This study is the result of a joint effort between Rich Sanger and Authoritas.

Google AI Overviews vary across different industries, affecting how information is presented to users and impacting content visibility within sectors like healthcare, finance, and retail. For website owners, content creators, and businesses, understanding how AI Overviews function in your specific industry is necessary. These insights can inform your content strategies, help optimize your visibility in search results, and ultimately impact how your audience engages with your site.

This article is the third part of an ongoing collaborative effort between the Authoritas team, and me, aimed at shedding light on how Google AI Overviews work. The first part of this study analyzed the links in AI Overviews, including direct match, related, and reformulated queries. The second explored how intent shapes AI Overviews.

This study examines how AI Overviews vary across industries, analyzing their frequency, link count, and alignment with organic search results. We also explored the space they occupy on results pages and the relationship between search rankings and AI Overview inclusion. Additionally, we identified the most frequently linked domains in each industry, offering insights into the sources shaping these summaries. This analysis highlights how AI Overviews impact content creators, businesses, and SEOs across different industries.

Key Insights from AI Overview Link Analysis

Background

AI Overviews, initially known as Search Generative Experience (SGE), have been analyzed in a variety of studies across various content industries. Studies from Authoritas, SE Ranking, Advanced Web Ranking, and seoClarity reveal significant variations in the prevalence, overlap with organic search results, the number of links, and the most common domains linked within AI Overviews.

Prevalence by Industry

Authoritas’s March 2024 study, using accounts in Search Generative Experience (SGE) beta, found high AI Overview presence across most industries, except for YMYL (Your Money Your Life) topics like Insurance, Finance, and Health, which had lower prevalence. SE Ranking(August 2024) identified Relationships, Food & Beverage, and Technology as the most represented industries, while Real Estate, Cars, and Careers and Jobs had the fewest AI Overviews.

Advanced Web Ranking(July 2024) found Health and Safety keywords were most likely to trigger AI Overviews, contrasting with lower presence in eCommerce, Entertainment, and Real Estate.

SeoClarity(August 2024) reported high AI Overview rates in Home Warranty, Social Media, and Technology, with Entertainment, Healthcare, and Mass Media being the least represented.

These findings suggest that AI Overviews are more prevalent in industries related to personal interests and technology, while areas tied to significant life decisions or regulated industries like finance and healthcare are less frequently impacted.

AI Overview and SERP Overlap

Authoritas (August 2024) showed that Health, Finance, and Travel had the highest overlap between AI Overview links and organic results, indicating alignment between AI-generated content and traditional SERPs. Industries like Home, Food & Drink, and Beauty had lower overlap, suggesting a divergence between AI Overviews and standard search results.

SE Ranking’s findings echoed this trend, showing high overlap in News and Politics, Real Estate, and Food & Beverage. In contrast, Fashion and Beauty, Cars, and eCommerce and Retail had minimal overlap, highlighting areas where AI content deviates from standard search rankings.

High overlap in some industries suggests that AI Overviews often reflect existing top search results, while in other areas, the AI-generated content diverges, potentially offering users a different perspective than traditional SERPs.

Number of Links

The number of links included in AI Overviews varies by industry. Advanced Web Ranking found an average of 7.2 links per Overview, with Travel, Health, Food & Beverage, Safety, and Automotive often containing 7-8 links. Real Estate had the fewest, averaging around 4 links.

SE Ranking reported a slightly lower average of 5.5 links per Overview. Industries like Travel, Relationships, and Sports & Exercise contained the most links, while Pets and eCommerce & Retail had the least.

The variability in the number of links suggests that AI Overviews prioritize providing multiple sources in information-rich industries like Travel and Health, while simpler or more transactional topics like Real Estate and Retail include fewer references.

Most Common Domains

Authoritas identified en.wikipedia.org, blog.google, and quora.com as the most common domains linked within AI Overviews, highlighting their reliance on established sources. SE Ranking found runnersworld.com, healthline.com, linkedin.com, runrepeat.com, and en.wikipedia.org frequently linked, showing a mix of niche and general content.

Advanced Web Ranking highlighted linkedin.com and youtube.com as the most frequently linked domains, indicating the significant role of professional and multimedia content in AI Overviews.

The consistent appearance of authoritative and widely recognized domains across studies underscores the AI’s preference for reliable and well-regarded sources, which helps build user trust in the information presented.

Overall, these studies highlight the significant differences in AI Overviews across indusries, their overlap with traditional search results, and the specific domains they frequently link to.

Study Overview

This study focuses on how Google’s AI-generated content behaves across different industries, providing key insights into how these overviews impact search visibility in various industries.

Our hypothesis:

Google AI Overviews are more likely to be triggered for informational and knowledge-based indusries (such as Health and Education) than for transactional or decision-heavy indusries (such as Finance and Real Estate), and the domains most frequently cited in AI Overviews will vary significantly depending on the query industry.

AI Overviews vary significantly across industries, affecting how users engage with content depending on the industry. This study aims to help website owners, content creators, and businesses better understand how AI Overviews function within their specific sectors. By identifying trends in the frequency of AI Overviews, the number of links they include, and their alignment with organic search results, we offer actionable insights to improve visibility and content strategy.

You can access the underlying data here.

Results

We evaluated 11,162 queries across 19 different industries. These industries included:

• Travel and Hospitality
• Technology
• Sports & Recreation
• Real Estate
• Non-profit and Charity
• Marketing and Advertising
• Manufacturing and Industrial
• Logistics and Transportation
• Legal
• Home & Garden
• Health
• Food and Beverage
• Finance
• Fashion and Apparel
• Environment and Energy
• Entertainment
• Education
• E-commerce
• Automotive

The data was collected between the last week of August and first week of September.

Rate of AI Overviews by Industry

We analyzed the percentage of keywords in each industry that triggered AI Overviews. Across all industries, 21.1% triggered an AI Overview. The industries with the highest rates of AI Overviews were Health (50.3%) and Home & Garden (46.6%), significantly outpacing all others. There was a notable drop to the next closest industries, with E-commerce (30.5%) and Logistics and Transportation (30.1%) showing moderate levels of AI Overview triggers. The industries with the lowest trigger rates were Real Estate (5.5%), Automotive (6.7%), and Sports & Recreation (7.1%).

Number of Links by Industry

Across all industries, AI Overviews average about 8.9 links.. There was some variation by industry. The industries with the highest average number of links are Education, Food and Beverage, and Health, each featuring around 9.5 links. This suggests that AI Overviews in these industries tend to provide more resources, possibly due to the complex or informative nature of the content, which requires additional references for users to explore.

Entertainment and Sports & Recreation have the lowest average number of links, slightly below 8. This indicates that AI Overviews in these industries may require fewer links to cover the subject matter comprehensively, perhaps because the content is more straightforward or less reliant on additional resources.

The remaining industries, such as E-commerce, Finance, Technology, and others, generally have an average of 8 to 9 links, with minor variations between them. This suggests a balanced approach in providing resources within these industries.

This distribution implies that industries that are more informative or regulated—like Education, Health, and Food and Beverage—tend to include more links in AI Overviews. The additional links may help users access a broader range of information or navigate complex topics more effectively. In contrast, entertainment-focused industries may require fewer links, as users might need less guidance to understand or engage with the content.

Alignment Between Links in AI Overviews and Top Search Results

We analyzed the average alignment between links in AI Overviews and top search results across various industries. The highest alignment was observed in Real Estate (58.5%), indicating that links in AI Overviews closely match the top search results for this sector. Fashion and Apparel (49.4%), Legal (47.3%), and Entertainment (46.9%) also showed strong alignment, suggesting a high degree of consistency between AI-generated links and what users see in top search results. Across all industries, the average was 46.3%.

Authoritas, my partners in this study, define the proportion of links in AI Overviews that correspond to the top organic search results as the GOA Score™ (Generative to Organic Alignment Score). See the GOA score below.

Industries with moderate alignment include Manufacturing and Industrial (45.7%), Sports & Recreation (45.3%), and Automotive (44.2%), reflecting a reasonable connection between AI Overview links and search results.

On the lower end, E-commerce (28.0%) and Marketing and Advertising (32.8%) showed the weakest alignment, suggesting that links in AI Overviews often differ from what appears in the top search results for these industries. Home & Garden (33.6%) and Food and Beverage (33.9%) also showed below-average alignment, highlighting potential discrepancies between AI-generated content and user expectations in search.%.

Vertical Drop by Industry

The data shows significant variation in how much vertical space AI Overviews occupy on search pages across different industries. The average vertical drop is measured in pixels. Marketing and Advertising (273.4) and Health (261) show the highest average vertical drop, indicating that AI Overviews in these industries take up a considerable amount of space on search pages. This likely reflects Google’s emphasis on summarizing content in these sectors, which can push organic results further down.

In contrast, industries like Entertainment (143.1), Fashion and Apparel (142.5), and Real Estate (147.6) have the smallest vertical drops. This suggests that AI Overviews in these industries are less prominent, possibly due to the nature of content or lower perceived need for summarization.

Overall, the data suggests that AI Overviews occupy the most vertical space in industries where users often seek quick, concise, and highly relevant information.

SERP Position and Probability of Being in an AI Overview by Industry

Top SERP Positions (1-2)

Generally, the top SERP positions (1-2) offer the highest chances of inclusion across all industries, with some exceptions where lower positions perform surprisingly well. Industries such as Real Estate, Finance, and Non-profit and Charity show particularly high likelihoods for top positions, with exact match inclusion rates often exceeding 60%. For example, in the Real Estate category, position 2 has a notable 70.59% likelihood of inclusion, while in Finance, position 1 reaches 62.43%.

Middle SERP Positions (3-7)

Middle SERP positions (3-7) show moderate variability, with some industries maintaining strong inclusion rates and others experiencing notable drops. In Logistics and Transportation, Technology, and Manufacturing, middle positions still offer competitive chances of inclusion, with likelihoods ranging between 30% and 50%. However, industries like Sports & Recreation and Travel and Hospitality demonstrate a clear decline in likelihood as we move further down the rankings. Interestingly, middle positions in Education, Entertainment, and Health hold steady, often performing on par with top positions, which suggests that middle positions in these sectors can still compete effectively for inclusion.

Lower SERP Positions (8-10)

Lower positions (8-10) generally show a decline in the likelihood of inclusion across most industries, though exceptions exist. In Technology, position 10 surprisingly holds the highest likelihood of inclusion at 51.72%, outperforming all other positions. Similarly, in Food and Beverage, position 10 shows a high inclusion rate of 60.00%, defying the typical trend of declining likelihoods at lower SERP positions. On the other hand, Non-profit and Charity, Marketing and Advertising, and Real Estate see significant drops at lower ranks, particularly in position 10, where the likelihood of exact match inclusion falls below 30%.

Overall trends

Top positions across all industries consistently offer the strongest chances for inclusion in AI Overviews. Middle positions show competitive but variable performance, with certain industries demonstrating resilience and others showing a more marked decline. Lower positions, while typically weaker, occasionally outperform expectations, particularly in industries like Technology and Food and Beverage, where position 10 holds unexpectedly high inclusion rates. The findings suggest that securing top positions remains the best path for AI Overview visibility, but in certain sectors, even lower positions can offer meaningful opportunities.

Most Common Domains by Industry

Next we analyzed the most common domains appearing in AI Overviews by Industry.

Automotive

cars.com dominates AI Overviews in Automotive with 23 citations, followed by edmunds.com (9) and kbb.com (7). Video platforms like YouTube and blogs such as autoblog.com and motortrend.com also feature prominently with 5-6 citations. Less frequent mentions include niche and regional sites, with popularmechanics.com appearing only once.

E-Commerce

In E-commerce, shopify.com dominates AI Overviews with 100 citations, far ahead of bigcommerce.com and forbes.com with 19 each. Several other sites, including printful.com, printify.com, and hostinger.com, appear with 6-7 citations. Platforms like youtube.com, crazyegg.com, bluehost.com, and wix.com each have 5 citations, while nexcess.net, websitebuilderexpert.com, and junglescout.com contribute with 4 citations each. This highlights a diverse mix of e-commerce and tech platforms shaping AI content.

Education

In Education, khanacademy.org leads with 58 citations in AI Overviews, followed by study.com and en.wikipedia.org, each with 34 citations. youtube.com and byjus.com also rank high, with 33 and 28 citations, respectively. Government sites like studentprivacy.ed.gov (24 citations) and www2.ed.gov (20 citations) contribute significantly. Lower down, trusted academic sources such as ncbi.nlm.nih.gov (15 citations), edutopia.org (14), and britannica.com (11) play key roles, along with specialized education sites like chem.libretexts.org, sciencedirect.com, and cuemath.com, which have around 9-10 citations each.

Entertainment

In the Entertainment category, ew.com leads with 90 citations in AI Overviews, followed closely by en.wikipedia.org with 89. youtube.com ranks third with 51 citations, followed by variety.com (32) and imdb.com (31). m.youtube.com also plays a significant role with 29 mentions. Other prominent sources include people.com (18), hollywoodreporter.com (17), and yahoo.com (17). Lesser-cited but still influential domains include netflix.com (13), cosmopolitan.com (11), and businessinsider.com (11), with facebook.com and etonline.com each cited 9 times.

Environment and Energy

In Environment and Energy, cleantechnica.com dominates AI Overviews with 88 citations, followed by youtube.com with 60 and tesla.com with 53 mentions. en.wikipedia.org ranks fourth with 42 citations, while m.youtube.com appears 40 times. Key government sites like epa.gov (35), nrel.gov (28), and energy.gov (22) also play significant roles. Other notable sources include edmunds.com (18), forbes.com (16), and cnbc.com (15). Industry-specific sources like energysage.com and teslarati.com each have 14 citations, contributing to a diverse mix of energy and environmental domains in AI-generated content.

Fashion and Apparel

In the Fashion and Apparel category, en.wikipedia.org leads with 43 generative mentions, followed by businessoffashion.com with 27 and instagram.com with 21. wwd.com and harpersbazaar.com both feature prominently with 19 mentions each. youtube.com is cited 18 times, while m.youtube.com appears 10 times. Notable media outlets like people.com (8), nytimes.com (7), and nypost.com (7) contribute as well, along with fashion-specific sources like vogue.com (6) and gq.com (5). Other significant contributors include businessinsider.com, forbes.com, washingtonpost.com, and cnn.com, each with 5 mentions, highlighting a mix of fashion, social media, and mainstream news sources.

Finance

In the Finance category, investopedia.com dominates with 104 generative mentions, followed by en.wikipedia.org with 60, and nerdwallet.com with 45. youtube.com and m.youtube.com contribute significantly with 31 and 27 mentions respectively. Other notable sources include finance.yahoo.com (24), markets.ft.com (21), and ig.ft.com (19). Financial news platforms such as marketwatch.com (18) and cnbc.com (12) are well represented, along with educational and corporate resources like corporatefinanceinstitute.com and treasurydirect.gov, each with 15 mentions.

Food and Beverage

In the Food and Beverage category, bonappetit.com leads significantly with 126 generative mentions, followed by youtube.com with 85, and allrecipes.com with 66. m.youtube.com also contributes 60 mentions. Other major players include thekitchn.com (43), foodnetwork.com (37), and marthastewart.com and southernliving.com, both with 28. Notable mentions also include simplyrecipes.com (22), epicurious.com (21), and healthline.com (19).

Health

In the Health category, healthline.com leads with 121 generative mentions, followed by webmd.com with 76, and ncbi.nlm.nih.gov with 58. verywellhealth.com has 50 mentions, and my.clevelandclinic.org ranks next with 45. Other notable sites include medicalnewstoday.com (43), mayoclinic.org (42), and youtube.com and m.youtube.com, both with 29 mentions.

Home and Garden

In the Home and Garden category, southernliving.com dominates with 231 mentions, followed by youtube.com with 95 and m.youtube.com with 81. thespruce.com appears 65 times, and bhg.com has 58 mentions. Other notable domains include allrecipes.com with 55, marthastewart.com with 49, and realsimple.com with 37 mentions. Websites such as thekitchn.com and thepioneerwoman.com also feature frequently with 35 and 32 mentions respectively.

Legal

In the Legal category, legalzoom.com leads with 70 mentions, followed by findlaw.com with 50 and en.wikipedia.org with 20 mentions. usps.com and youtube.com also appear frequently with 19 and 18 mentions respectively. Other notable sites include forbes.com with 15, law.justia.com with 14, and m.youtube.com with 13 mentions. Sites such as investopedia.com, law.cornell.edu, and nolo.com also make regular appearances, further highlighting their authority in AI-generated overviews within the legal domain.

Logistics and Transportation

In the Logistics and Transportation category, inboundlogistics.com tops the list with 68 mentions, followed by en.wikipedia.org with 61 and linkedin.com with 42 mentions. youtube.com also appears prominently with 39 mentions. Other commonly cited domains include indeed.com with 30 mentions, statista.com with 29, and ziprecruiter.com with 24. Additionally, investopedia.com, oec.world, and shipbob.com each have a notable presence, further emphasizing their authority in this sector within AI-generated overviews.

Manufacturing and Industrial

In the Manufacturing and Industrial category, engineering.com leads with 67 mentions, followed closely by youtube.com with 62 mentions, and en.wikipedia.org with 51 mentions. m.youtube.com appears 33 times, and manufacturing.net has 19 mentions. Several news and research-oriented websites, such as usatoday.com, sciencedirect.com, and forbes.com, each have 14 mentions. Other notable sources include brandwatch.com with 12 mentions and files.engineering.com with 11 mentions, making them key contributors in AI-generated content in this sector.

Marketing and Advertising

For the Marketing and Advertising category, socialmediaexaminer.com leads with 33 mentions, followed by youtube.com, facebook.com, and help.instagram.com, each with 30 mentions. webfx.com has 26 mentions, while wordstream.com and searchengineland.com are both cited 24 times. support.google.com and linkedin.com each appear 23 times, and en.wikipedia.org has 20 mentions. Other notable sources include ahrefs.com and blog.hubspot.com with 18 mentions each, making them significant contributors in this domain.

Non-Profit and Charity

For the Non-profit and Charity category, charitynavigator.org tops the list with 102 mentions, followed by en.wikipedia.org with 79 mentions and nonprofitquarterly.org with 54. youtube.com is cited 24 times, while zeffy.com has 23 mentions. Other significant contributors include investopedia.com (16), donorbox.org (15), give.org and glassdoor.com (14 each), and nolo.com and springly.org (12 each). Notable sources also include guidestar.org with 11 mentions and givingtuesday.org with 10.

Real Estate

For the Real Estate category, bankrate.com leads with 39 mentions, followed by mortgagenewsdaily.com with 19 and nerdwallet.com with 16 mentions. investopedia.com is cited 12 times, while realtor.com and global-rates.com both have 10 mentions. fred.stlouisfed.org and youtube.com are referenced 8 times each, and zillow.com, forbes.com, and themortgagereports.com are mentioned 7 times. Other notable mentions include fortune.com, en.wikipedia.org, usbank.com, freddiemac.com, money.usnews.com, and fanniemae.com with 5 mentions each.

Sports & Recreation

In the Sports and Recreation category, en.wikipedia.org ranks highest with 41 mentions, followed by nytimes.com with 37 and espn.com with 19 mentions. youtube.com has 14 citations, nba.com is referenced 13 times, and m.youtube.com has 10 mentions. Other notable sources include si.com with 7 mentions, ohiostatebuckeyes.com, cbssports.com, and nfl.com each with 6 mentions. atlantafalcons.com and cabletv.com are cited 5 times, while opengoaaalusa.com, goducks.com, apnews.com, herosports.com, sports.yahoo.com, and mlb.com have 4 mentions each. ncaa.com and theguardian.com close the list with 3 mentions each.

Technology

In the Technology category, arstechnica.com leads with 50 mentions, followed by youtube.com with 45 and zdnet.com with 29. m.youtube.com appears 27 times, and en.wikipedia.org is cited 25 times. Other notable sources include cnet.com with 17 mentions, support.apple.com and pcmag.com with 16 mentions each, and wired.com with 13. amazon.com has 10 mentions, while support.microsoft.com, nytimes.com, and forbes.com each have 9. Additional sources include theverge.com, ibm.com, and cnn.com, with pcworld.com and techcrunch.com rounding out the list at 6 mentions each.

Travel and Hospitality

In the Travel and Hospitality category, cntraveler.com dominates with 64 mentions, followed by travelandleisure.com with 39, and en.wikipedia.org with 24 mentions. Other notable sources include afar.com with 17 mentions, travel.usnews.com with 16, and thepointsguy.com with 15. m.youtube.com appears 14 times, while youtube.com is cited 12 times. going.com, tripadvisor.com, and lonelyplanet.com all appear 11 times, with cruisecritic.com close behind at 10 mentions. Additional sources include audleytravel.com, transportation.gov, aa.com, and nerdwallet.com with 8 mentions each, and delta.com and united.com with 7 mentions each. businessinsider.com rounds out the list with 6 mentions.

Discussion

The findings from this study provide important insights into how Google AI Overviews function across different industries, offering clear trends that can guide SEOs, content creators, and digital marketers in shaping their strategies.

AI Overviews Prioritize Informational and Resource-Rich Industries

One of the most significant trends is the high prevalence of AI Overviews in industries like Health and Home & Garden, where over 50% of queries triggered AI Overviews. This suggests that the summaries are designed to cater primarily to users seeking detailed, reliable information. Industries where users seek authoritative knowledge—such as Education, Health, and Food & Beverage—also showed the highest number of links per overview. This trend highlights that AI Overviews are most useful in content areas where users need access to a broad range of resources to make informed decisions.

By contrast, industries like Real Estate and Automotive, which are more transactional in nature, saw much lower rates of AI Overviews. This aligns with what we’ve seen in that Google AI Overviews are not yet summarizing decision-heavy or commercial queries in the same way it does for informational searches. For SEOs in transactional industries, this suggests a need to focus on capturing organic search results rather than relying on AI Overviews to drive visibility.

Google’s AI Overviews Mirror Organic Search Results in Some Industries but Diverge in Others

Another important finding from the study is the alignment (or lack thereof) between AI Overview links and traditional organic search results. In industries like Real Estate, Legal, and Fashion & Apparel, there is a strong overlap between AI Overviews and top organic results, with nearly 60% of links in AI Overviews coming directly from the top search results. This suggests that in these fields, AI-generated summaries are reinforcing existing search behaviors, highlighting the same sources users are already clicking on.

On the other hand, in industries like E-commerce and Marketing & Advertising, there is a significant lack of alignment between AI Overviews and traditional search rankings. Only 28-32% of links in AI Overviews in these industries overlapped with top organic results, which may indicate that AI is finding the documents responsive to the query to be low quality or lacking diversity. It may be seeking out content responsive to related queries to introducing new sources to users. For brands operating in these sectors, this divergence highlights an opportunity to improve content visibility through AI-focused optimization strategies that target not just organic rankings, but also content that can secure visibility in AI Overviews whether through direct match or related queries.

The Role of Vertical Drop in Content Visibility

The study also highlighted differences in how much vertical space AI Overviews occupy in search results depending on the industry. Marketing & Advertising, E-commerce, and Travel & Hospitality saw the largest vertical drops, where AI Overviews took up significant portions of the page. This means that in these industries, AI-generated summaries push organic results further down, which can impact user interaction and click-through rates for lower-ranking results.

In industries with smaller vertical drops—such as Entertainment and Fashion & Apparel—organic results retain more prominence, suggesting that AI Overviews might play a smaller role in impacting the overall user experience. This variability in vertical drop highlights the importance of understanding how AI Overviews affect a brand’s visibility within specific industries. Brands in industries with large vertical drops should consider getting included in AI Overviews to avoid losing visibility.

Common Domains Reflect Authority and Trustworthiness Across Industries

An interesting trend across all industries is the dominance of a few high-authority domains in AI Overviews. YouTube, Wikipedia, and Healthline consistently appeared as top domains across multiple industries, regardless of the query intent. This suggests that Google’s AI is heavily reliant on trusted, authoritative sources to populate its overviews.

In industries such as E-commerce, Education, and Real Estate more specialized domains—like shopify.com, khanacademy.org, and bankrate.com—rose to the top, indicating that AI Overviews are sourcing their content from the most authoritative sources within each industry. For brands, this highlights the need for understanding exactly how competitive they can be against these domains in achieving first page rankings.

Limitations of the Study

When interpreting the results of this study, we acknowledge several limitations. First, the sample size might not fully capture the complexity and diversity within each industry. Industries like Health or E-commerce, with broad subcategories, may behave differently in AI Overviews. A more granular approach that analyzes specific subtopics within these industries could provide deeper, more detailed insights. Additionally, recent findings from my partners at Authoritas show higher penetration rates for finance-related queries with other clients compared to what we observed here, suggesting that different samples and timing of data collection can significantly impact the results.

Furthermore, the study data was collected at a single point in time, reflecting Google AI Overview behaviors during a specific period. Google continuously updates its algorithms, and AI Overviews are subject to frequent changes. Therefore, the results of this study may not hold true over time. A longitudinal approach, capturing how these overviews change over time, would provide a more comprehensive understanding of their behavior.

The broad categorization of queries presents another limitation. While the industries used (e.g., Health, Finance, Real Estate) allow for an industry-level analysis, these generalizations may mask variations within each sector. For instance, searches related to preventative health may trigger different AI Overview behaviors than those concerning chronic medical conditions. Similarly, within the E-commerce industry, queries related to high-value products may differ from low-cost, everyday items in terms of how Google generates summaries.

Lastly, the study does not fully account for regional differences in search behavior and AI Overview presentation. Google often tailors search results based on a user’s location, cultural context, and language, which can influence the frequency and nature of AI Overviews. These regional variations might result in different findings if the study were conducted in non-English-speaking countries or regions with distinct search patterns. Consequently, the results may not be fully representative of a global audience.

These limitations highlight the importance of cautious interpretation and point toward future opportunities for more detailed research that captures the full spectrum of AI Overview behaviors.

Conclusion

The variability in Google AI Overviews across different industries offers important insights into how search is evolving with the introduction of AI. While AI Overviews are still primarily focused on informational content, there is potential for growth in transactional and commercial industries as Google adjusts its algorithms. For now, brands need to focus on creating high-quality, authoritative content and optimizing for AI features to maximize their search visibility. Keep in mind that Google continues to tinker with AI Overviews and what type of content they display. E-commerce and other transactional and commercial queries will surely play a larger part in the near future.

References

• AI Overview Study for 8,000 Keywords in Google Search by Advanced Web Ranking
• AI Overviews Research: Analyzing sources in Google’s AI-generated answers by SE Ranking
• Generative summaries for search results Google Patent
• Google AI Overviews: Do Ranking Studies Tell the Whole Story? by Rich Sanger
• How Does Google AI Overview Work? Insights From the Patent by Rich Sanger
• Research Study – The Impact of Google’s Search Generative Experience on organic rankings by Authoritas
• SGE Research Study – The Impact of Google Search Generative Experience on Brand and Product Terms by Authoritas
• Why Generative to Organic Alignment Scores (GOA Score™) matter when optimising for AI Overviews by Authoritas