we have a team of SEO experts who have already helped businesses like yours improve their online visibility and increase website traffic. We recently won SEO Agency of the Year at the 2024 UK Agency Awards, so you can trust that we’re an agency that can deliver. Get in touch with us today if you’d like to find out more about how we can help.
