Marketing teams are facing a visibility crisis. Traffic from Google is dropping across most categories, even for brands that have followed every SEO rule for a decade. A recent industry analysis showed impressions rising but clicks falling sharply across millions of queries.

This shift is not a seasonal dip. It is a structural change driven by AI overviews, AI modes, and conversational search systems that provide answers upfront and reduce the need to visit a website. When your customer finds everything above the fold in an AI summarised box, brand websites lose their central role in the journey.

For B2B marketers, this is not just a traffic issue. It is a threat to discovery, authority and measurable ROI. And this is where FTA focuses its work. Helping brands adapt to an ecosystem where visibility happens beyond the website and where search is no longer a click-based game.

What Is Causing the Drop in Traffic Even When Rankings Look Fine

The core shift is simple. AI overviews are replacing clicks with answers.
Search engines are showing more impressions than ever, but fewer people are leaving the platform.

Here are some of the key drivers -
• AI answers summarise multiple sites into one view
• Search engines claim traffic is stable, but analytics tells a different story
• Publishers and large content sites are the most affected
• Universal Search once changed layouts, but this is the first time the click intent itself has shifted

Marketers need to treat this as the new normal and not a phase.

Is Zero Click Search Now the Default Experience

AI mode is being positioned as the future of search across geographies. Once AI mode becomes the default view, click-through rates will reduce even further.
The experience is also personalised. What shows up for one person may differ for another, increasing volatility and making measurement harder.

This forces brands to rethink visibility as presence rather than position.

Should Brands Still Optimise Their Websites or Prepare for a Platform-First Future

The website still matters. It remains the primary source from which AI engines learn and extract information. But depending fully on search traffic is no longer practical.

Three shifts are already visible
• Brands that relied only on Google are facing the worst hits
• Being present where customers talk on Reddit, YouTube, communities, and category-specific forums is becoming essential
• Even conventional advertising is returning as a traffic source

Where Should CMOs Focus When Clicks Are Falling but Impressions Are Rising

Clicks will not be the core KPI for organic search in the next few years. CMOs should prepare for impression-based evaluation, similar to that in traditional media.

Look for these new brand visibility metrics -
• Brand mentions inside AI answers
• Potential query impressions
• Share of appearance across AI search tools
• Visibility within agent-based journeys
• Frequency of inclusion across platforms like Reddit, forums and YouTube

Search will look more like media planning than technical ranking.

How do you measure AI visibility when every answer looks different

AI responses shift depending on the user and context. The only way to stay grounded is to measure the signals that remain steady. Here are some of those - 

1. Presence
   Check if your brand appears for the high-value topics you want to be known for.
   
   
2. Consistency
   Run controlled tests over time and see if your visibility holds or fluctuates.
   
   
3. Competitive share
   Review how often AI tools pick your brand versus your nearest competitors.
   
   
4. Outcome quality
   Assess leads and conversions generated from AI-driven sessions.
   
   

This keeps the measurement practical and gives leadership a clear view of real visibility, not vanity metrics.

Should Brands Allow LLMs to Crawl Their Content or Block Them

The current share of LLM traffic is small but growing. Most brands benefit from having their content accessible while the ecosystem matures.

Some of the guiding principles that you should look out for -
• Allow access during experimentation
• Track whether platforms use the content meaningfully
• Block only after confirming no return on investment
• Prepare for future agent-based workflows that require access to structured information

Will LLM.txt or Similar Files Improve Visibility in AI Search

There is no clear evidence yet. Some tools claim to read it. Google openly disregards it. But the implementation effort is low and non-risky. It can be added as a hygiene measure while acknowledging its limits.

What Should a Brand Starting Today Do in the AI-First Search World

A modern brand must operate like a distributed system, not a single domain.

Here’s how to navigate your brand’s identity in an AI-first search world -
• Build the website as the core knowledge source
• Publish consistently across YouTube and social
• Participate in niche forums where the audience is active
• Strengthen community presence before doing any product pushes
• Prioritise short-form discovery content
• Invest early in agent-based integrations and APIs

Being everywhere is no longer optional.

Trends that CMOs must not ignore in the AI-first search world

1. SEO is still required. Content must be discoverable by crawlers and AI engines. The traffic model is changing, but the discovery model is not.
   
   
2. Branding matters more than ranking. Presence across communities, platforms and formats builds the recognition that AI systems rely on.
   
   
3. Prepare for agent-based conversion journeys. Agent integrations will become a revenue path for conversions that occur without visiting the website.
   
   

Are Forums Like Reddit Now Mandatory for Brand Visibility

Forums are rising in search results because AI systems trust real conversations. This makes them valuable, but they are unforgiving environments.

Communities reject anything that feels like marketing. The only viable path is to treat these spaces as long-term relationship channels, not promotional slots.

1. Spend time understanding how the community talks about your category.
   
   
2. Provide helpful answers before mentioning your brand.
   
   
3. Step in only when a question matches your expertise or product fit.
   
   
4. Use a real human voice, not a campaign message.
   
   

If your customers are active in a forum, your brand must be present, but as a participant who adds clarity and expertise. That is what earns visibility in AI summaries and in the community itself.

Search is no longer a channel where brands win by ranking

It is now a space where brands win by being present across every environment that feeds AI engines and human conversations. Organic search has become a visibility layer. Not a traffic layer.

The brands that adapt early will capture disproportionate mindshare because AI engines learn from what already exists. The more surface area a brand creates, the more future-proof it becomes.