The net impact of AI Overviews on the open web is as positive as Trump's tariffs on the US economy. Spoiler: not very positive. 📉

Google just launched AI Mode, an AI Overview on steroids, in beta. The data shows a gaping trade deficit in traffic that AI Mode threatens to rip wide open.

I argue this is Google's natural response to the threat from Deep Search. OpenAI's Deep Search agent performs dozens of searches to compile comprehensive reports, saving hours of research and numerous ad clicks. ⚡

The irony? Every search platform now has a Deep Search clone. Bing, Grok, Gemini, Perplexity - all have identical features with identical names (# commoditization).

For SEO, my meta-analysis of 19 studies confirms AI Overviews reduce CTRs across the board. Will AI Mode make it worse? Likely. But there's hope in transparency - these agents show their searches, meaning we can tie citations back to search engine ranks. 🧠

The biggest question: How will Google monetize AI Mode? They've reduced AI Overview costs by 90%, but could this bring subscription-based Search to the table? What if users could pay for better AI models with better answers? 💰