When an AI Overview appears, fewer people click the blue links. Seer Interactive measured organic click-through rate falling from 1.76 percent to 0.61 percent on such queries between June 2024 and September 2025. A rankings report cannot show that. Track impressions, clicks, branded versus non-branded search, and which landing pages turn visits into leads.
This is the problem our tracking and website ecosystem service exists to solve: seeing what brings customers when the old signals stop telling you.
What did the study find?
Seer’s September 2025 update analysed informational queries from June 2024 to September 2025: 3,119 search terms across 42 client organisations, with 25.1 million organic impressions. Its findings:
- Organic CTR on queries showing an AI Overview fell 61 percent, from 1.76 to 0.61 percent.
- Paid CTR on the same queries fell 68 percent.
- Queries without an AI Overview also fell, by 41 percent in organic CTR, so they are not a safe harbour.
- When a brand was cited in the Overview, its organic CTR was 0.70 percent against 0.52 percent when it was not.
Seer says the last point is correlation. Brands with more authority may simply be both cited more and clicked more.
Is the picture still getting worse?
Not in a straight line. Seer’s 2026 update reports that organic CTR on queries with an AI Overview rose from a floor of 1.3 percent in December 2025 to 2.4 percent in February 2026. One firm’s client set is not the whole web, and Google keeps changing how Overviews show links. The safe reading is that behaviour is moving, and your own data should decide what you do.
Google’s view, in its page on AI features and your website, is that clicks from results pages with AI Overviews are higher quality, with visitors more likely to spend time on the site. That is Google’s own observation, so test it on your site.
Why do rankings stop telling the story?
A page can hold position 3 and still lose clicks, because the answer is shown above it. Rank is the same. Clicks are not. If you only watch rank, you will think nothing happened.
What should you measure?
- Impressions and clicks together. Impressions rising while clicks fall points to answers being shown without a visit.
- Branded versus non-branded search. Branded clicks (people typing your name) tend to hold up. Non-branded informational clicks are where the loss shows. Split them in Search Console.
- Leads by landing page. Which pages bring enquiries, not just visits? A page with half the traffic and the same leads has not lost value. This needs your form events set up properly.
- AI referral traffic. Group assistant visits into one channel, as shown in our GA4 guide.
- Lead quality. Compare the leads from search with those from other channels. If fewer visits bring the same number of good leads, the click loss matters less.
- Cost per lead. Use our break-even ROAS calculator to see what a lead is worth before judging a channel.
What does Search Console add?
In June 2026 Google announced generative AI performance reports in Search Console, giving dedicated views of your impressions in AI Overviews and AI Mode. They started with a subset of sites. Google’s help page says the figures are also included in the main Performance report under the Web search type. Impressions are not clicks, so use the new report to see where you appear, then check your analytics for what happened next.
What should you change?
- Stop reporting rank as the headline number.
- Write for the question as well as the keyword: a direct answer first, then depth for the reader who needs more.
- Build pages for decisions, such as comparisons, pricing logic and setup guides, where a summary is not enough to replace a visit.
- Make the next step obvious. A visitor who does arrive should find a clear way to talk to you.
We cover the citation side in how to get cited in AI answers.
Questions people ask
Should we stop investing in SEO? No. Google says its AI features are rooted in its core ranking and quality systems, so the basics still apply. What changes is how you measure it.
Does our own traffic show the same drop? It may not. Seer’s numbers come from its clients’ informational queries. Check yours before you change the plan.
If you want your own numbers put side by side, send us the brief.
