140 | Are AI Overviews Killing Blogging? Here's What the Data Actually Says

Rumor has it blogging and SEO are dead again. It used to be every few years. Now it feels like every few months. I’m not going to pretend nothing has changed. People really are clicking through to websites less often because the AI overview at the top of Google already gave them the answer. But somewhere along the way, “Google is sending fewer clicks” turned into “blogging doesn’t work anymore,” and those are two very different statements. Because when you look at the actual numbers, zero-click searches were happening long before AI overviews showed up, search volume has roughly tripled in a few years, and most people still don’t fully trust an AI summary to make a big decision for them. For service providers who aren’t monetizing page views, the opportunity is still enormous. It just requires a more strategic blog than the one most people are publishing. I’m walking through the data I think every small business owner should know, plus exactly what I’d change about my own blogging strategy because of AI overviews. 🎙️ In This Episode: What AI overviews actually are, and why the “SEO is dead” panic is missing the nuance Why 60% of searches ending without a click isn’t as scary as it sounds for service providers How Google search volume has grown since 2022 (and why commercial queries are going up) A luxury inquiry that proves high-end clients still love to research before they hire The four changes I’d make to a blogging strategy right now 🔗 Links Mentioned:  Read the full shownotes: https://thekarareport.com/140 My private podcast on search-driven marketing: https://thekarareport.com/private-podcast SparkToro Research: https://sparktoro.com/blog/2024-zero-click-search-study-for-every-1000-us-google-searches-only-374-clicks-go-to-the-open-web-in-the-eu-its-360/ Pew study: http://pewresearch.org/short-reads/2025/07/22/google-users-are-less-likely-to-click-on-links-when-an-ai-summary-appears-in-the-results/ Learn more about working with our team: https://thekarareport.com/services Follow me on Instagram: https://instagram.com/thekarareport