Google Expands AI Overviews to Over 100 Countries

Overview

Google recently expanded its AI Overview feature to more than 100 countries, delivering instant answers to more than 1 billion questions. This shift from traditional search to AI-driven answers reflects a larger change in how people search for information. While customers still use traditional search engines like Google, they also search on social channels and AI-driven tools like ChatGPT for fast, conversational answers. With AI Overviews, Google is joining this trend, moving away from pages of blue links to providing direct answers, powered by AI.

As AI-driven search grows, brands must adapt by structuring data that's accurate and easy for AI to pull into results. Here's how brands across the globe can prepare their strategies to thrive in this evolving search landscape.

Key Takeaways

• Adapt for AI-driven search: AI-driven search platforms favor structured, reliable data over traditional websites to surface accurate answers.

• Organize data with a knowledge graph: A knowledge graph helps AI understand and share your brand's information across search channels.

As more users rely on conversational queries — asking questions in everyday language to tools like Google's AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and others — AI platforms pull from structured, reliable data sources to deliver answers. Unlike traditional search, which relied on links to direct users to find information, AI-driven search now draws from organized, connected data to deliver answers instantly. For brands, this means you need well-structured, accurate information to reliably show up in search results and connect with customers wherever they're searching.

1. Create useful content for AI-driven search

As AI-powered tools surface answers directly, brands must build content that emphasizes Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T). This includes updating FAQs, writing clear product descriptions, highlighting reviews, and creating location-specific pages that answer common questions. Content that directly addresses what customers are searching for helps brands appear in AI-driven search results and connect with customers at key moments.

2. Organize data with a knowledge graph

A knowledge graph allows brands to structure and connect their data, creating a single, reliable source of truth. This organized approach is essential as AI-led search experiences, like AI Overviews, pull directly from a knowledge graph to provide answers.

3. Focus on data quality and consistency

As AI Overviews transform search results, make sure your brand's data is accurate and consistent across all platforms. Regularly audit location details, product information, hours, and other data to keep your brand visible in AI-driven search and maintain customer trust. Organized, high-quality data increases the chances that AI will feature your brand as a reliable answer.

4. Adapt to conversational search trends

With more customers using AI tools that respond to natural questions, brands should shape their content and organize data to fit this style of searching — like asking ChatGPT, "What is the best restaurant that's 5 minutes away from Piccadilly Circus and good for solo dining?" Aligning with these specific, conversational questions helps brands engage customers directly and meaningfully, increasing visibility in AI results and building loyalty through a more relevant experience.

5. Optimize webpage performance for AI readiness

Hosting your E-E-A-T content on webpages that meet Google's technical standards — like fast loading times (Core Web Vitals), structured data (schema markup), and mobile-first design – helps Google's AI recognize and pull that information from your pages. Using website technology, like Yext Pages, that aligns with these standards makes your content easier for AI to understand and more likely to appear in search results as a reliable source.

Google's rollout of AI Overviews to 100 countries signals a new direction in search, where structured, connected data is key to showing up in results. Brands that prepare — by creating optimized content, organizing data with a knowledge graph, and adapting for conversational search — will stand out in this new landscape. The future of search is AI-led, and brands ready for this change will stay ahead.

Click here to read more about how customer trust in AI answers is evolving — and what to do next.