Something strange happened to healthcare websites in 2024. Rankings did not change. Content stayed the same. The SEO agency kept sending reports showing strong positions for all the right keywords.
But traffic dropped. Sometimes by 40% or more.
The culprit was not a penalty, an algorithm update, or a competitor stealing market share. It was Google itself. Specifically, its AI Overviews — the large AI-generated answer boxes that now appear at the top of search results, answering the user's question directly on the page. The user reads the answer, gets what they need, and never clicks through to your website.
For most industries, this is an inconvenience. For healthcare, it is the single biggest shift in organic traffic acquisition in a decade.
The Zero-Click Problem
The concept of "zero-click searches" is not new. Users have been getting answers directly from Google for years — through featured snippets, knowledge panels, and People Also Ask boxes. But the scale has changed dramatically.
According to data from multiple industry sources, 69% of all Google queries now result in zero clicks. That is up from 56% in May 2024. In less than two years, the share of searches that actually send traffic to a website dropped by 13 percentage points.
When you narrow the lens to healthcare specifically, the numbers get worse. Healthcare queries now have an 83% zero-click rate when an AI Overview appears — the highest of any sector measured.
Global Google traffic to publishers dropped 33% in a single year. This is not a gradual decline or a minor algorithm fluctuation. It is a structural change in how search delivers value — and healthcare is at the centre of it.
The search results page is no longer a directory of links. It is increasingly a destination in itself. Google provides the answer, and the websites that created the content become invisible sources rather than visited destinations.
Healthcare Is Hit Hardest
Across all industries, healthcare has the highest penetration of AI Overviews. The data paints a clear picture of how deeply this affects the sector.
| Metric | Number | Context |
|---|---|---|
| AI Overview in healthcare queries | 43% | Highest of all industries |
| Treatment/procedure queries with AI Overview | 100% | Was 45% in 2023 |
| Organic CTR drop when AI Overview shows | -61% | From 1.76% down to 0.61% |
| Paid CTR drop when AI Overview shows | -68% | Even paid ads lose clicks |
| Traffic loss on affected keywords | -18% to -64% | Varies by query type |
Sources include BrightEdge's Healthcare AI Evolution study, Digital Bloom's 2025 Organic Traffic Crisis Report, and Dataslayer's AI Overview impact analysis. The numbers vary slightly across studies, but the direction is consistent and the magnitude is large.
A healthcare site that ranked #1 for "rotator cuff surgery recovery" and received 500 visitors per month in 2023 now gets between 195 and 315 visitors from the same position. The ranking did not change. Google simply answers the question without sending the click.
The shift from 45% to 100% on treatment and procedure queries is particularly significant. In 2023, less than half of these searches triggered an AI Overview. Today, every single one does. If your content strategy relies on ranking for procedure-related terms, the traffic from those rankings has been cut in half — or worse — regardless of how well you rank.
This does not only affect organic results. Paid ad click-through rates drop by 68% when an AI Overview appears. Both organic and paid channels are losing clicks to the same source — Google's own AI-generated answer.
Why Your SEO Agency Has Not Told You
If these numbers are this significant, why is nobody raising the alarm? The answer is straightforward: standard SEO reporting does not track this.
Your agency reports rankings. And the rankings are fine. Position 1, position 3, page one for all your target keywords. The monthly report looks healthy. Green arrows, upward trends, positive language.
But rankings and traffic are no longer the same thing. The metric that matters shifted from "where do you rank" to "how many people actually click through to your site from that ranking." Most SEO tools do not flag zero-click rate or AI Overview presence by default. It requires a different kind of analysis.
Nobody is lying or withholding information. The standard metrics that SEO has been measured by for twenty years — rankings, impressions, keyword positions — simply do not capture this problem. It is like measuring a restaurant's success by how many people walk past the door instead of how many walk in.
The gap between "ranking well" and "getting traffic" has never been wider. And it is growing every quarter as Google expands AI Overviews to more query types.
You can check this yourself. Open Google Search Console, compare click-through rates for your top keywords over the last 12 months. If impressions stayed flat but clicks dropped, you are likely seeing the AI Overview effect in your own data.
What You Can Do About It
This is not a problem you can ignore and hope reverses itself. Google has no financial incentive to send more traffic to your website — every click that stays on Google is another opportunity for them to show ads. The trajectory is clear. But there are concrete steps you can take to adapt.
1. Track Clicks, Not Just Rankings
Open Google Search Console and look at actual click-through rate trends over the past 12 months. Compare total clicks to total impressions for your top 20 keywords. If impressions are stable but clicks are declining, you know which keywords are being eaten by AI Overviews.
2. Identify Which of Your Keywords Have AI Overview
Manually search your top traffic-driving keywords and note which ones trigger an AI Overview box. Tools like Semrush and Ahrefs have started flagging this, but a manual spot check gives you immediate clarity. Focus on keywords that drive actual patient enquiries, not just informational traffic.
3. Structure Content for Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO)
If Google is going to summarise your content in an AI Overview, make sure it summarises your content accurately and attributes it to you. Use FAQ schema markup, write clear answer paragraphs at the top of your pages, and implement structured data (LocalBusiness, MedicalOrganization, FAQPage) throughout your site.
4. Diversify Traffic Sources
If organic search delivers 60-70% of your website traffic today, that concentration is a risk. Build email lists. Invest in referral partnerships. Develop social media presence where your patients actually spend time. Direct traffic and referral traffic are immune to AI Overview disruption.
5. Create Content That AI Cannot Easily Summarise
Original research, proprietary data, interactive tools, patient outcome calculators, and detailed case studies with specific numbers are difficult for AI to compress into a three-sentence answer. Generic "what is X" and "symptoms of Y" content is the easiest to replace with an AI-generated summary. The more unique and specific your content, the harder it is to commoditise.
6. Monitor the Shift Quarterly
This landscape is changing fast. AI Overview coverage went from 45% to 100% on procedure queries in under two years. What is true today will shift by Q3. Set a quarterly review to re-check your top keywords, measure CTR trends, and adjust your content strategy accordingly.
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Get Your Free CheckThe Bigger Picture
AI Overviews are not an isolated problem. They are part of a broader shift affecting healthcare marketing on every channel. Patient acquisition costs have risen 56% since 2022. Google Ads CPC for healthcare keywords is up 40-60%. Facebook cost per lead increased 20% year-over-year while conversion rates dropped in 80% of industries.
The practices and health organisations that set up their marketing before 2024 built it for a different market. The channels still work. The rankings still hold. But the economics underneath have changed — and the change is accelerating.
The organisations that recognise this shift and adapt their strategy — diversifying traffic, restructuring content for AEO, and measuring clicks rather than rankings — will capture the patients and traffic that others are losing. The window is open, but it narrows every quarter as AI Overviews expand to more query types and more searches result in zero clicks.
The data is clear. The question is whether you see it in your own numbers — or wait until the gap becomes impossible to ignore.
