Google is stealing your clicks. Now Facebook wants to charge you for them.
A new study from Penn and Northeastern tracked about 1,100 people's search usage for a week, and the results are probably exactly what you'd expect.
People who are using AI mode on Google clicked through to websites a lot less, and they also trusted the results a lot less. Often, these users switched to one of the other available options, whether it be DuckDuckGo, Kagi Search, or Yahoo, just to see if things were different over there.
Maybe most interestingly for business owners to know: when AI overviews were removed, clicks went up, and satisfaction did not drop. Confused? I don't blame you. But if you think that's going to stop Google from inserting more and more AI overviews into the results page, you don't know Google.
Google's definitely going to be going ahead and pushing this feature that its own users like less. That's just the reality. AI overviews now show up on 39% of U.S. desktop searches, and similar results are being seen in Canada. They seem to show up 100% of the time in my case. That means that a lot fewer people are going to be clicking through to your website. Many searchers simply read the AI overview and then move on.
The small businesses I talk to are pretty split. Some believe that it's time to invest heavily in AEO (which stands for Answer Engine Optimization, the new stepsister of SEO). Others believe that the purpose of websites has shifted altogether from being used for discoverability to being primarily used to sell people who specifically seek out a website.
One thing's for sure: Google is actively trying to send fewer people to your website, and now Facebook wants in on the party.
Facebook wants businesses to pay to share links
If you've been sharing links on Facebook since 2008, you'll probably have noticed that your reach on posts with links in them has been consistently going down. Facebook simply does not want to drive people off of its platform and would much rather show people videos and posts that don't tempt people from ever leaving their ecosystem. Up until now, though, they still allowed you to share those links. You just do it, knowing that you're probably not going to reach a very large audience.
That's going to change very soon.
In December of 2025, Meta started testing not allowing certain business pages to share more than two links per month. As of this week, they're slowly going to be rolling out and testing it more and more. Meta says that if you want to share more than two links per month, that's no problem. You just have to pay them.
That's worth repeating. You'll have to pay them to share content on their website. And $49.99/month is the cheapest plan that gets you more than two links.
WHAT IS HAPPENING?
Yeah. I'll bet money this is going to be rolled out to everyone's page within the next year.
It won't include links inside paid ads or links to other Meta platforms like Instagram or Threads, or links being shared by established publishers (keep in mind this doesn’t mean that businesses can share links from the New York Times, it just means that the New York Times can). But if you're a small business wanting to promote a product or service and want to include a link within a Facebook post, this is going to impact you.
So, what can you do?
- It's important that you check to see whether you're affected yet. Facebook will show you an alert when you try to post a link. If you're seeing it, you know the time has come to work out a new strategy.
- Save your two free links for posts that bring in money, like bookings or sales, and only consider paying for Meta One for Business, which allows more links if the monthly price point is fully justified.
- Make sure you're putting key details in posts going forward, like price, hours, and your phone number, and stay active on Messenger. Maybe even sneak the link into the bottom or the end of your videos, if it's not too long for a viewer to remember.
Keep in mind that links in Messenger aren't limited. And if you're wondering whether your ads are going to be affected, they will not. Those links are safe.
This is all just another reminder that these platforms really only care about keeping you on their platform. You do not own your Facebook audience or your spot on Google Search. Creating content that drives people to message you on Facebook and that highlights how they can get in touch with you is going to be the focus for brands that continue using the platform.
Outside of that, small business owners really need to focus on growing audiences that they do own, whether it be email lists, other touchpoints, or social followings for the sake of advertising and brand strengthening. This is a crucial reframing for businesses going forward. I've been saying that for years, but it just keeps being more important than ever.
I'll keep providing our thoughts and ways forward from a marketing perspective.
The enshittification cycle continues.
Have a social media, web design, or marketing project you need help with? Shoot me an email, I'd love to chat.