Understanding the Ongoing Volatility of Google AI: A Cycle of Ups and Downs
Google’s AI Overviews have been a topic of interest and concern among SEOs and content creators, and new data from enterprise SEO platform BrightEdge shows that their visibility has been fluctuating. In July, the visibility of AI Overviews in Google’s search results increased to 12%, but by the end of the month, it fell back to 7%.
While the visibility of AI-generated answers in Google search results was previously at 15% in May, it has now decreased. This volatility suggests that AI Overviews are still an unsolved problem for Google.
The data from BrightEdge also reveals some interesting trends in the appearance of AI Overviews. In July, they were less likely to appear for general product searches, brand-specific queries, basic how-to queries, and healthcare searches related to rare, genetic, and complex disorders. However, healthcare still had the highest number of AI Overviews, although it decreased from 68% to 61%.
On the other hand, salary-related queries saw a significant increase in AI Overviews, jumping from 7% to 85% in July. AI Overviews were also more likely to be shown for complex technical keywords, long-tail keywords, and specific product features.
The overlap of AI Overviews with Google’s search results increased overall. Pages ranking in positions 31-100 experienced a general increase in overlap, sometimes exceeding 3%. Citations of the top 10 results decreased, and there were significant spikes in fluctuations. The most stable area was for pages in positions 11-30, but there were still some fluctuations observed.
The sources cited by AI Overviews also experienced significant fluctuation. Some websites, such as Wikipedia, CDC, USA Today, and Forbes, lost citations. This suggests that Google is testing and refining the formats, citations, and the amount of real estate that AI Overviews occupy in the search results.
The data also revealed specific sectors where AI Overviews were more prevalent. B2B tech queries saw an increase from 29% to 45% in July, but there was a significant drop and increased volatility at the end of the month. Education queries also saw an increase from 16% to 38%, but experienced a sharp decline and volatility at the end of July. Insurance queries had a presence of 35% in the second half of July, but dropped significantly by the end of the month. Ecommerce queries saw an increase from 11% to 17%, but also had significant volatility at the end of July. Finance queries remained relatively stable at 6.5%.
Overall, the data from BrightEdge highlights the ongoing volatility of Google’s AI Overviews. While they have a stronger presence compared to previous months, their visibility in search results is still inconsistent. Google continues to test and refine the formats and citations of AI Overviews, indicating that they are still working to solve the challenges associated with this feature. SEOs and content creators should stay updated on these changes to effectively optimize their content for search.
