An intriguing moment for search engine result pages (SERPs) is on the horizon, as Google is about to begin trialling their controversial AI overviews on Australian shores.
Alphabet, the parent company of both Google and YouTube, has briefed stakeholders in Australia that AI overviews will begin being tested imminently.
A lot has been made of the blunders of AI overviews so far, but Google claims that despite the experiment being in its early stages, it has shown ‘positive results’ in terms of increasing organic traffic for web content publishers.
Let’s try to understand the situation a little more holistically.
What Exactly Is An AI Overview?
At Google’s I/O 2024 event, it was announced that Google would start trialling AI overviews across their American market.
So what exactly are they?
To quote Google: AI Overviews show links to resources that support the information in the snapshot and explore the topic further. This allows people to dig deeper and discover a diverse range of content from publishers, creators, retailers, businesses, and more, and use the information they find to advance their tasks.
To quote Me: AI Overviews are concise, AI-generated summaries that provide quick answers to search queries directly in Google, without needing to click through to other websites.
You might ask: How does that differ from a featured snippet? Simply put, AI overviews are a little more advanced and slightly more UX-friendly.
They provide multiple links to different sources on the query, as well as have the addition of related/suggested questions you might want the answer to as a result of your search—moreover, the answers pool from a wider range of information.
What Do AI Overviews Look Like?
As described, AI Overviews are essentially just an amalgamation of information, presented in a concise and user-friendly manner.
When Will AI Overviews Be Used?
Google Product Search Senior Director, Hema Budaraju, has said that the AI tool is more commonly used to cater towards open-ended or complex search queries, an example of this being how to clean a couch or detailed maths questions like how do i solve a quadratic formula.
How Will This Impact Search Results?
The 200 billion dollar question.
There’s an argument to be made that as Google will now take information from an existing website and present it to the user on the SERP. This act theoretically negates the need to click on an external site.
News publishers in particular are worried about this, and how it threatens to impact their ad revenue as fewer users will be clicking on their articles.
It is worth highlighting, that Google has pushed back on this notion, saying their evidence was “showing links to supporting web pages directly within AI overviews is driving higher traffic too publisher sites”
Hema also stated that Google will “remain focused on sending valuable traffic to publishers and creators”. Then going one further, stating “clicks are likely higher quality” and “people spend more time on the site that they’re visiting.”
It’s also important to remember that this new format is still being tested, so the situation is continually evolving.
How Have They Been Rolled Out To This Point?
As previously mentioned, AI Overviews launched in America in May of 2023. Three months later, they then began rolling out across six more countries including the United Kingdom, India, Japan, Indonesia, Mexico and Brazil.
It’s been said that the gesture would roll out to one billion searchers in 2024.
How Will AI Overviews Affect Businesses?
It’s difficult to give a definitive answer on how AI overviews will affect businesses, as the AI Overview framework is still continuing to evolve, improve and adapt.
That being said, time and time again the SEO industry has proven that it can adapt to the challenges thrown at it, and able to adjust to the change in how search engines operate.
As rapid changes are made to SERPs, it becomes more important to work with verified Google partner SEO agencies that will be at the forefront of the latest changes and be able to guide your businesses SEO strategy accordingly.
If you’re aiming to enhance your business’s online presence, consider reaching out to nimbl. As a boutique digital marketing agency, nimbl specialises in SEO and paid digital advertising, offering tailored strategies that align with your specific needs to drive growth and visibility. Contact us today to learn how we can help your business grow.
