By Matt G. Southern
Publication Date: 2026-04-25 12:30:00
Liz Reid, head of Google search, said on Bloomberg’s Odd Lots podcast that AI overviews reduce “bounce clicks” from publisher sites, continuing an argument she has made in public appearances since last year.
Reid appeared on the April 23 episode of Odd Lots. Moderators Joe Weisenthal and Tracy Alloway asked how AI overviews impact publisher traffic and advertising revenue.
What Reid said
Reid described what she called “bounce clicks” as the category of clicks that are becoming smaller and smaller in AI overviews.
She said users who quickly click and return to search no longer need to visit the page because they see the facts from the overview. If you want to read longer, click through anyway. She acknowledged that some searches saw fewer ad clicks, but said higher search volume compensated for this. The argument is consistent with Reid’s arguments in other public appearances.
The pattern
Reid published a Google blog post in August in which he explained that organic click volume from Google searches on websites was “relatively stable”…