The Traffic Cliff Nobody's Talking About
You open Google Search Console on a Monday morning. Traffic is down 25%. You check: no algorithm update. No penalty. No technical issues. Rankings look the same.
So where did the traffic go?
It didn't go anywhere. Google kept it. An AI Overview answered the query at the top of the page. The user got their answer. They never clicked.
The Scale of the Problem
Here's what the data shows:
| Metric | Before AI Overviews | After AI Overviews |
|---|---|---|
| Queries with AI answers | 0% | ~30% of all queries |
| CTR on affected queries | 28-35% | 12-18% |
| Informational query traffic | Baseline | -40 to -60% |
| Commercial query traffic | Baseline | -15 to -30% |
| Branded query traffic | Baseline | -5% or less |
How to Diagnose AI Overview Impact
Before you panic, confirm the cause. Here's the diagnostic framework:
1. Check Query-Level Data in GSC
Filter for queries where impressions stayed flat but clicks dropped. This is the signature of AI Overview absorption — your page still appears in results, but nobody clicks because the AI answered the query.
2. Search Manually for Your Top Keywords
Open an incognito window and search your top 10 traffic keywords. If you see an AI Overview box above the organic results, that's your answer. Count how many of your top queries trigger AI Overviews.
3. Segment by Query Type
- Informational ("what is", "how to") — most affected
- Commercial ("best X for Y", "X vs Y") — moderately affected
- Transactional ("buy X", "pricing") — least affected
- Navigational (brand searches) — rarely affected
The Recovery Playbook
You can't fight AI Overviews by doing more traditional SEO. You need a new strategy:
Strategy 1: Become the Source AI Cites
AI Overviews cite sources. Your goal is to be one of them. This requires:
- Structured data — JSON-LD schemas help AI verify your content
- Answer blocks — 40-60 word direct answers that AI can quote
- First-party data — Original statistics and research AI can't find elsewhere
- E-E-A-T signals — Author bios, credentials, industry experience
Strategy 2: Diversify Beyond Google
Google isn't the only AI engine. Perplexity, ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and Mistralare all growing. Users who would have Googled are now asking ChatGPT directly. You need to be cited there too.
Strategy 3: Track Your AI Visibility
You can't improve what you don't measure. Traditional SEO tools track rankings — but rankings don't capture AI citation. You need a dedicatedAI citation tracking tool that monitors all 6 major engines.
What GEO Optimization Looks Like
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is the discipline of making your content citable by AI engines. Here's the minimum viable stack:
- Deploy llms.txt — Machine-readable knowledge base for AI scrapers
- Allow AI crawlers — Update robots.txt to permit GPTBot, PerplexityBot, etc.
- Add TL;DR blocks — 40-60 word summary after every H1
- Structure for RAG — Short paragraphs, markdown tables, clear headings
- Implement JSON-LD — FAQPage, Article, HowTo schemas
- Monitor citations — Scan weekly across all 6 AI engines
The Bottom Line
The traffic isn't coming back. AI Overviews are expanding, not shrinking. The sites that adapt to GEO will capture the new distribution channel. The ones that don't will watch their organic traffic erode year over year.
Step one: know where you stand.