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    SEO News Week 43: More Links in AI Overviews and AI Mode

    9 min read
    Quick answer:

    On October 15, 2026, Google announced it will show more links in AI Overviews and AI Mode, placed higher and more often. Google is also testing a section for official websites. For advertisers and site owners, this means pages that serve as strong sources get more chances to earn clicks from AI answers. Meanwhile, ChatGPT visits briefly went missing from analytics reports, and rank trackers are partly showing incorrect positions.

    At a glance

    NewsWhat changesWho it affectsAction neededSource + date
    More links in AI Overviews and AI ModeMore inline links, a test section for official websites, news carousels in more countriesEvery website with informational contentMedium: review content and official pagesGoogle Blog, October 15, 2026
    ChatGPT clicks counted as DirectLinks without utm_source=chatgpt.com, visits show up as direct trafficAnyone measuring AI trafficHigh: annotate October 8 to 15Search Engine Land, October 15, 2026
    Bad data in rank trackersSince September 13, Google has served tracking tools some incorrect resultsAnyone reporting rankings from a toolMedium: check outliers against Search ConsoleRelevant Audience and PPC Land, October 13, 2026
    Google explains PDF rankingPDFs are converted to HTML and rank like other documentsBusinesses with price lists, menus or brochures as PDFsLow to medium: check for a text layerSearch Engine Journal and PPC Land, October 14, 2026
    Bing Topics Portfolio (beta)New tab in the AI report of Bing Webmaster ToolsAnyone with a Bing Webmaster Tools accountLow: review the reportSearch Engine Journal and Search Engine Land, October 13, 2026

    More links in AI Overviews: What Google announced on October 15

    According to the Google Blog on October 15, 2026, Google introduced several changes to AI Overviews and AI Mode. AI Overviews are the AI-generated summaries shown above the classic search results. AI Mode is Google's separate conversational search mode. The announcement came from Hema Budaraju, Vice President of Product Management at Google.

    The changes at a glance:

    • Inline links: Google says it has made continued, substantial increases to inline links in its AI answers. The links will appear more often and higher up. Google did not provide specific numbers.
    • Official websites (test): A dedicated section at the top of an answer will highlight one or two official pages for a task, with a note on why each link is useful.
    • News carousels: Carousels for timely articles are expanding to more countries and languages and highlight preferred sources. Preferred Sources are outlets that users actively mark as favorites in Google Search. According to Google, their use has grown more than sevenfold since the start of the year.
    • Related articles: Links at the end of some answers get preview thumbnails.
    • Creator names (test, AI Mode only): Names on video results link to the creator's Search profile.

    Search Engine Land confirmed the changes the same day. According to Search Engine Land, Google Search Console still offers no separate click data for AI answers. Google has not said which countries will see the official websites test.

    What does this mean for your business?

    More links in AI answers increase the chance of being clicked as a source. The official websites test matters for local businesses: if your own pages for opening hours, booking or pricing clearly present you as the official point of contact, you are well prepared. For now, the effect can only be measured indirectly through standard performance reports. Stroe Media recommends prioritizing pages that give clear answers to specific customer questions.

    ChatGPT tracking: Why AI visits showed up as direct traffic

    Search Engine Land reported on October 15, 2026, that ChatGPT links stopped including the utm_source=chatgpt.com parameter after GPT-6 launched. A UTM parameter is an addition to a URL that analytics tools use to identify where a visit came from. Without it, and without a referrer, tools such as Google Analytics 4 count the visit as direct traffic.

    According to Search Engine Land, Cedric Huesler of Adobe analyzed about 500 pages. From October 9 to 13, ChatGPT visits on those pages fell by about 31,000 per day, while direct visits rose by about 26,000 per day. On October 13, LLM Pulse measured a drop of around 46 percent in ChatGPT sessions for October 9 to 11.

    Reports on the fix conflict. According to Dr. Web, a German web publication, on October 16, 2026, Huesler says OpenAI confirmed a bug to him and the fix began rolling out on October 15. Search Engine Land, by contrast, reported no statement from OpenAI on October 15. There is no official confirmation from OpenAI so far.

    What does this mean for your business?

    If your ChatGPT traffic dropped in early October, the cause is most likely measurement, not your visibility. Add an annotation in Google Analytics 4 for October 8 to 15, 2026. Don't compare AI traffic with previous months in client or management reports without this note.

    Rank tracker data: Google is serving tools some incorrect results

    According to Relevant Audience on October 13, 2026, rank tracking tools have received measurably more incorrect Google results since September 13, 2026. The finding is based on an analysis by the vendor Nozzle covering 27.5 million results pages from 49 countries. From September 13 onward, 8.0 percent of pages were affected, compared with 0.17 percent before. The peak was 27.0 percent on September 29.

    On affected pages, a tracked website was missing from the top 10 in 58.6 percent of cases, compared with 2.7 percent normally. 77.9 percent of affected pages returned to normal within three days. On the same day, PPC Land reported data from the vendor DemandSphere showing that about 11 percent of daily checks are affected. Google has not commented. So far, only tool vendors have described the causes.

    What does this mean for your business?

    A sudden ranking drop in your tool may not be a real loss. Always check notable outliers against Google Search Console, which is based on real search data. The period overlaps with the September spam update, so real fluctuations and measurement errors are hard to separate.

    PDF SEO: How Google indexes and ranks PDFs

    In the "Search Off the Record" podcast episode from October 13, 2026, Martin Splitt and John Mueller of Google explained how Search handles PDFs. According to Search Engine Journal on October 14, 2026, Google converts PDFs to HTML before indexing. Links in PDFs work like normal links. PDFs can also appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode. Splitt said: "indexing and ranking is pretty much the same as any other document."

    PDFs that consist only of images and have no text layer cause problems. Splitt's test: select all the text in the PDF, paste it into a text editor and check whether it comes through. Google also rarely refetches PDFs. Mueller therefore advises using a new file name when the content changes. According to PPC Land on October 14, 2026, Google's documentation lists 64 MB as the fetch limit for PDFs, a figure the hosts could not name on the podcast.

    What does this mean for your business?

    Many restaurants, trades businesses and real estate agents publish menus, price lists or property brochures as PDFs. Check whether these PDFs contain real text. According to Google, important content such as menus is better added to the website as an HTML page as well. When a price list changes, upload it under a new file name and update the links.

    Bing Webmaster Tools: Topics Portfolio shows AI citations by topic

    According to Search Engine Journal and Search Engine Land on October 13, 2026, Microsoft introduced a new beta tab called Topics Portfolio in the AI Performance report of Bing Webmaster Tools. The report groups the queries for which a website is cited in AI answers by topic. It also shows so-called opportunity queries, where competitors are cited but your own website is not.

    Metrics include topic size, the number of cited websites and queries. Citation volumes appear as ranges. You can choose time periods of one, two or three months. The tab only appears when Bing has enough data.

    What does this mean for your business?

    Bing Webmaster Tools now offers data on AI visibility that Google does not yet provide in Search Console. For generative engine optimization, meaning optimization for AI answers, this is a free data point. Small websites may not see anything yet because of the data threshold.

    What you should do this week

    1. 1Add an annotation in Google Analytics 4 for October 8 to 15, 2026: ChatGPT visits partly counted as Direct.
    2. 2From October 16 onward, check whether visits with utm_source=chatgpt.com are showing up in your reports again.
    3. 3Compare any notable ranking losses in your tool since September 13 with the data in Google Search Console.
    4. 4Open your most important PDFs, select the text and paste it into an editor. If the text is missing, create a new PDF with a text layer or an HTML version.
    5. 5Sign in to Bing Webmaster Tools and check whether the Topics Portfolio tab shows data for your website.
    6. 6Check whether your pages on opening hours, pricing and booking are clearly recognizable as your business's official pages.

    Frequently asked questions

    Yes. On October 15, 2026, Google announced it will show inline links in AI Overviews and AI Mode more often and higher up. Google is also testing a section that highlights one or two official websites for a task. Google has not published specific figures on the increase in links or a list of countries for the test.

    After GPT-6 launched, ChatGPT links were missing the utm_source=chatgpt.com parameter, according to Search Engine Land. As a result, Google Analytics 4 counted many visits as direct traffic. According to Dr. Web, the fix started on October 15, 2026, but there is no official confirmation from OpenAI. The data for the affected period cannot be corrected retroactively.

    Partly. According to a Nozzle analysis, about 8 percent of the Google results pages queried by tools have been incorrect since September 13, 2026, with much higher shares on some days. Most errors disappeared within three days. Check major outliers against Google Search Console, which is based on real Google search data.

    According to Martin Splitt of Google, PDFs are indexed and ranked like other documents after being converted to HTML. PDFs can also appear in AI Overviews. They need a real text layer. Because Google rarely refetches PDFs, John Mueller recommends a new file name when the content changes. Important content usually works better as an HTML page.

    Topics Portfolio is a beta tab in the AI Performance report of Bing Webmaster Tools, introduced on October 13, 2026, according to Search Engine Journal. It groups the queries for which a website is cited in AI answers by topic. It also shows queries where competitors are cited. The tab only appears when there is enough data.

    Conclusion

    Google is adding more links to AI Overviews and AI Mode but still does not measure the results separately for site owners. At the same time, two important data sources are disrupted: ChatGPT visits temporarily appeared as direct traffic, and rank trackers showed some incorrect positions. Anyone writing reports this week should flag both effects. Stroe Media is currently checking which client pages are linked in AI answers and which measurement gaps affect the reports.

    Want to know how visible your website is in Google and in AI answers? Explore our SEO services, learn about Google Ads as a complement or contact us directly. You can find last week's updates in SEO News Week 42.

    Sources

    Author: Stroe Media Editorial Team, Last updated: October 19, 2026

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