Search Console applies block flattening to AI Overviews, the synthesized answers Google shows at the top of results. This can make your site look like it's in position 1 when your real visibility is much lower. The number you see in the report doesn't reflect where you actually appear in the user's eyes.
The practical consequence: if you keep using average position as your main SEO KPI, you're making decisions based on distorted data. A site can show a seemingly great ranking and get very few visits from that SERP.
The right move is to shift your focus to business metrics: actual organic sessions, conversions attributed to the search channel, real clicks. This isn't a cosmetic change to your reporting. It changes how you evaluate campaigns, justify your budget and measure the work of your agency or in-house team.
The number Search Console shows you isn't what you think
Search Console uses a technique called block flattening to calculate position in AI Overviews, the synthesized answers generated by Google that appear above the classic results. In practice, the whole AI Overview section is treated as a single flattened block, and your site gets a position that doesn't match where it visually appears on the page.
The result: a site cited at the bottom of an AI Overview can get an average position of 1 or 2 in the report. The data looks great. Real traffic, though, is close to zero.
Search Engine Journal flagged the issue directly in its analysis of block flattening and AI Overviews: the recommendation is clear. Stop measuring position and focus on outcomes.
Why this affects the reports you send to clients (or to your board)
If your monthly reporting includes average position as an indicator of SEO health, you're probably showing numbers that overstate real visibility. It's not the reader's mistake. It's a structural limit of the data.
Three situations where the problem becomes critical:
- You've increased your presence in AI Overviews but organic traffic is flat or declining. Ranking won't tell you that.
- You're comparing periods in which Google changed how often AI Overviews appear: the data isn't comparable.
- You're justifying an SEO budget with an improved average position, but conversions aren't moving.
This fits into a broader picture we've already analyzed: Google AI Mode reduces organic clicks, which makes it even more urgent to shift your focus from rankings to real business metrics.
The KPIs to use now, in order of priority
This isn't about throwing out Search Console. It's still a useful tool for understanding which queries generate impressions. It's about not stopping there.
Here's the hierarchy of metrics worth following:
- Actual clicks from Search Console: not position, but how many times someone actually clicked your result.
- Organic sessions in Google Analytics 4: how many real visits come from the search channel, week over week.
- Conversions attributed to the organic channel: leads, purchases, contact requests, depending on your business model.
- CTR (Click-Through Rate) for strategic queries: if impressions grow but CTR drops, you're showing up in contexts where users don't click, typically inside AI Overviews.
We already covered this transition in the article on declining SEO traffic and where to invest your budget: the logic is the same. A number in Search Console is worthless unless it's tied to real user behavior.
How to update your reporting in four steps
If you manage SEO in-house or work with an agency, these are the concrete steps to take in the next few days.
- Remove average position from your executive report. Keep it as internal data for the technical team, not as a KPI to show the board or the client.
- Segment the queries that trigger AI Overviews. In Search Console you can filter by result type: compare the CTR of those queries with classic queries. The difference tells you how much you're losing.
- Set up a monthly comparison on clicks and organic sessions, not on position. If clicks drop while impressions grow, the problem is structural. Optimizing content for ranking won't fix it.
- Connect Search Console to GA4 if you haven't yet: it lets you see which queries bring sessions that convert, not just sessions.
It's also worth reading our analysis of SEO, metrics and budget in the AI era to understand how this KPI shift fits into a broader strategy heading into 2027.
The mistake people make right after reading this news
Many teams react by ditching AI Overview monitoring altogether. That's the opposite mistake. Appearing in Google's synthesized answers still has value: for brand awareness, for being cited as an authoritative source, for reaching users in the early stages of the buying journey.
The point isn't to ignore AI Overviews. It's to stop using position as a proxy for their effectiveness. If you want to truly understand how AI Overviews affect your visibility, the right approach is the one we describe in our article on how to map AI citations in your industry: find out who gets cited, how often and in what context.
SEO in the era of AI visibility requires a shift in mindset even before a shift in tools: ranking is a means, not an end. If your September report shows better positions but flat conversions, you've found the answer you were looking for.
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