AI Overviews are eating the click. Here's what we tell clients.
When Google answers in the box, fewer people click through. That's not a reason to panic — it's a reason to change what you optimize for.
A question we get weekly now: "If Google's AI answers the query, why would anyone click my site?"
Some won't. AI Overviews compress the results page into a direct answer, and for informational queries, click-through drops. That's real, and pretending otherwise helps no one.
But the conclusion isn't "SEO is dead." It's "the goal moved." The win is no longer only a click — it's being the source the answer is built from and cites. If Google's summary is assembled from your content and names you, you got the trust signal even without the click, and you get the click on the higher-intent queries where people still dig in.
So we've shifted what we measure and build:
- Less obsession with raw traffic on informational terms.
- More focus on citation share — how often you're the source in AI answers.
- Structured, quotable content that's easy for an engine to lift and attribute.
- Commercial-intent pages, where clicks still convert, kept sharp.
The click was always a proxy for influence. AI Overviews just made the proxy leakier. Optimize for the influence.