Google People Also Ask (PAA) is an expandable box of related questions in Google search results. Clicking any question opens a short answer and loads more questions below it. According to AlsoAsked data from 19.2 million English-language queries, 97% of People Also Ask answers in the first week of September 2026 were AI Overviews. That number comes from a vendor's sample, so treat it as a signal. It still changes the job. To earn visibility in PAA now, your page has to be the clearest, most direct answer to a question people already search.

Most PAA advice online still says the same thing. Find questions, add FAQ schema, wait for traffic. Two of those three have aged badly, and the answers in the box are now mostly written by Google's AI.

What Google People Also Ask Is and Where It Appears

Google People Also Ask is a SERP feature that shows a stack of related questions in the search results, each collapsed into one line until a searcher clicks it.

Google's documentation uses a drier label. Google's Visual Elements Gallery documentation groups People Also Ask under "Exploration features" and tells site owners they "can't control what shows up here."

PAA is a different feature from related searches. Clicking a related search loads a whole new results page. Clicking a PAA question opens the answer in place, on the same SERP.

The "can't control" line bothers some marketers. It shouldn't. You don't pick the questions, but you decide how well your page answers them.

That control starts with knowing how the box behaves once someone clicks.

How PAA Boxes Expand Each Time You Click a Question

PAA boxes expand dynamically, so clicking a question opens its answer and Google adds more related questions to the bottom of the box.

The result is an accordion that keeps growing as long as the searcher keeps clicking. A short list turns into a long one. Each new question drifts a little further from the original search.

Google treats the box as a standard part of the results page. In December 2022, Google launched its Visual Elements Gallery. The launch post listed 22 visual elements most likely to appear on results pages, including "Exploration features."

That drift is useful to you.

Try a five-minute test. Search your main product category, click three different PAA questions and write down every new one that appears. That list is your first content brief, built from Google's own suggestions.

What People Also Ask Does for Visibility and Organic Traffic

People Also Ask adds SERP visibility because it is one of the places Google shows featured snippets. Google's Search Help page on featured snippets names three: the top of results, next to Knowledge Graph information and the "People also ask" section.

For a small site, that's extra real estate on results pages where the top slots are hard to win. A spot in the box puts your name in front of people who never scroll past the first few results.

The bigger payoff is research. PAA shows the follow-up questions searchers have, phrased the way they type them. For a store, those questions often map straight onto product-page FAQs, the stuff people ask right before they buy.

Organic traffic is the weaker promise. When the answer sits right there in the box, plenty of people read it and move on.

Which raises the obvious question of who writes those answers.

How Google Picks People Also Ask Answers in 2026

Google fills People Also Ask with answers that match each question's search intent and answer it clearly, and in 2026 most of those answers are AI Overviews.

The older route was the featured snippet. Google's featured snippets documentation says snippets "can also appear within a related questions group (also known as People Also Ask)." One page, one quoted answer, one link back.

That route is shrinking fast. By July 2025, nearly 13% of PAA answers were AI-generated, according to Mark Williams-Cook's AlsoAsked data reported by Search Engine Land. Back then, AI answers were the exception.

About a year later they were the rule. Search Engine Watch's report on AI-generated PAA answers puts the AI Overview share at 86% in August 2026 before it climbed further, and Williams-Cook expects it to reach 100% soon.

These are one vendor's numbers. They all point the same way. Whatever writes the answer, Google still needs pages that state it plainly, so put the answer in the first sentence under the question and save the backstory for later.

How to Rank in People Also Ask: Five Steps

Ranking in People Also Ask takes five steps: find eligible questions, check search intent, write a direct answer, use question headings and track results.

None of this is clever. Most of it is discipline.

Step 1: Find PAA Questions Near Queries You Already Rank For

The best PAA questions to target first are tied to queries where your pages already rank on Google's first page.

Open Google Search Console, go to the Performance report and filter queries for words like "how," "what," "why" and "can." Sort by average position and keep anything in the top 10. Search each one in a private window and note the PAA questions that show up.

The sources worth adding to your question research are:

• AlsoAsked maps PAA questions into trees, so you can see which question leads to which.
• Ahrefs pulls question-style keywords from a seed term, with search volume attached.
• Google autocomplete shows how people finish a question as they type. Free and fast.
• Your inbox and sales calls hold the questions customers ask before they buy.

Questions that keep turning up across several sources go to the top of the list.

Step 2: Check the Search Intent Behind Each Question

Search intent decides what a good PAA answer looks like, so read the current answer in the box before you write yours.

"How long does a website redesign take" wants a time range. "How do I set up Search Console" wants steps. "Ahrefs vs. AlsoAsked" wants a comparison.

Match what the searcher came for. Skip the preamble.

Step 3: Write a Direct Answer in the Matching Format

A PAA-ready answer states the answer in its first sentence, in the same format Google already shows for that question.

The four answer formats that fit most PAA questions are:

Keep the answer short enough to lift cleanly, then add depth underneath. Write it in your voice and back every number with a cited source. Vague answers lose to specific ones.

Step 4: Turn Questions Into H2 and H3 Headings

Question-based H2 and H3 headings tell readers and Google exactly which question each section answers.

Use the searcher's phrasing. Nobody searches for your internal jargon. A short FAQ section at the end handles the smaller questions that don't need their own section.

Step 5: Track PAA Results and Refresh Answers

PAA placements change often, so recheck your target questions each month and update answers when the questions or the current answer shift.

In Google Search Console, watch impressions and clicks for the pages you rewrote. Rerun your AlsoAsked checks too. New questions appear, old ones drop out, and a refreshed answer costs less than a new post.

FAQ Schema Won't Get You Into People Also Ask

FAQPage schema is a separate feature from People Also Ask, and there is no evidence that FAQ markup helps a page appear in the PAA box.

Plenty of older guides still claim it does. The markup's main payoff was FAQ rich results, and Google has spent years taking those away.

On August 8, 2023, Google's HowTo and FAQ rich results update restricted FAQ rich results to "well-known, authoritative government and health websites" and limited How-To rich results to desktop. For most sites, that ended the FAQ dropdown in search results.

Then the rest went. Google's FAQPage structured data documentation says that since May 7, 2026, FAQ rich results no longer appear in Google Search.

Keep the FAQ section for your readers. If a guide tells you FAQ schema is the route into PAA, check the date on it.

The Catch: Zero-Click Searches, Volatility and Thin Pages

The main limits of People Also Ask are zero-click searches, constant volatility, heavy competition and the temptation to churn out thin pages for every question.

Zero-click is the big one. A searcher who gets the full answer in the box has no reason to visit you. With AI Overviews writing almost all PAA answers, count on the box for visibility first and organic traffic second.

Volatility comes next. The questions shift, the answers shift, and a placement you hold today can vanish without any change on your side.

Competition is stiff too, because anyone with AlsoAsked sees the same questions you do.

The worst response to PAA data is a content plan with one thin post per question. Pages built only to catch a question are low-value, and they pile up as a liability.

Group related questions into one strong post instead. More work per page, far less work overall.

Quick Answers About Google People Also Ask

The most common questions about Google People Also Ask cover removing the box, AI-written answers, related searches and featured snippets.

How do you get rid of People Also Ask on Google?

Site owners cannot remove the People Also Ask box or choose which questions appear in it. Google's guide to exploration features says site owners "can't control what shows up here." You can limit snippets with nosnippet and data-nosnippet, but Google does not say these controls remove a page from PAA.

Are People Also Ask answers written by AI?

Most People Also Ask answers are now written by AI. AlsoAsked's sample of 19.2 million queries found that 97% of PAA answers in the first week of September 2026 were AI Overviews.

Is People Also Ask the same as related searches?

People Also Ask and related searches are different features. A PAA question expands in place and adds more questions. A related search opens a new results page.

Can a featured snippet appear in People Also Ask?

A featured snippet can appear inside People Also Ask. Google's featured snippet guidelines describe PAA as a "related questions group" where snippets can show up.

Your People Also Ask Plan for the Next Seven Days

The most useful People Also Ask work in 2026 is rewriting pages that already rank so they answer real questions in the first sentence.

Your priority order for the next seven days is:

1. Today: export question queries in the top 10 from Google Search Console.
2. Tomorrow: search each one and note the PAA questions and answer formats.
3. Days 3 to 5: rewrite three sections with question headings and direct first sentences.
4. Day 7: check impressions for those pages and search the questions again.

A good week ends with at least one rewritten page earning more impressions on its target question. Clicks may lag. That's the zero-click tax.

If you'd rather skip the manual digging, Serpjoy studies People Also Ask and AI Overviews for every post, then writes in your voice with each stat cited. Your first post costs $1.

Either way, write the answer first. The box rewards pages that get to the point.

Google AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries, built on Google's Gemini models, that appear at the top of some search results and link to the pages they draw from. At Google I/O 2026, Sundar Pichai said AI Overviews now have over 2.5 billion monthly active users. Ahrefs' December 2025 data shows the top-ranking page's average click-through rate is 58% lower when an AI Overview appears. To be cited, a page must be indexed and eligible to show with a snippet. After that, it has to answer the question more clearly than every other candidate.

You've probably read the two usual takes on this: SEO is dead, or you need a new acronym. Neither helps. The pages that get cited answer fast, name their author and source every number, which was good SEO before Gemini arrived and still is.

Key Takeaways on Google AI Overviews

Google AI Overviews summarize answers at the top of search results, reduce clicks to the pages below them, and cite pages that are indexed, clear and trustworthy.

The five points worth keeping from this guide are:

• AI Overviews show up mostly on informational, question-style searches and far less on transactional ones.
• Clicks and organic traffic drop when an AIO appears, though recent data shows a partial recovery.
• There's no special file or markup to add. Eligibility starts with normal indexing.
• Answer-first sections, named authors and cited sources give Google clean passages to quote.
• Citations move around, so track the trend in Search Console instead of trusting one screenshot.

What Are Google AI Overviews?

Google AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries shown at the top of some Google results, with links to the sources used to write them.

Google treats them as permanent. Its help center calls AI Overviews "a core Google Search feature, like knowledge panels". That's a polite way of saying they aren't going anywhere.

The Gemini Models Behind AI Overviews

AI Overviews run on Gemini, Google's family of AI models, tuned specifically for search. At launch in May 2024, they used a new Gemini model customized for Google Search, with multi-step reasoning.

In December 2024, Google said it was bringing Gemini 2.0's reasoning to AI Overviews for complex questions, including math, multimodal queries and coding. Each upgrade widened the kind of question an AIO will attempt. Fewer queries are safe from them than you'd hope.

How Far AI Overviews Have Spread

AI Overviews went from a U.S.-only launch in May 2024 to more than 200 countries and territories within about a year. Google began rolling them out across the U.S. at I/O 2024 and predicted they'd reach over a billion people by the end of that year.

That forecast landed early. By October 2024, AI Overviews were reaching more than 1 billion users every month in over 100 countries and territories. By May 2025, they covered more than 200 countries and 40-plus languages.

If your customers use Google, they see these. That settles whether to plan for them. The next question is how they differ from the SERP features you already know.

How AI Overviews Differ From Featured Snippets and AI Mode

AI Overviews combine information from several sources into one generated answer, while featured snippets quote a single page and AI Mode is a separate conversational search mode.

A featured snippet lifts one passage from one page. You won the box or you didn't. An AI Overview writes its own answer and cites several pages, so you're one voice in a group summary.

To build that answer, Google may use "query fan-out," running several related searches and combining what it finds. AI Mode goes further. It's a separate space for exploratory, back-and-forth questions.

One trap when reading Google's announcements: AI Overviews and AI Mode audiences overlap, so don't add their user counts together.

For planning, write for fan-out. Cover the obvious follow-up questions on the same page, because each one is another search Google might run. That matters more once you see what happens to clicks.

AI Overviews Cut Clicks, but the Numbers Keep Moving

AI Overviews reduce organic click-through rate on the queries where they appear, according to independent studies from Pew Research Center, Ahrefs and Seer Interactive.

What the Click Studies Found

Pew Research Center tracked 900 U.S. adults in March 2025, and 58% ran at least one search with an AI summary. This is a mainstream experience, not a niche one.

When a summary appeared, users clicked a traditional result on 8% of visits versus 15% without one. Close to half the clicks, gone.

And being cited doesn't make up the gap. Users clicked a link inside the AI summary on just 1% of visits. A citation is good for your brand. It's a weak source of visits.

Ahrefs puts the damage at the top of the page. Its December 2025 data shows the number-one result's average CTR is 58% lower when an AI Overview is present. Ranking first still matters. It just pays less.

Why the Traffic Story Is Messier Than the Headlines

Organic CTR on AI Overview queries started recovering in early 2026 after a long decline. Seer Interactive found that CTR on those queries rebounded 85% in two months, following 18 months of decline.

Check the base before celebrating. Search Engine Land's report on Seer's data shows CTR rose from 1.3% to 2.4% between December 2025 and February 2026, across 53 brands and 5.47M queries. Very low to still low.

Google sounds calmer. Head of Search Liz Reid said in August 2025 that total organic click volume was "relatively stable year-over-year". Total volume across the web can hold steady while your organic traffic falls.

All of these CTR studies are correlational, and results vary by dataset and method. Treat them as ranges, then check your own Search Console numbers. Which queries you target decides how much any of this touches you.

Which Queries Trigger AI Overviews?

AI Overviews appear mostly on informational queries, such as long-tail questions and how-to searches, and much less on transactional or navigational searches.

Intent Decides Whether an AIO Shows Up

Ahrefs found that 99.2% of keywords triggering AI Overviews had informational intent in March 2025. If your blog is full of "what is" and "how to" posts, you're in the blast zone. Your pricing page mostly isn't.

Frequency still swings. Semrush's study of 10M+ keywords found AI Overviews on 6.49% of queries in January 2025, peaking at 24.61% in July before settling near 16% by November. A keyword with no AIO today can have one next month.

The mix is creeping toward buying research. Between November 2025 and April 2026, AI Overviews on commercial-intent results grew 71% on average, while transactional results fell 5%. B2B and SaaS teams should watch their comparison and "best X for Y" pages closely.

Use People Also Ask to Map the Questions

People Also Ask boxes show the follow-up questions searchers type, which makes them a free map of what an AI Overview needs to cover.

Search your main keyword, expand the People Also Ask box, and write down every question. Group them. Each group becomes an H2 or H3, answered in its first two sentences.

This lines up with query fan-out. A page that already answers the related questions gives Google fewer reasons to look elsewhere. Serpjoy reads People Also Ask and the live AI Overview before writing any post for the same reason.

How Google Chooses Which Pages to Cite

Google cites pages in AI Overviews only if they are indexed and eligible to appear in Search with a snippet, and Google says there are no additional technical requirements.

That's the entry ticket. No llms.txt file, no special AI markup. Google says you don't need either.

One newer condition matters. Google's July 2026 AI optimization guide says a site must be included in generative AI features in Search Console. Check that setting before you touch any content.

A first-page ranking puts you in the candidate pool. It doesn't get you picked. The emphasis shifts from classic ranking signals to what makes a passage easy to quote, as this comparison shows:

You'll hear this called Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) or Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). They're labels for one idea: write so a machine can lift a correct answer from your page. The same work carries over to ChatGPT, Perplexity and Copilot, which also build answers from web sources.

How to Rank in Google AI Overviews: 9 Steps

Getting cited in Google AI Overviews comes down to eligibility, answer-first structure, visible E-E-A-T, clean technical SEO and regular measurement.

Work through these nine steps in order:

1. Confirm you're eligible. Check the page is indexed and not held back by noindex, nosnippet or max-snippet. Then confirm the Search Console setting for generative AI features.
2. Answer in the first two or three sentences. Open each section with a 40-70 word answer capsule that makes sense alone. No warm-up.
3. Use question-based headings. Write H2s and H3s the way people search. Google lifts passages, so each section has to stand on its own.
4. Make E-E-A-T visible. Add an author bio with real credentials, describe first-hand experience where you have it, and link every statistic to its original source.
5. Add schema markup that clarifies who and what. Google says no special markup is needed, so structured data won't win citations by itself. Use Article, Organization and Person schema markup to tie pages to a real author, plus FAQ schema (FAQPage) or HowTo where the format fits. Validate it in the Rich Results Test.
6. Build topical authority. Cover a subject with a pillar page and cluster posts, linked internally. One post rarely convinces Google you know a topic.
7. Keep technical SEO clean. Pass Core Web Vitals, work well on mobile and stay crawlable. Check robots.txt isn't blocking Googlebot, and follow Google's image and video SEO guidance.
8. Refresh on a fixed schedule. Update statistics, show a visible "last updated" date and cut claims that aged badly. An old stat tells readers the page is stale.
9. Measure in Search Console. Google's Search Generative AI performance reports show impressions in AI Overviews, AI Mode and Discover. As of August 31, 2026, every site worldwide has access.

Expect citations to wobble. A page can drop out of an AIO with nothing changed on your end, so the trend beats any single check.

This is the checklist Serpjoy writes to. Every stat is paired with its source, authors get asked two or three questions where their experience matters, and every post ships with schema.

Common AI Overview Mistakes That Cost Citations

The most common AI Overview mistakes are burying the answer, publishing unsourced statistics, building files Google doesn't use and opting out without data.

The mistakes worth fixing this week:

• Warm-up intros. If your answer sits in paragraph four, a competitor's first sentence gets quoted instead.
• Stats with no source. A number without a link is a number Google has to take on faith.
• Building llms.txt for Google. Google says special files and new markup aren't needed for AI Overviews.
• Opting out on instinct. Google's June 2026 toggle lets sites opt out of generative AI features, and Google says it isn't a ranking signal elsewhere. It also removes you from the citations, so decide with your own numbers.

Quick Answers About Google AI Overviews

Google AI Overviews appear automatically on some searches, can't be switched off in settings, and link to their sources so you can check the answer.

How Do You Get an AI Overview?

You get an AI Overview by searching a question or informational query, since Google shows them automatically on some searches. For site owners, being cited starts with an indexed, snippet-eligible page.

Why Do I Keep Getting AI Overviews?

You keep getting AI Overviews because Google treats them as a permanent Search feature, and they show up most on informational questions.

How Can I Turn Off AI Overviews?

You can't turn off AI Overviews in Google's settings, but choosing the "Web" filter shows only text links. Site owners can use the Search Console opt-out instead.

Should I Trust Google AI Overviews?

Google AI Overviews are a starting point, so click the cited sources before acting on anything important. A short summary can't carry every caveat.

What to Do About AI Overviews This Week

AI Overviews are a permanent part of Google Search, so the practical response is to make your page the clearest, best-sourced answer on the results page.

Do it in this order. Confirm eligibility and the Search Console setting. Rewrite your top informational pages answer-first. Then add author bios, sources and schema markup, and measure.

Your first step today: open Search Console, find the Generative AI performance report and list the pages already earning AI Overview impressions. Those are your proof of concept.

Within seven days, aim to have your five strongest informational pages rewritten with answer-first openers and every stat linked. That's a realistic week, and it moves the needle more than any new acronym.

If you'd rather not do it by hand, Serpjoy researches, cites and writes in your voice. Consult Now's active users rose 498% after it started publishing Serpjoy posts in late July 2026, and your first post costs $1.

Answer the question in sentence one. The rest is supporting detail.

SERP features are the parts of a Google results page that aren't standard blue links. The ones worth your time are AI Overviews, featured snippets, People Also Ask, local packs, knowledge panels, rich results, image and video packs, sitelinks, Top Stories and forum results. They matter because 68.01% of US Google searches ended without a click in January to April 2026, according to SparkToro's 2026 zero-click search analysis. You win most of them with four habits: a direct answer under each question heading, clean lists and tables, accurate structured data, and a complete Google Business Profile.

If your rankings held and your traffic didn't, this is usually why. Position one still exists. It just sits under an AI answer, a map and a stack of questions now.

What Are SERP Features? The Results Beyond 10 Blue Links

SERP features are any elements on a search engine results page (SERP) other than the standard organic listings, the title, URL and description results known as the ten blue links.

The old results page had one job. Show ten links and let the searcher pick. Today's page answers the question itself, shows a map, lists products and plays a video before it gets to the links.

Google keeps its own catalog of these elements. When it launched the Visual Elements Gallery in December 2022, it documented 22 search results elements. Keep that number handy the next time someone sends you a much longer list of SERP features to chase.

Try this now. Open a private browser window, search your three most valuable keywords, and write down every feature sitting above your listing. It's the most useful five minutes you'll spend on SEO this month.

Once you've seen what's above you, the next question is what it costs you.

SERP Features Decide Who Gets the Click

SERP features lower organic click-through rate when they answer a query on the page or push the first blue link further down the screen.

Most founders still treat ranking first as the finish line. The data says position one now shares the page, and often loses the argument.

AI Overviews Cut Clicks on the Same Ranking

AI Overviews cut the top-ranking page's click-through rate by 58%, according to an Ahrefs comparison of 300,000 keywords from December 2023 and December 2025.

Same ranking. Well under half the clicks. Nothing on your page changed, but the page around it did.

Pew Research Center's browsing data points the same way. In March 2025, users clicked a regular result on 8% of visits with an AI summary and on 15% without one, as Search Engine Land reported from Pew's study.

The summary did the reading for them. Your page became the footnote.

Zero-Click Searches Now Cover Most US Queries

Zero-click searches made up 68.01% of US Google searches in January to April 2026, up from 60.45% in 2024, according to SparkToro's zero-click research. The two years use different data providers (Datos in 2024, Similarweb in 2026). So read the jump as direction, not precision.

Google itself is fine. Alphabet's Search & Other revenue grew 17% year over year in Q2 2026, and Sundar Pichai said people are adopting one search experience across AI Overviews and AI Mode. Searchers are still searching. They're clicking less.

Position zero is the old name for the result above the first organic listing, originally the featured snippet. In 2026, a first-page ranking under three SERP features is a smaller prize than your rank tracker suggests.

How often those features show up depends heavily on the query.

How Common SERP Features Are in 2026

AI Overviews had more than 2.5 billion monthly active users as of May 2026, according to Sundar Pichai's Google I/O 2026 keynote.

That's a reach number. It tells you how many people see AI answers, and nothing about whether one shows up for your keyword.

Google's AI Mode, the separate conversational search experience, passed 1 billion monthly active users within about a year of launch. It lives outside the classic results page. Your content still feeds it.

Question Searches Trigger AI Answers Most Often

AI summaries appeared on 60% of Google searches starting with who, what, when or why in March 2025, according to Pew Research Center's analysis of Google users. Question words are the trigger.

Length matters too. AI summaries appeared on 53% of searches of 10 or more words and only 8% of one- or two-word searches. Short head terms still get a mostly classic page, and long questions get an answer box first.

Intent seals it. Ahrefs found 99.2% of keywords that trigger AI Overviews are informational. If your product pages target commercial terms, AI Overviews are mostly your blog's problem. Your blog is also where you get cited.

Google Removes SERP Features Too

Google removes SERP features as well as adding them: in November 2025 it began phasing out more lesser-used results-page features "to simplify the page and improve the speed of search results," according to Google Search Central's November 2025 update.

Every list of SERP features has a shelf life, including this one. Check yours against Google's documentation twice a year.

Quick action: sort your keyword list by length and question words. The long questions are your AI Overview and People Also Ask targets. The short ones are where classic ranking still does most of the work.

Organic, Paid and Informational SERP Features

SERP features fall into three groups: organic features you earn with content, paid features you buy with ad spend, and informational features that answer on the page with few clicks.

The group tells you who owns the job. Content wins the organic ones and budget wins the paid ones. The informational ones need good content plus clean entity data.

The three groups of SERP features, with examples and what gets you in, are:

For the official view, Google's Visual Elements Gallery shows what each element looks like, what Google calls it, and whether sites can optimize for it. Google last updated it on February 4, 2026. If Google says an element can't be optimized, stop paying anyone to optimize it.

The biggest informational feature is also the newest, so it goes first.

AI Overviews: How to Get Cited in Google's AI Answers

AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries at the top of Google results, and Google states there are "no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary" in its AI features guidance for site owners.

That sentence should end most of the AI Overview packages in your inbox. There's no secret tag. What works is ordinary SEO done cleanly: crawlable pages, quality content and a good page experience.

Cited Pages Keep More of Their Clicks

Sites cited inside an AI Overview had 35% higher organic CTR, even as organic CTR on AI Overview queries fell 61%, according to Seer Interactive's June 2024 to September 2025 data.

The AI Overview is a tax on everyone except the sources it names. Being cited is the ranking that counts now.

Don't expect much traffic from the citation link itself. Users clicked a link inside the AI summary on only 1% of visits in March 2025, according to the Institute for Public Relations' review of Pew data. The value is the trust, and the organic click sitting next to it.

The trend isn't a straight line down. Organic CTR on AI Overview queries fell to 1.3% in December 2025, then recovered to 2.4% in February 2026. Seer Interactive's 2026 update across 53 brands found organic CTR on these queries rose 85% in early 2026, and Seer calls the data directional.

Directional is the right word. Plan for low CTR and treat any recovery as a bonus.

Five Steps to Get Cited in AI Overviews

Getting cited in AI Overviews comes down to making each answer easy to find, easy to lift and easy to trust.

The five steps that do most of the work are:

1. Lead every section with the answer. Put a one- or two-sentence claim under each heading that names the subject in full.
2. Write headings as the questions people type. Long question searches trigger AI summaries most often, so match their wording.
3. Pair every statistic with its named source. A number with a source is easier to trust and easier to cite.
4. Show who wrote it. A named author, first-hand detail and clear sourcing are the E-E-A-T signals a reader and a model can check.
5. Keep the page crawlable and fast. Don't block Googlebot, and don't make the answer depend on a script loading.

People now call this GEO, or generative engine optimization. It's SEO with better formatting and better sourcing.

The same formatting wins the older answer box too.

Featured Snippets: Win the Paragraph, List or Table Box

A featured snippet is a highlighted answer that Google pulls from one web page and shows at the top of the results. There is no markup to opt in, and Google's featured snippet documentation says its systems decide whether a page would make a good one.

That's frustrating and fair. You can't claim position zero with a tag. You earn it by writing the best short answer for the query.

The Three Featured Snippet Formats

Featured snippets come in three main formats, paragraph, list and table, and each one rewards a different page structure:

• Paragraph snippets answer "what is" and "why" queries. Write a two- or three-sentence definition directly under a question heading.
• List snippets answer "how to" and "best" queries. Use a real HTML numbered or bulleted list with short, parallel items.
• Table snippets answer comparison, pricing and spec queries. Use an HTML table with clear column headers, because a screenshot of a table can't be lifted.

Formatting is half the job. The other half is ordinary ranking work. A perfect paragraph on a page Google doesn't trust for the query won't get lifted.

Your action: find keywords where you rank on page one but a competitor holds the featured snippet. Rewrite that one section answer-first, then add detail below it. Check again in a few weeks.

How to Opt Out of Featured Snippets

The nosnippet rule is the only guaranteed way to keep a page out of featured snippets, and it blocks every other snippet for that page too, according to Google's robots meta tag documentation.

It's a blunt tool. Use nosnippet only if the featured snippet gives away the thing you charge for.

A featured snippet answers one question. The next box answers the ones that come after it.

People Also Ask: Answer the Next Question on the Page

People Also Ask boxes are lists of related questions on Google results that expand to show a short answer and a link to the page it came from.

You want to know what your reader asks after the first question. Google has already written it down. Expand one question and more appear, so a single search can hand you a full outline.

Serpjoy reads the People Also Ask box before it writes a post, alongside search intent and the AI Overview. It's the cheapest keyword research on the internet.

Copy the People Also Ask questions for your target keyword into a doc. Use the best three or four as H2 or H3 headings, word for word where it reads naturally.

Answer each one in the first sentence under the heading, then add detail. Group the leftovers into an FAQ section at the end.

Skip questions you can't answer well. A thin reply does nothing for the box and something bad for the page.

Question features reward good writing. The next set rewards good data.

The Other SERP Features and How to Win Each One

The other major SERP features are local packs, knowledge panels, rich results, image and video results, sitelinks, Top Stories, forum results and ads. Most depend on data, profiles or media more than on prose.

Local Pack and Map Pack

The local pack is the map and short list of nearby businesses Google shows for location-based searches, and Google's local ranking guidance says those results depend mainly on relevance, distance and prominence.

Review count and ratings feed prominence. You can't move your shop closer to the searcher. You can work on the other two.

Fill in every field of your Google Business Profile: categories, hours, services and photos. Keep your name, address and phone number identical everywhere they appear online. Ask happy customers for reviews and reply to all of them, including the bad ones.

Knowledge Panels and Knowledge Cards

A knowledge panel is the information box Google builds about an entity, such as a company, person or place, using its Knowledge Graph. A knowledge card is the smaller fact box that answers a simple query, like a date or a definition, at the top of the page.

You can't apply for a knowledge panel. You can make your entity easy to confirm. Add organization schema markup to your homepage, link your official profiles with sameAs, and keep your details consistent on Wikidata.

Once a knowledge panel appears, claim it through Google so you can suggest edits. Wikipedia helps the Knowledge Graph too, but only if you're notable enough to earn a page.

Rich Results and Rich Snippets

Rich results, also called rich snippets, are listings with extra detail such as review stars, recipe times, prices or event dates, and they come from structured data on the page.

Add schema markup in JSON-LD for the content you have, such as Product, Recipe, Event or Article. Mark up only what a visitor can see. Test it with Google's Rich Results Test before you publish.

Google retires structured data types as well. In June 2025 it phased out six structured data types from Search results: Course Info, Claim Review, Estimated Salary, Learning Video, Special Announcement and Vehicle Listing. Google said the change does not affect ranking, which tells you what markup earns: a better-looking listing, and no ranking boost.

Image Packs

An image pack is a row of image thumbnails inside the main results, and it appears for searches where pictures help answer the query.

Name files for what they show, so blue-running-shoe-side.jpg beats IMG_4471.jpg. Write alt text that describes the image for someone who can't see it. Place the image near text that explains it, and compress it so the page stays fast.

Video Results and Video Carousels

Video results and video carousels show clips, often from YouTube, for how-to and visual queries, sometimes with key moments that jump to a specific timestamp.

Add chapters with timestamps to your YouTube descriptions so Google can show key moments. Embed the video on a relevant page with a transcript nearby. Short videos appear in the video carousel too, so a quick clip can win a spot your long post can't.

Sitelinks for Branded Searches

Sitelinks are the extra links under a site's main result, mostly for branded searches, and Google generates them automatically from the site's structure.

You can't pick your sitelinks. You can make them sensible with clear navigation, descriptive page titles and internal links pointing at your most important pages. If a junk page shows up in your sitelinks, fix it or remove it.

Top Stories and News Results

Top Stories is the news box Google shows for timely queries, and it rewards fresh, clearly dated reporting.

Show visible publish and update dates, use Article schema markup, and follow Google News guidelines if news is part of your business. If it isn't, skip Top Stories. Chasing it with evergreen content wastes a quarter.

Discussions and Forums, Plus Social Posts

Discussions and forums is a results block showing threads from sites like Reddit and Quora, while social results such as the X box show recent posts from social accounts.

No markup gets you in. Show up where your buyers already ask questions, answer as a named person from your company, and never post fake praise of yourself. It's slow, and it's the only version that works.

Paid Features: Top Ads, Bottom Ads and Shopping

Paid SERP features include text ads at the top and bottom of results and Shopping ads with product images and prices, and you buy them through Google Ads and Merchant Center.

Popular Products and free product listings draw on product data too. A clean Merchant Center feed and Product schema markup help even if you never pay for a click.

All of this is useless if you can't see which features you hold.

How to Track SERP Features in Semrush, Ahrefs and Search Console

You track SERP features with two tools working together: a rank tracker that records which features appear for your keywords, and Google Search Console, which shows the impressions and clicks your pages earn.

Use only one and you'll misread your own data. A page can hold position two for months while its clicks slide, because an AI Overview moved in above it.

The tracking routine that catches this is:

1. Export your top queries from the Search Console Performance report, with clicks, impressions, CTR and average position.
2. Load them into Semrush, Ahrefs, Moz or SE Ranking and filter by SERP feature. Note which queries show AI Overviews, a featured snippet, People Also Ask or a local pack.
3. Record who owns each feature. That's your competitor analysis for the quarter.
4. Pick pages that rank well but don't hold the feature, and rewrite them with the tactics above.
5. Compare impressions and CTR in Search Console before and after, and use the Search appearance filter to watch rich results and rich snippets.

Steady impressions with falling CTR usually means a feature took your clicks. Falling impressions means you lost the ranking. Those need different fixes.

The common mistakes are easy to spot. Teams mark up content visitors can't see and chase features Google has retired. Some rewrite a whole site for AI Overviews when only the blog targets informational queries.

Quick Answers About SERPs and SERP Features

What does a SERP include?

A SERP includes organic results, paid ads and SERP features such as AI Overviews, featured snippets, People Also Ask, local packs and knowledge panels, with the mix set by the query.

What is the difference between SERP and SEO?

SERP means search engine results page, and SEO (search engine optimization) is the work of getting your pages onto it. SEO is the method. The SERP is the scoreboard.

What are the different types of SERPs?

Different types of SERPs follow search intent, so informational, local, commercial and branded queries each show different SERP features. Ahrefs data shows 99.2% of AI Overview keywords are informational. Local searches get a local pack, product searches get Shopping ads, and brand searches get sitelinks and a knowledge panel.

How does a SERP work?

A SERP works by matching a query to Google's index, ranking the results, and adding SERP features that fit the intent. Google builds entity boxes from its Knowledge Graph and chooses which page supplies each featured snippet. You don't control the layout, only whether your page is the best candidate.

Where to Start With SERP Features This Week

The fastest SERP feature win for most sites is a featured snippet or AI Overview citation on a keyword where a page already ranks, because it needs a rewrite instead of a new ranking.

Work in this order. Search your top keywords and note the features above you. Rewrite one ranking page so every section opens with the answer and every statistic has a source.

If you serve a local area, finish your Google Business Profile the same day. Add structured data after that.

Today's step: open Search Console and find the page with high impressions and the lowest CTR. That's your first rewrite. After seven days, confirm Google has recrawled it and note impressions and CTR, then give clicks a few weeks to move.

That answer-first, source-paired structure is how Serpjoy writes every post, after reading 70 to 100 sources and checking what already ranks. Rankings still matter. They just stopped being the whole page.