Contact
Contact

What are AI Overviews and what does it mean for SEO?

AI Overviews (AIO) are a new search feature within Google that provides quick AI-generated answers to search questions. This eliminates the need for users to visit multiple websites for complete answers to their questions. As such, AI Overviews are actually Google’s answer to the meteoric rise of conversational AI tools such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Microsoft’s Copilot. So how exactly do these AI Overviews work and what impact does it have on SEO? Read on quickly.

What exactly is an AI Overview?

With AI Overviews, Google answers search questions through a comprehensive, AI-generated response. The search engine collects various Web resources and summarizes them into a relevant answer. For example, are you looking for healthy ways to lose weight? An AI Overview generates information and tips on how to get it done. In the traditional search engine, Google answered this type of search query by showing the most relevant and qualitative Web page at the top of the SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Instead, an AI Overview uses several Web pages for a comprehensive answer, including links to that Web page.

Why don’t I notice this in the Netherlands and Belgium?

In the Netherlands, Belgium and the rest of the European Union, AI Overviews are not yet available. This is because the EU has not yet taken a clear legal position on AI, for example, regarding intellectual property and privacy laws. For now, Google wants to prevent AI Overviews from incurring billions in fines later because it is found to violate European law. On other continents, AI Overviews did roll out. The feature debuted in the United States in May 2024 and is now available in more than 100 countries including India, Japan, Mexico, Brazil and the United Kingdom.

What do AI Overviews mean for SEO?

With AI Overviews, Google aims to improve the search experience by providing answers to search queries without requiring users to click through to multiple Web sites. This is a form of zero-click, which logically reduces organic traffic to websites. In addition, an AI Overview appears at the top of the SERP, causing the normally coveted No. 1 position to drop significantly. This also seems to be bad news for website administrators who have put a lot of time, money and energy into their SEO strategy. So much for the pessimistic view of AI Overviews and their impact on SEO.

On the bright side: AI Overviews always cite the most relevant sources in their answers. Is your website one of these? Then you’re still generating organic traffic. Even better: people coming to your website via an AI Overview are often quality visitors with probably a concrete intention to read your page carefully, search further on your website or convert. In addition, it is good to know that by no means every search query yields an AI Overview answer. Various studies show that between 15 and 20 percent of searches trigger an AI Overview. For other searches, just the traditional SERP appears.Can I already start optimizing for AI Overviews?
Because of AI Overviews (and other AI-powered search engines like Perplexity), it will become increasingly important in the near future to optimize your Web content so that it appears in the AI-generated answers. How do you do that? The disappointing part of this answer: Google tells you nothing about the algorithm used to trigger an AIO response, let alone how to optimize for it. The optimistic part of the answer: in the countries where AI Overviews has been rolled out, notice that the cited sources often have high SEO rankings as well. That means optimizing for AIO starts with optimizing your SEO strategy, something you’ve probably been doing for some time.

What you can do right now to prepare for AI Overviews

In the countries where AIO is already active, SEO specialists are increasingly recognizing best practices for appearing in AI Overviews:

  • Focus on creating high-quality content for the user, not the search engine.
  • Keep E-E-A-T principles (Expertise, Experience, Authority, Thrustworthiness) in mind when doing this
  • Devote content to answering long-tail keywords (searches with 4 or more keywords). These types of searches most often get an AIO.
  • Write in a conversational manner as much as possible. Ask a question and answer it directly.
  • Focus on good on-page SEO techniques such as a clear meta-title, full meta-description and logical headers.
  • Use short sentences and write in a way that a 14-year-old child can understand. This way, AI Overviews understand your content better, too.
  • Pay attention to the User Experience of your website. For example, does the content load fast enough and is your website mobile-friendly?

These optimizations have not been confirmed by Google. The remarkable thing is that these points are also part of a good SEO strategy. So it absolutely doesn’t hurt to start optimizing for AIO today. It will give you a big advantage when it is actually rolled out in the EU.