As AI Search Dominates, Publishers Should Pay Attention To These Topic Trends

The recent research that found top-ranking websites in Google’s search results to be more likely to appear in AI search results did provide a bit of sunlight in a darkening SEO world.

But for publishers continuing to try to make sense of the brave new search world, new numbers from Similarweb are showing just how quickly those skies have darkened.

“Since Google launched AI Overviews in May 2024, the share of zero-click news searches (e.g., the percent of searches resulting in no clicks) has steadily increased, rising from 56% to nearly 69% by May 2025,” says The Impact of Generative AI: Publishers report, which showed the organic traffic that news publishers saw during this time falling from a high of 2.4 billion to 1.77 billion.

(Source: Similarweb)

“The inverse relationship suggests that users are increasingly getting answers directly on the results page, without clicking through to publishers,” the report says. “For news organizations, this shift marks a critical inflection point: visibility alone may no longer translate into traffic, challenging long-standing assumptions about the value of ranking in search.”

From January 2024 to May 2025, the report found news-related Google searches declining by 5% while rising for ChatGPT by 212%. Stocks, finance, sports, weather, and the economy were the leading ChatGPT news topics, followed by politics, which the report found to be “outpacing all other categories in long-term (YoY) and short-term (YTD) growth … suggesting a move away from reactive information toward deeper issue-driven engagement.”

“Publishers,” the report says, “must now adapt their strategies to stay visible and relevant across AI-powered platforms.”