Google Rolls Out AI Organized Search Results
Google has announced the rollout of search results organized by AI. It’s starting with US users in the specific category of recipes and meal inspiration, but will expand to other categories later. It will include a variety of content formats and perspectives from across the web, personalized for the searcher.
“This week, we’re rolling out search results pages organized with AI in the U.S. — beginning with recipes and meal inspiration on mobile. You’ll now see a full-page experience, with relevant results organized just for you. You can easily explore content and perspectives from across the web including articles, videos, forums and more — all in one place.”
The results are labelled as “Organized with AI” and grouped into modules of categories like easy recipies or dips. You can dig deeper, for example to explore recipies using specific ingredients.
Google said that in testing people found AI-organized search results “more helpful”. However it didn’t cite data for this. Providing different format types such will, Google says, create “even more opportunities for content to be discovered”.
In the same announcement, Google also said more prominent links to supporting websites within AI overviews were being rolled out widely after testing. It said tests showed the improved design had driven an increase in traffic to supporting websites, so the new format was rolling out globally to all countries where AI Overviews are available.
The AI being used comes from Google’s Gemini model and shows Google’s increasing use of its generative AI for its core products.
Implications for Website Owners & SEO
The launch of AI organized search results is a big shift and raises some key questions about visibility and optimization practices, and how the change might affect website traffic.
Search Engine Journal quoted a Google spokesperson as saying, in response to a question on optimizing content for AI-organized search results, that no changes were needed:
“SEO professionals and creators don’t need to do anything differently. Search results pages organized with AI are rooted in our core Search ranking and quality systems, which we have been honing for decades to surface high quality information.”
It’s not clear how easy it will be to track metrics relating to AI-organized search results. The spokesperson told Search Engine Journal that traffic was not separated out by every feature in Search Console, but publishers would “continue to see their traffic from Search reflected there”.
