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SEO specialists have talked about a zero clicks reality since Google debuted the featured snippet in 2014. Now, with the advent of the Overview of AI 10 years later, we finally see it happen.
AI Overviews (AIO) are what SEOs think the presented snippet would be: They are long, in-depth, and provide not only an answer, but also context, proactively answering related questions that the searcher does not yet have to ask They’re so long that when expanded, AIOs take up about half the screen for both desktop and mobile devices — meaning searchers don’t need to click through to a website to get the full picture.
The expansion of AIOs, coupled with their answers in depth and their size, means that the forerunners were right, just a little earlier: zero click search results are no longer a prediction, but a stark reality for many brands.
He has Google has it completely changed the SEO landscape? In a word, yes. And marketers need to evolve as well or see their work become obsolete. So, what’s next?
The measure must change
A sharp drop in clicks doesn’t mean marketers need to panic. We just need to adapt. And the easiest part of this puzzle to adjust is the measurement.
That’s because – while yes, clicks will decrease in 2025 – ranking and impressions will probably remain stable, or even improve. AIOs do not impact rank; they simply push the rest of the results down the page, making a No. 1 ranking a little less valuable.
And with AIO, conversions could even increase. Think of it this way: AIOs decrease the need to click through to a website, which means that searchers who actually click through to a website are more likely to convert. In a way, we should thank the AIOs for culling the unqualified traffic for us.
When SEO metrics are analyzed together rather than in silos, organic traffic decreases in conjunction with a stable ranking and impressions, as well as with consistent engagement and conversion – or even improved, shifting the story from “our marketing efforts fail” ” to “the decrease in traffic is only the result of changes in the search landscape.
