Google's AI Overviews, which are rolling out to users in the United States, are a significant development in the search results landscape. These overviews won't have a separate data breakout in Google Search Console (GSC) but will be treated like any other search from a reporting perspective.
Some publishers are unhappy about their content being used to train Google's models and do not want their content appearing in AI Overviews. Google has explained that 'preview controls' can be used to limit or remove content from these overviews.
How to remove content from Google's AI Overviews?
To remove content from Google's AI Overviews, site owners can use preview controls such as nosnippet, max-snippet, and data-nosnippet. Here's how each control works:
- nosnippet: This completely removes a snippet from the search results. However, it also impacts non-AI overviews and can decrease click-through rates.
<meta name="googlebot" content="noindex">
<meta name="googlebot-news" content="nosnippet">
- max-snippet: This limits the snippet to a certain character length.
<meta name="robots" content="max-snippet:20">
- data-nosnippet: This removes certain pieces of content from the search snippet.
<p>This text can be shown in a snippet
<span data-nosnippet>and this part would not be shown</span>.</p>
Glenn Gabe shows tested using nosnippet and it worked, you can use other controls too but a lot of this is trial and error. However, this also removes the search snippet from the default search results, which could decrease click-through rates. It's unclear how the other preview controls would impact AI Overviews.
Before adding the snippet:
After adding the snippet:
Google claims that AI overviews yield more clicks than standard search results, but this is yet to be verified. For those uncomfortable with their content appearing in AI Overviews, these 'preview controls' provide a mechanism for removal or limitation.
