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SEO expert warns Google's AI could eliminate website clicks

Veteran industry analyst predicts "zero result SERP" scenario as AI Overviews reduce traffic by over 34%.

Luis Rijo

• 10 min read
Google gatekeeper controlling digital content flow as AI Overviews reduce website traffic by 34%
Google gatekeeper controlling digital content flow as AI Overviews reduce website traffic by 34%

SEO specialist Dan Callis issued a stark warning about the future of search engine optimization, predicting Google could eventually eliminate all organic website listings in favor of AI-generated responses. The analysis comes as new data reveals Google's AI Overviews have already reduced organic clicks by 34.5% when present in search results.

Callis, who has 15 years of experience in search engine optimization, detailed his concerns in a comprehensive analysis published today. The veteran marketer coined the term "Zero Result SERP" to describe a hypothetical scenario where Google provides only AI-generated answers without any traditional website links.

"What happens if the biggest search engine in existence decides that organic listings underneath LLM-generated answers no longer need to be there?" Callis wrote in his analysis. The prediction extends existing concerns about Google's AI Overviews feature, which launched in the United States in May 2024 and expanded globally by the same month.

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Summary

Who: SEO specialist Dan Callis, with 15 years of industry experience, issued warnings about potential elimination of organic search results. Supporting research comes from Ahrefs, Brainlabs, Kevin Indig, Eric van Buskirk, and other industry analysts.

What: The "Zero Result SERP" scenario describes a potential future where Google eliminates organic website listings in favor of AI-generated responses. Current data shows AI Overviews reduce organic clicks by 34.5% and zero-click searches increased to 69% since May 2024 launch.

When: The analysis was published July 16, 2025, as concerns mount about traffic impacts observed since AI Overviews launched in May 2024. The timeline spans from initial feature rollout through current regulatory challenges and industry adaptation efforts.

Where: The phenomenon affects Google search results globally, with AI Overviews operating in 200 countries and 40 languages. Regulatory challenges emerge in European Union and United States jurisdictions, while Brazil pursues similar investigations.

Why: Google's substantial AI infrastructure investments ($75 billion planned for 2025) and business model changes drive the shift toward direct answer provision. The company aims to monetize AI capabilities while maintaining search dominance, potentially at the expense of external website traffic.

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Growing evidence supports traffic decline concerns

Independent research from multiple sources confirms significant traffic reductions associated with AI Overviews. According to Ahrefs analysis published April 17, 2025, websites experience a 34.5% reduction in organic clicks when AI Overviews appear in search results. The study examined 300,000 keywords, comparing click-through rates before and after AI Overview implementation.

Ryan Law, Director of Content Marketing at Ahrefs, noted the correlation between AI Overview presence and reduced user engagement with traditional search results. "We analyzed 300,000 keywords and found that the presence of an AI Overview in the search results correlated with a 34.5% lower average clickthrough rate for the top-ranking page," Law stated in the research report.

Additional studies reveal broader impacts on search behavior. ChatGPT referrals surge as Google searches hit zero-click records shows zero-click searches on Google increased from 56% to nearly 69% since AI Overviews launched. Meanwhile, ChatGPT referrals to news publishers jumped 25x year-over-year during the same period.

The phenomenon extends beyond simple traffic metrics. Research conducted by Kevin Indig and Eric van Buskirk tracked 70 users across eight search tasks, documenting that most users only read top third of Google AI Overviews. While 88% clicked "show more" to expand AI Overviews, median scroll depth reached just 30%.

Technical infrastructure reveals Google's commitment

Google's substantial investment in AI infrastructure demonstrates the company's long-term commitment to these technologies despite industry criticism. CEO Sundar Pichai revealed plans to spend $75 billion on artificial intelligence infrastructure in 2025, representing a significant increase from $20 billion several years prior. The announcement came during the Bloomberg Tech Summit on June 5, 2025.

Google's AI Overviews now operate in 200 countries and 40 languages as of May 2025, while AI Mode remains available exclusively in the United States and India. The company recently expanded AI Overviews to nine European countries, including Germany, Belgium, Ireland, Italy, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Spain, and Switzerland on March 26, 2025.

According to Brainlabs analysis released July 8, 2025, AI search fundamentally changes SEO by requiring marketing professionals to shift from traditional website-focused strategies to multi-platform visibility approaches. The study found that 96% of AI Overview links come from top 10 organic results, while AI search visitors demonstrate 4.4 times higher value than traditional organic traffic.

Industry observes "Great Decoupling" phenomenon

Search marketing professionals have documented what Darwin Santos termed "The Great Decoupling" – an unprecedented separation of search impressions from clicks. Google explains great decoupling of search clicks and impressions reveals websites now receive significantly more impressions while experiencing substantial click decreases.

Martin Splitt, Google's Developer Advocate, acknowledged the pattern during a Warsaw event on June 17, 2025. Publishers report seeing impression increases alongside traffic declines in Google Search Console data. The timing coincides with Google's aggressive AI Overview rollout, according to Ahrefs analysis showing AI Overview presence doubled by 116% following the March 2025 Core update.

Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince provided additional context during a CNBC interview on May 21, 2025. Cloudflare CEO warns zero-click searches threaten content creator revenues by highlighting how content scraping ratios have deteriorated dramatically. According to Prince, Google previously sent one visitor for every two pages crawled from websites ten years ago. Six months ago, this ratio had deteriorated to one visitor for every six pages scraped. Currently, the ratio reaches 15 pages scraped per visitor sent to original sources.

Google defends AI Overview implementation

Google maintains that AI Overviews provide "higher quality" clicks despite traffic volume reductions. Google claims AI Overview clicks are "higher quality" despite traffic decline reports John Mueller's assertion during a July 1, 2025 announcement that users clicking from AI Overview results spend more time on websites and demonstrate higher engagement.

"We've seen that when people click to a website from search results pages with AI Overviews, these clicks are of higher quality, where users are more likely to spend more time on the site," Mueller stated. However, independent research contradicts these claims, with multiple studies showing 34.5% reduction in organic clicks when AI Overviews appear.

Elizabeth Reid, Head of Google Search, explained in Financial Times interviews that AI Overviews function as pre-filtering systems. Users clicking through to websites have already consumed introductory information, arriving with specific intent for deeper content or transactions. The filtering effect creates both benefits and drawbacks for publishers, with remaining clicks demonstrating higher purchase intent while overall traffic volume decreases substantially.

Regulatory challenges emerge globally

Legal pressures are mounting against Google's AI Overview implementation. Google faces EU antitrust complaint over AI Overviews feature details how publishers report significant traffic declines of 34.5% or more when AI Overviews appear in search results, while Google prevents opt-out without losing search visibility entirely.

The complaint centers on publishers' inability to opt out from AI training and content crawling without losing visibility in Google's general search results. "Publishers using Google Search do not have the option to opt out from their material being ingested for Google's AI large language model training," according to the complaint filed with European Union authorities.

Brazilian media organizations have similarly escalated pressure while traffic plummets amid new AI Mode rollout. The United States Department of Justice has proposed that Google divest its advertising platforms AdX and DFP after a federal judge concluded the company illegally dominates two online advertising markets.

Implications for marketing community

The potential Zero Result SERP scenario carries significant implications for the marketing community, particularly those focused on search engine optimization and content marketing. According to Callis' analysis, several factors contribute to the threat facing the industry.

Google's business model has shifted substantially from its original mission. "Google has now long removed DON'T BE EVIL from its mantra and continues to make changes that push search results towards Google's bottom line over external websites," Callis observed. The company faces pressure to monetize substantial AI infrastructure investments while maintaining search dominance.

The SEO industry itself faces credibility challenges. "The rise of LLMs has opened the door to the same spammers of yesteryear, promising big results with less work/money without fully understanding the need for long term impacts," according to Callis' assessment. This situation creates additional pressure on Google to filter content quality while potentially reducing reliance on external websites.

For marketing professionals, the changes require fundamental strategy adjustments. Traditional approaches focused on driving traffic to owned websites may prove insufficient as AI systems increasingly provide direct answers within search interfaces. Search behavior shifts as AI summaries reduce organic clicks demonstrates that zero-click searches now reach 60% as AI-powered summaries change user interaction patterns.

The transformation affects different types of content unequally. Technical queries requiring detailed explanations maintain higher click-through rates compared to simple factual questions easily answered within AI Overviews. Health and financial topics ("Your Money, Your Life" queries) drive deeper reading behavior, with users scrolling further to validate information for consequential decisions.

Alternative strategies emerge

Industry experts suggest several approaches for adapting to the changing search landscape. Callis recommends diversifying away from Google dependence while supporting transparency initiatives. "Could Bing make a comeback? Could DuckDuckGo or Ecosia, two search engines with strong USPs away from major big players the future?" he questions in his analysis.

Schema markup and structured data become increasingly important for AI Overview inclusion. The Brainlabs study notes that "platforms like Perplexity and Google's AI Overviews don't care which team made the content – they care whether it's credible, structured, and consistent." This observation highlights how AI systems evaluate content quality across multiple formats and platforms simultaneously.

Building direct audience relationships emerges as a critical strategy. Email marketing, social media engagement, and community building provide alternatives to search-dependent traffic generation. Multiple PPC Land articles document how marketing professionals are adapting campaign strategies to account for reduced organic visibility while maintaining competitive positioning.

Technical implementation becomes more complex with AI search integration. Claude "only performs a web search in about half of user queries, typically when the prompt involves current events or complex, multi-dimensional tasks," according to recent analysis. ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity prefer content addressing timely topics, decision-making scenarios, and nuanced comparisons.

Key terminology explained

Zero Result SERP represents a theoretical search engine results page configuration where users receive complete answers without any traditional website links. This concept extends beyond current zero-click searches by eliminating organic listings entirely. The scenario would fundamentally alter the relationship between search engines and content publishers, creating a closed information loop where search platforms provide all answers internally without directing traffic to external sources.

AI Overviews are Google's implementation of generative artificial intelligence technology that creates summarized responses to user queries directly within search results pages. These summaries appear above traditional organic listings and synthesize information from multiple web sources into cohesive answers. The feature represents Google's attempt to provide immediate value while maintaining user engagement within its ecosystem, fundamentally changing how information discovery occurs in search interfaces.

Zero-click searches describe user interactions where searchers obtain satisfactory answers directly from search engine results pages without clicking through to any external websites. This phenomenon has grown substantially with enhanced search features like featured snippets, knowledge panels, and AI-generated summaries. Zero-click searches create challenges for content publishers who rely on website traffic for revenue generation while potentially improving user experience through faster information access.

Click-through rate (CTR) measures the percentage of users who click on a specific link after viewing it in search results or advertisements. CTR serves as a fundamental metric for evaluating search result effectiveness and user engagement patterns. Changes in CTR directly impact website traffic volumes and can indicate shifts in user behavior, search engine algorithm modifications, or competitive landscape alterations affecting visibility and appeal.

The Great Decoupling refers to an unprecedented phenomenon where website impressions increase while clicks decrease simultaneously in Google Search Console data. This pattern emerged following AI Overview implementation and represents a fundamental break from historical correlation between visibility and traffic generation. The decoupling suggests users view content in search results without engaging further, creating visibility without corresponding business value for website owners.

Schema markup consists of structured data vocabulary that helps search engines understand webpage content meaning and context more effectively. This standardized annotation system enables enhanced search result displays and improves AI system comprehension of content topics, relationships, and hierarchies. Proper schema implementation becomes increasingly critical as AI systems rely on structured information for content evaluation and inclusion in generated responses.

Organic search results represent non-paid website listings that appear in search engine results based on algorithmic relevance determination rather than advertising spend. These listings traditionally form the foundation of search engine optimization strategies and represent earned visibility through content quality, technical optimization, and authority building. Organic results face increasing competition from AI-generated content and enhanced search features that provide immediate answers.

Search Engine Results Page (SERP) encompasses the complete interface users see after submitting search queries, including organic listings, advertisements, featured snippets, knowledge panels, and AI-generated content. Modern SERPs have evolved into complex information ecosystems where multiple content types compete for user attention. Understanding SERP composition becomes essential for optimizing visibility across various result formats and anticipating user interaction patterns.

Large Language Models (LLMs) are artificial intelligence systems trained on vast text datasets to understand and generate human-like responses to queries and prompts. These models power AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and similar tools that synthesize information from multiple sources into coherent answers. LLMs represent both opportunities and threats for content creators, offering new distribution channels while potentially reducing direct website engagement through intermediate answer generation.

Content scraping ratios measure the relationship between content pages accessed by search engines and actual user traffic directed to source websites. These metrics reveal how efficiently content indexing translates into audience engagement and revenue generation for publishers. Deteriorating ratios indicate search engines extract increasing value from content without providing proportional benefits to original creators, raising concerns about sustainable content ecosystem economics.

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