Google begins integrating ads into AI Overviews on Google Search

Google is revamping its search engine with the help of AI. The company announced AI Overviews not long ago. This new feature displays an AI reply at the top of the Google Search results.

Now, Google announced the start of showing ads as part of AI Overviews on Google Search. The addition is available for searchers in the United States at the time, but will expand to more regions and countries in the future.

The advertisement shows up as sponsored blocks in the reply of the AI. This section can be distinguished better from the AI’s content than regular ads from organic search results on Google Search.

Google claims that people “use Search more, and are more satisfied with their results” when AI Overviews are shown. The advertising giant says that website links included in AI Overviews get more clicks when compared to traditional lists of websites returned by Google Search.

Google continues to enhance AI Overviews. It is currently working on integrating options to simplify the AI’s result or break it down in more detail. At the end of the year, Google plans to make AI Overviews available to over 1 billion Google Search users.

Google highlights the following capabilities of AI Overviews specifically:

Get answers to complex questions. Example search query: “Find the best yoga or pilates studios in Boston and show me details on their intro offers, and walking time from Beacon Hill”. Previously, users had to run multiple searches to find the information.
Get help with plans. Starting with meals and vacations, AI assists users when it comes to creating plans. Google says users may fine tune the results.
AI-organized results pages. These pages help searches “find inspiration” and make it “easy to explore” a certain topic.
Get search results from videos. Take a video, ask a question, and get an AI response.

AI Overviews criticism

Criticism can be broken down to two major concerns:

Hallucinations and outdated information — Generative AI may hallucinate, which refers to content being returned that is not true. It may also show old information, as it relies on previously generated content.
Less traffic for websites who produce the content — AI relies on content that has been created by humans. Without it, generative AI would not exist. With Google Search showing AI Overviews at the top, webmasters and publishers fear that users will click less on links pointing to their sites, regardless of whether the link is included in an AI Overview or part of the organic results. Who needs to click on links anymore when Google returns the information right on its search page?

With generative AI, it is important to verify the returned information, especially if you plan to act on it.

Closing Words

Most search engines will integrate AI on search results page, if they have not done so already. On Brave Search, for instance, AI generated results are already the default. Some allow users to turn the functionality off, but it seems likely that the majority won’t.

What about you? Will you use AI Overviews or other AI generated search results once they becomes available?

Summary