The answer sits above the links
When an AI summary appears, people click less. Pew Research Center found people clicked a traditional result on 8% of visits with an AI summary on the page, compared with 15% without one (United States, March 2025). The summary itself increasingly shapes the first impression.
Why rankings and answers diverge
Vendor research- Several sources, one answer
AI combines multiple pages into a single response, so a comparison site or directory can shape what’s said about you more than your own page.
- Questions, not keywords
Buyers ask full questions with context (budget, location, use case) that your ranking page may not address.
- Accuracy isn’t ranked
A page can rank well and still carry an outdated fact that AI repeats.
- Different engines, different sources
Even Google’s own AI features don’t agree on sources: Ahrefs found just 13.7% citation overlap between AI Mode and AI Overviews across 730,000 response pairs, while the two often reached similar conclusions.
What to measure instead
Track three things on the questions that matter: whether you’re named (Answer Share), where the answer’s information comes from (Answer Chain), and whether it’s right (Accuracy Check). Keep watching your rankings too; they tell you something different.
Frequently asked questions
Should we stop investing in SEO?
No. SEO helps you get found. This adds a second question: once you’re found, are you named and described correctly?
Can a lower-ranked page still be cited?
Yes. Assistants often cite several sources, not only the top result.
