Google is putting more links inside its AI answers
Google says AI Overviews and AI Mode will link out more often, and place some of those links higher in the answer.
Google is adding more links inside AI Overviews (the AI written answer at the top of search results) and AI Mode (Google's chat style search). Nick Fox, who posts as @thefox, announced the changes and said some links will sit higher up in the response.
Marie Haynes listed five changes. More inline links inside the answer text, shown higher up more often. Official websites placed high when they are where people go to finish a task. New carousels for timely news articles inside AI answers. More links at the end of answers with image thumbnails and a more clickable design. And clickable creator and publisher names on video results.
Nick Fox described the top of response change as a new section that highlights the one or two links you need to complete a specific task or find exact info. Glenn Gabe, flagging Barry Schwartz's write up, noted the video name links go to a Google Search profile page first rather than straight to the creator's site.
The numbers Google shared
Fox said the number of people using Preferred Sources, the setting that lets searchers pick sites they want to see more of, has grown 7x since the beginning of the year. The new news carousels will highlight those picked sources and are rolling out globally. Fox also said over 400 publications worldwide are now in Google's News AI pilot licensing program, where Google pays for content used to build AI features.
We covered Preferred Sources earlier, when Google started emailing site owners a count of how many people had favorited them.
What is missing
More links on screen does not automatically mean more visits, and there is still no way to check. Barry Schwartz made the point directly.
What to do
If you run a small business site, there is no setting to change here. The practical move is to make sure you have one clear page that answers the exact thing a customer wants to do, because that is the type of page Google says it will promote to the top of an AI answer. A booking page, a pricing page, a contact page with real detail beats a vague overview.
If you publish anything timely, the news carousel is worth knowing about, and it leans on Preferred Sources. Ask your regular readers to add your site in their Google search settings.
There is no confirmed traffic change yet. Google announced the features, nobody outside Google has measured what they do to clicks, and Search Console still will not show click data for AI answers. Watch your overall traffic in Google Analytics over the next few weeks rather than reading anything into the announcement itself.
Google continues to refuse to show us click data in Search Console
A new section at the top of a response that prominently highlights the 1-2 links you need to complete a specific task or find exact info
Be the person who already knew
One email a day. Under three minutes. You will hear about a Google change before it shows up in your traffic.