Dofollow Digest #54: AI Mode vs AI Overviews

Author

Eric Carrell
January 09, 2026

Hey, it's Eric 👋

Google's been busy. AI Mode is now officially out of Google Labs and rolling out to users. If you've been tracking AI Overviews, this is the next step, and the differences matter.

I'll break down what separates AI Mode from AI Overviews below, and what it means for SaaS companies. Plus the usual roundup of what's been happening in SEO land. Spoiler: the December core update hit news publishers hard.

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🔍 DEEP DIVE: AI Mode vs AI Overviews

Google launched AI Mode out of Google Labs earlier this month. It looks similar to AI Overviews at first glance, but there's one key difference: AI Mode doesn't include the 10 blue links.

With AI Overviews, you get an AI-generated summary at the top of the page, but organic results still appear below. With AI Mode, organic results are gone. You either get cited in the AI response, or you don't show up at all.

Both features cite sources and show ads. Neither gives you analytics data to distinguish between traditional search, AI Overviews, or AI Mode traffic. That visibility gap makes it hard to understand where your traffic is actually coming from.

How AI Mode works

AI Mode uses a "fan-out" technique that issues multiple queries at once. Google shows you this in real-time. You might see it running 16 different searches to generate a single response.

It also has capabilities AI Overviews doesn't: Deep Search for longer reports, Live search using video and audio, agentic features for completing tasks like buying tickets, and personal context that pulls from your Gmail and past searches.

This makes AI Mode feel more like ChatGPT than traditional Google. It's a full AI experience, not an AI layer on top of existing results.

The traffic impact

AI Overviews already reduce click-through rates by about 34.5% on average, according to research cited in the source analysis. Some sites have seen traffic drops of 20-60% where AI Overviews show up frequently.

AI Mode removes organic results entirely, so the impact could be larger. But there's an important caveat: AI Mode requires users to switch tabs. It's not the default. Whether it changes behavior at scale is still an open question.

What stays the same

Google says AI Mode is "rooted" in their core quality and ranking systems. The signals that help you rank in traditional search (crawlability, helpful content, structured data, page experience) also influence whether you get cited in AI Mode.

For SaaS Companies

The practical takeaway here is straightforward. The same things that build authority in traditional search will help you get cited in AI Mode: quality content, strong backlinks, and brand mentions from credible sources. Google needs to trust you enough to cite you, and that trust comes from the same signals it always has.

If anything, off-site reputation matters more now. When AI is deciding which sources to reference, it's looking for clear signals that you're a credible voice in your space. That means links from authoritative publications, brand mentions across the web, and content that demonstrates real expertise.

The companies at risk are the ones who relied on thin content and volume tactics. The companies positioned well are the ones who've invested in building genuine authority.

🔗 LINK ROUNDUP

Til next time,

Eric