A few months back, one of our clients noticed something strange. Their website traffic from Google had dipped even though their rankings hadn't moved. Same position on the page, same keywords, fewer visitors. That's not a fluke. It's what happens when Google answers a question directly at the top of the results page instead of sending someone to click through to a website.
That box at the top, the one with a short written answer and a handful of source links, is called an AI Overview. And it's not the only place this is happening. ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's newer AI Mode are all answering questions the same way, pulling information from websites and presenting it as a summary instead of a list of links. For a business in Pittsburgh trying to get found online, this changes the math. Ranking well isn't enough anymore if the AI answer never mentions you by name.
At Web Canvas, this is a question we get asked constantly right now, usually some version of "why is my traffic down when my rankings look fine." So let's get into what's actually happening, why it matters for local businesses specifically, and what you can realistically do about it.
What AI Overviews and AI Search Actually Are
An AI Overview is the summary Google generates and places above the traditional list of search results. It's built by pulling information from several web pages, condensing it into a short answer, and citing a handful of sources, usually three or more. Google's AI Mode takes this further, letting people ask follow up questions in a back and forth format closer to a conversation than a search.
Outside of Google, tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot work on a similar principle. When someone asks a question, the tool doesn't hand back ten blue links. It reads across multiple sources and writes an answer, sometimes naming where the information came from and sometimes not.
The industry has started calling the practice of optimizing for these tools Generative Engine Optimization, or GEO, and sometimes Answer Engine Optimization, or AEO. Neither term describes something entirely new. It's closer to an extension of SEO than a replacement for it. The goal is the same as it's always been: be the source that gets cited when someone asks a relevant question. The difference is where that citation shows up and how much attention it gets once it's there.
Why This Is Worth Paying Attention to Right Now
It would be easy to write this off as a minor shift, but the data suggests otherwise. Pew Research Center studied the browsing behavior of 900 U.S. adults and found that when a Google search produced an AI generated summary, people clicked on a traditional search result in only about 8 percent of visits. When no summary appeared, that number roughly doubled. The same research found that people rarely clicked on the sources cited inside the AI summary itself, doing so in only about 1 percent of visits.
That's the uncomfortable part. Even being cited doesn't guarantee a visit. But not being cited at all means you're invisible in a growing share of searches. Pew's research also found that AI summaries showed up in close to one in five Google searches during the month they studied, and the share climbs sharply for longer, more specific, question style searches, the kind homeowners and shoppers actually type when they're trying to solve a real problem, not just browsing.
For a Pittsburgh business, this plays out in a specific way. Someone searching "how much does a kitchen remodel cost in Pittsburgh" or "best time of year to replace a roof in Western PA" is exactly the kind of longer, question shaped search that tends to trigger an AI summary. If your website isn't structured in a way that makes it easy for Google or ChatGPT to pull a clear answer from it, a competitor's site probably will be, and they'll get the citation instead of you.
How Google Actually Decides What Shows Up in an AI Overview
Here's where a lot of misinformation floats around, so it's worth going straight to the source. Google's own Search Central documentation states plainly that there is no separate AI index and no special markup that unlocks placement in an AI Overview. The same content that ranks well in ordinary organic search is the same pool of content the AI systems pull from.
In other words, there's no secret trick, no hidden schema tag, no shortcut. Google's guidance points back to the same fundamentals that have mattered for years: content that's genuinely useful, technically accessible, well organized, and written by someone who clearly knows the subject. What's changed isn't the standard. It's the format the answer gets delivered in once your content clears that bar.
That said, Google's guidance does highlight a few things that carry more weight in an AI driven environment than they did before. A clear point of view helps, since these systems tend to pull from several sources and something distinct is more likely to get pulled into the mix than something that reads like everyone else's version of the same article. Structured data still matters too, not as a magic key into AI Overviews specifically, but because it gives both traditional search and AI systems a cleaner, more accurate read on what your page is actually about.
What Actually Helps You Get Cited
Given that there's no secret formula, the practical advice comes down to a handful of habits that tend to move the needle.
Write in a way that answers the question directly, near the top of the page, before getting into supporting detail. If someone searches "what does it cost to replace siding in Pittsburgh," a page that opens with a real answer, even a range, is more useful to an AI system trying to summarize it than a page that spends three paragraphs on introduction before getting to the point.
Structure your content so it's easy to scan and extract. Clear headings that mirror the way people actually search, short paragraphs, and a logical flow from question to answer all make it easier for a summarization system to pull an accurate excerpt without losing context.
Build out topic depth instead of writing one page and calling it done. A business with a handful of pages that each answer a different, specific question in the same subject area tends to read as more authoritative to both Google and AI tools than a single page trying to cover everything at once.
Keep your business information accurate and consistent everywhere it appears. AI search tools cross reference details across your website, your Google Business Profile, and third party directories to judge whether a business is legitimate and current. Inconsistent hours, addresses, or phone numbers work against you here in a way that's easy to overlook.
And don't chase AI visibility at the expense of quality. Google has been explicit that content produced mainly to game rankings, whether written by a person or generated by AI, falls under its scaled content abuse policy. The goal was never to trick the summarizer. It's to be the source worth summarizing.
What This Looks Like for Businesses in Pittsburgh Specifically
Local search has always leaned on a slightly different set of signals than broad national search, and that hasn't changed with the rise of AI Overviews. Your Google Business Profile, consistent business listings, and genuine local relevance still carry real weight, arguably more now, since AI tools are actively cross checking sources like Google Business Profile and other directories to confirm a business is real and trustworthy before summarizing information about it.
That matters a lot in a market like Pittsburgh, where someone searching for a contractor, a remodeler, or a retailer is usually looking for something nearby, not just something well written. A roofing company in Squirrel Hill and one in Cranberry Township are technically competing for some of the same broad keywords, but a searcher typing "roof repair near me" or "roofer in Pittsburgh" is going to get a locally filtered answer either way. If your website content, your Google Business Profile, and your directory listings all tell a consistent, specific story about who you are and where you work, you give both traditional search and AI search a much easier job.
This is also where a lot of small and midsize businesses in the Pittsburgh area are behind, not because they're doing anything wrong exactly, but because their websites were built years ago around an older version of how search worked. A site that was fine in 2019 often isn't structured in a way that makes it easy for a modern AI system to extract a clean, citable answer from it. That's less about a redesign for its own sake and more about making sure the content itself is written and organized to actually get picked up.
How to Check Where You Currently Stand
Before changing anything, it's worth finding out whether you're already showing up. Google Search Console has started surfacing some data on AI Overview impressions, which gives a rough sense of which pages are getting pulled into summaries and for what kinds of searches. It's not a complete picture, but it's a starting point.
Beyond that, the simplest test is still the most useful one. Search the actual questions your customers ask, the way they'd ask them, and see what comes back. Type "how much does kitchen remodeling cost in Pittsburgh" or "best rug cleaning near me" into Google and into ChatGPT and see whose name shows up, whose doesn't, and what the cited sources actually say. It's a quick way to spot gaps between how your business is positioned and how it's actually being represented, or not represented, in these tools.
Where to Go From Here
None of this means traditional SEO is dead or that you need to overhaul your entire website overnight. The fundamentals Google has always rewarded, useful, clearly written, well organized content from a legitimate business, are still exactly what these AI systems are looking for when they decide what to cite. What's different is that showing up on page one isn't the finish line anymore. Getting picked as the answer is.
For a lot of Pittsburgh businesses, closing that gap comes down to a handful of concrete steps: tightening up how content is structured, making sure your Google Business Profile and listings match across the board, and building out real depth on the topics your customers are actually searching for. That's the kind of work Web Canvas does with clients every day, whether that means restructuring existing content, building new pages around the specific questions your customers ask, or just taking a hard look at where you currently stand in AI search results. If you're not sure whether your business is showing up where it should be, that's a conversation worth having before your competitors have it first.