Insights
What Google Must Provide in AI Search Reporting
Last week, SEOs and site owners celebrated Google's announcement of changes to reporting in Search Console.
It's a step in the right direction, but here's what many people missed:
1. The features are only available to a test group of site owners in the UK. Right now, only impressions are shown in the reports.
2. Google didn't do this willingly (IMHO). They must comply with a ruling from The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in the UK which requires them to provide publishers with specific data.
I read the final decision and other papers from the CMA to check what's explicitly required.
Google must provide
- Impressions, clicks, and click-through rate data for publisher content in search generative AI features, disaggregated from general search results
- Referral labeling: Google must indicate whether a specific referral originated from a search generative AI feature or other elements of general search, so publishers can assess click quality using their own on-site analytics
What was asked for but rejected
- Per-feature data: separate metrics for AI Overviews vs. AI Mode
- Detailed click quality indicators: engagement depth, conversion rates, advertising presence on a query
- Query context data: which types of queries trigger AI features or use publisher content
- Human vs. machine traffic indicators
So, Google is not mandated to provide the more granular query-level or per-feature data that publishers pushed for.
The timeline
Google has 6 months from publication of the Conduct Requirement (CR) Notice of June 3 to provide:
- the controls: training/grounding opt-outs.
- transparency requirements: impressions, clicks, CTR, referral labelling.
- attribution obligations.
This puts the deadline around early December 2026.
Within 9 months of the CR Notice, Google must offer page-level controls. The estimated deadline is early March 2027.
Since Google has made no commitments on a timeframe for a global release of these features, it's anyone's guess when we might benefit from them.
When do you think people outside the UK will get access?
| When will Google let us access AI Search reporting globally? |
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Related: A good question
In a LinkedIn post, Eli Schwartz discussed how AEO would only replace SEO if Google lost their dominant position.
Referring to all the new AEO tools in the market, he asked:
"what happens to all the new AEO platforms built on the assumption that Google would lose? Most will struggle to justify their existence when the incumbent toolset just needs one new feature to cover the gap."
The comments on his post reveal a variety of differing opinions.
Reply and tell me what you think will happen.
AI Mode will not be the default
Google confirmed they have no plans to make AI Mode the default search experience in Google Chrome.
There was some confusion after Chrome Canary added a new experimental flag that redirected searches from the address bar directly to AI Mode.
In response to a post from Glenn Gabe, Rajan Patel, a Google VP, confirmed this was an error.
Google Zero is a lie
There's panic in the publishing industry but Barry Adams argues that the narrative of zero Google traffic is entirely false and actively dangerous.
He cites examples to back up his claims, and believes the real danger is publishers abandoning SEO in response to a story that the data doesn't support.
"… When you take your eye off the Google ball, you’re making a colossal mistake.
No matter how you interpret the data, Google is still by far the single largest source of visitors for websites. There is literally no other channel that comes close…"
This newsletter issue from a few weeks ago is worth your time.
The future of Google
Harry Clarkson-Bennett made an interesting observation in his recent newsletter about what the future of the SERP looks like.
Referring to why AI Mode might not be the default, he said, "Hugging Face estimated it costs about 30 times as much energy to generate text versus simply extracting it from a source. Whilst that isn’t revenue as such, computational power correlates pretty closely with cost."
Perhaps this is purely a financial decision for Google?
It's not FAANG anymore...
This is one option after the upcoming IPOs are complete.
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