Google Search Console now includes dedicated reporting showing how frequently content from a website appears within Google's generative AI search features. It represents an important step towards making AI search visibility measurable and gives businesses a clearer view of how search behaviour is evolving.
For businesses, this is important. Until now, understanding whether your website was actually being surfaced by Google's AI systems has largely involved educated guesswork. We can now begin to see that visibility directly.
What has changed?
Businesses can now analyse AI search impressions, which pages are being surfaced, visibility by country and device, and performance over time.
There is one significant omission: Google isn't currently providing click data. So while businesses can see whether their content is being used within AI-powered search results, they can't yet directly measure how much website traffic those appearances generate.
Google has also introduced greater control over whether website content can appear within its generative AI search experiences. Website owners can opt out of these AI features, although doing so also means giving up the impressions and potential traffic they may generate. Importantly, this control is separate from traditional web search rankings.
Search is becoming answer-led
Traditional SEO has largely focused on a familiar objective: getting webpages to rank prominently for relevant searches.
Generative search changes that dynamic. Increasingly, users aren't simply being presented with a list of websites. They're receiving an AI-generated answer assembled from information gathered across multiple sources.
The opportunity therefore isn't just to rank. It's to become one of the sources AI systems trust enough to use when constructing an answer.
That changes how businesses need to think about search visibility.
From SEO to GEO
SEO isn't disappearing. Strong technical foundations, authoritative content, structured information and a well-organised website remain extremely important.
But businesses increasingly need to consider Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) alongside traditional SEO.
GEO focuses on improving the likelihood that a brand, website or piece of content is discovered, understood and referenced by AI-powered search engines and assistants. That includes Google's AI experiences, but the principle extends much further to platforms such as ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot and other AI-driven discovery tools.
The question is gradually changing from “Where do we rank?” to “When someone asks AI about our products, services or expertise, does it know who we are – and does it recommend us?”
AI visibility is becoming measurable
This is perhaps the most significant part of Google's announcement. Businesses can now start establishing a baseline for their visibility within Google's AI-generated results.
That means organisations can begin asking more useful questions: Which parts of our website are appearing in AI results? Which topics are generating visibility? Which markets are we appearing in? What content is AI choosing to reference? And, importantly, where are our competitors appearing when we aren't?
Over time, this creates the possibility of treating AI visibility as a measurable digital performance channel rather than an experimental marketing exercise.
What should businesses do now?
The first step isn't producing hundreds of pages of AI-generated content. It's understanding what information already exists across your digital estate and whether AI systems can easily discover, interpret and trust it.
That means looking at your website structure, technical SEO, content quality, authority, structured data and how clearly your organisation communicates its expertise.
Businesses should also begin monitoring their new AI performance data in Google Search Console and establishing benchmarks. AI search is developing quickly. Having that baseline today will make it considerably easier to understand how your visibility changes over the coming months.
Search isn't disappearing. It's evolving.
Google's decision to expose AI search performance inside Search Console is another indication of where search is heading.
Traditional search results will remain important, but they are increasingly being supplemented – and in some cases replaced – by generated answers.
For businesses, the objective remains fundamentally the same: be visible when potential customers are looking for what you offer.
The difference is that the route between the question and your business is changing. And understanding how your organisation appears within AI-generated answers is quickly becoming an important part of digital strategy.
How Firefly can help
At Firefly, we're helping organisations understand how AI is changing search, customer behaviour and digital discovery.
From technical SEO through to AI visibility and Generative Engine Optimisation, we can assess how effectively your organisation is being discovered by both traditional search engines and emerging AI platforms.
Want to understand how visible your business is in AI search?
