AI Overview User Intent Research

January 27, 2025

Contents

• Background to this AIO Research & Methodology
• How Often Do AIOs Appear?
• How Often Do AIOs Show by Industry and User Intent?
• Brand vs. Non-Brand
• Impact on Traditional Search Results

Background to this AIO Research & Methodology

2024 marked a transformative year for AI Overviews in search, but we anticipate 2025 will reveal their true impact on the search landscape.

In early 2024, we started exploring Google’s Search Generative beta launch by researching the potential impact on ecommerce and of generative AI on branded and product search.

Later in the year, we started a series of collaborative research studies on the full rollout of AI Overviews in partnership with our esteemed friend and SEO veteran Rich Sanger. These studies covered many aspects of AI Overviews and there are multiple studies on his site, he’s also taken time to breakdown the Google SGE patent which is well worth a read.

SERP data was collected for 10,000 keywords across 7 industries in the US on desktop devices in December 2024.

As always, we have shared the keywords we used on Google drive. For any SEO developers or data scientists, I have also shared the detailed AI Overview export files and the AIO PowerPoint slides we usually share with all customers.

How Often Do AIOs Appear?

Our research shows that:

• AIOs still don't show up for the majority of searches.
• AIOs appear for a relatively low number of searches (29.9% of Keywords and 11.5% of Total Search Volume).
• AIOs don't appear more frequently for terms with higher search volumes.
• AIOs do show for less popular terms on a regular basis, though most frequently for medium search volume terms (501-2,400 searches/month).

The research did find that AIOs are most likely to appear for keywords with mid-range search volume. 42% of keywords with a monthly search volume between 501 and 2,400 have an AIO, and 36% for those with a search volume between 101 and 500.

How Often Do AIOs Show by Industry and User Intent?

AIOs don't appear equally across all topics or sectors and the opportunities in your sector will depend on what you are selling. Of the seven sectors the research looked at, Telecoms had the highest percentage of keywords with AIOs (56%), while Beauty/Cosmetics had the lowest (14%).

AIOs do show more often for some industries/sectors than others. The appearance of AIOs also varies significantly by user intent. The research found that:

• AIOs do appear more often for Problem Solving and Specific Question intents.
• AIOs don't show for any navigational queries.
• Topic Research searches are much less likely to have AIOs. Only 3.37% of keywords in this intent category show an AIO.

Brand vs. Non-Brand

Non-brand keywords are more likely to trigger AIOs than brand terms. 33.3% of non-brand keywords and 19.6% of brand terms show an AIO. However, AIOs can still be relevant for brand terms, particularly for Informational intent keywords, with 69.8% of Informational brand keywords showing an AIO.

Impact on Traditional Search Results

With the "Show more" button clicked, AIOs can push traditional organic results further down the page, potentially even below the first fold.

Before the AIO is expanded, two organic results are typically visible on mobile and three on desktop. However, once the AIO is expanded, the median pixel drop is 220 pixels on desktop. This means that only the first organic result might still be visible without scrolling.

This covers some of the main highlights. If you would like to get into more depth then please do download the Full Whitepaper.

I'm currently working on research into AI Overview Volatility and whether this is driven by changes in the SERPs and organic rank changes or whether AI Overviews fluctuate independently of other SERP changes.

Stay tuned.