As you probably know, Google has started rolling out AI summaries called “AI Overviews” in search results. Now, they are about to start testing search and shopping ads within AI Overviews in the U.S. The ads will be displayed in a “sponsored” section and will be relevant to both the query and the information in the AI Overview.
In Q1, Google Search and other advertising revenues were $46.2 billion, up 14% year-over-year, so they are going to do everything they can to keep up the good work.
Problematically, while ads in AI Overviews might be good for Google, they do nothing to remunerate or support the creators and publishers of the content they have trained on to deliver the AI Overview itself. Unlike a SERP (search engine results page), which offers organic search results (web listings), AI Overviews offers a paragraph or two that (depending on the topic) may be the only results you need. No attribution, no links, and no compensation of any kind. On mobile, the layout I’ve seen has room for one and a half small tiles for sites related to the AI Overview, but that single carousel is immediately followed by a robust section of ads.
To echo many of my colleagues: “Search is dead. Long live Google.”
Author’s note: This is not a sponsored post. I am the author of this article and it expresses my own opinions. I am not, nor is my company, receiving compensation for it. This work was created with the assistance of various generative AI models.