How can website owners fight back against AI overviews and zero-click searches?
Statistics show that fewer users are clicking on website links when they search online. Here's what you need to know as a website owner to fight back.
Have you noticed that organic traffic to your website is down from last year? If you have, you’re not alone. While this could be due to several factors, one certain factor is the rise of AI overviews and zero-click searches.
What is a zero-click search?
In the past, when you searched for something on Google, you saw a list of websites that Google recommended you visit to find the information. You clicked on a link to visit the website and get the information. You might have then returned to the search results and clicked on a second link to see if the information was the same or different. Today however, Google gives you that information as an answer to your question, so no clicking is necessary.
Recent data showing the rate of zero-click searches in Canada illustrates what happens after a Google search:
- 36.2% of the time – a click happens
- 74% of these go to paid or organic results
- 26% to AI mode, YouTube, Maps, Images, News or another property owned by Google/Alphabet
- 38.2% of the time – nothing else happens, meaning that the search session ends.
- 25.6% of the time – another search happens
This is a big change from just a few years ago when over 50% of searches resulted in a click. If you’ve been counting on visitors coming to your website to learn/buy/engage, this isn’t good news.
What can a website owner do?
Adjust your goals
Link clicks and even visits to your website are no longer an accurate way to measure the success of your digital marketing. They may be easy to measure, but the picture they paint is no longer clear. For example, in the near future your Canadian customers won’t even need to visit your website to purchase a product from you – they’ll be able to do it directly on ChatGPT. You’ll have made a sale without a click.
If you change your primary goal from website visits to sales or memberships (however you define engagement), the rest of the formula starts to change. You’ll realize that there are many paths to engagement and many opportunities to explore.
Expand your marketing channels
People still use Google more than any other platform to search. PPC ads are still worthwhile when someone is nearing the bottom of the funnel. The performance of those ads will greatly improve, however if your customer has seen you talk on Instagram or YouTube, or read a reference about your company on Gemini or Claude. Those customers may then read through some Google reviews or look on Reddit to see what people say about you. As a result, you need to expend effort in a variety of places to ‘bring in’ those customers because today there are as many paths to a sale as there are customers.
This is not easy to do because it takes a lot of effort, or money, or both. If you understand how your target audience behaves, it helps to narrow the scope of the effort. For example, if your target audience is in the 50-60 age range, you can join a few Facebook groups rather than posting to TikTok.
That said, you also want to try something outside the box – for example, the Hill Potters Guild in Richmond Hill, Ontario, who started an OnlyFans page in July. It’s too soon to tell if this campaign will be successful, however the creative thinking that sees the connection between the two is genius. You may think you know how your audience behaves, however even audience surveys have proven to be inaccurate because people don’t do what they say they do.
Get used to the long game
There was a time when long range planning and experimentation was a big part of every marketer’s job. It is true again today. Since Christmas only comes once a year, tweaks to your marketing campaign (be it for sales, or for volunteers) can only take place and be measured as the cycle repeats itself.
Double down on SEO
Just because fewer people will be visiting your website doesn’t mean that the content of the website isn’t important. In fact, with more people using agentic search, website SEO (or it’s fraternal twin AEO) is more important than ever. Today, however, keywords are not as important as case studies, and long word count has given way to short, authoritative answers – when those answers are backed up with convincing explanations.
What NOT to do
It would be easy to use AI like a magic solution to content creation. Easy and possible. But content created by AI – whether for Instagram or for your website blog – won’t be as effective as original content written or recorded by a real expert. Already today, AI bots are trained to recognize and discount content generated by AI. With good reason. AI doesn’t think; it can only recognize and repeat what it finds on the Internet. AI by itself cannot create new things or think new thoughts; it can only reproduce what it has already found. Your audience needs your voice. In the fight against AI and zero-click searches, your best weapon is yourself.
Leave a Comment