Venturebeat iconVenturebeatJul 27, 2026 ~1 min source read

AI cites the deep pages but sends humans to the homepage — most sites are built backward

If your business depends on people clicking through to web pages, the last two years have been brutal. adults and found that when Google shows an AI summary, users click a traditional result just 8% of the time, roughly half the 15% rate when no summary appears.

AI cites the deep pages but sends humans to the homepage — most sites are built backward
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If your business depends on people clicking through to web pages, the last two years have been brutal.

adults and found that when Google shows an AI summary, users click a traditional result just 8% of the time, roughly half the 15% rate when no summary appears.

Links cited inside the AI answers themselves fare worse: users click on them only about 1% of the time.

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The useful part

If your business depends on people clicking through to web pages, the last two years have been brutal. adults and found that when Google shows an AI summary, users click a traditional result just 8% of the time, roughly half the 15% rate when no summary appears. Links cited inside the AI answers themselves fare worse: users click on them only about 1% of the time.

How it works

  • Business Insider's organic search traffic dropped 55% over three years, and some smaller publishers have already shut down.
  • Pew Research Center tracked the browsing behavior of 900 U.S.
  • Chatbot referrals, meanwhile, still account for less than 1% of publisher page views despite growing more than 200% in a year.
  • The share of ChatGPT answers containing live web citations grew more than fivefold in under a year, reaching 6.8% of all answers by May 2026....

Details worth keeping

The story in publisher circles has been simple: AI is killing the web.

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