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What you are probably seeing
You see a dip in direct traffic to your landing pages while your ad spend remains steady, suggesting users are not clicking through to your site as expected.
Your session duration data shows visitors reading information without converting, indicating they may have gotten their answers from an AI overlay instead of your content.
Why it happens
Search engines now prioritize synthesized answers that summarize multiple sources, which satisfies user intent without requiring a click to a specific domain.
Traditional pay-per-click slots are pushed below these AI-generated blocks, reducing the visibility and value of your paid ad placements in the top results.
What changed recently
Step by step
1. Review your search console to identify which query terms now trigger AI-generated summaries instead of organic links.
2. Compare your ad click-through rates against the visibility of your brand in these new summary formats to find correlation.
3. Update your website content structure to ensure your brand is a primary source cited in AI answers rather than just a link.
4. Monitor which specific AI tools or platforms are summarizing your content and note if your brand name appears in those syntheses.
5. Adjust your advertising strategy to target keywords where your brand is not yet overshadowed by AI summaries to maintain ROI.
Ways to go further
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Other problems readers raise
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