Search has always been the most direct line between a buyer's intent and a brand's opportunity, but with the dawning of AI, it's only getting harder. Ashley Fletcher, CMO of Adthena, breaks down how to build a high-ROI search strategy in the modern era of AI.

Paid search is now several years into its most significant structural shift in two decades, and the ROI math has only gotten harder. The channel still looks familiar on the surface, but the underlying dynamics have changed in ways standard reporting doesn't capture. For CMOs, that gap isn't abstract; it shows up in budget conversations, performance reviews, and the growing pressure to justify spend in an environment the legacy tools weren't built for. 

Search has always been the most direct line between a buyer's intent and a brand's opportunity. For two decades, the rules were simple: bid on the right keywords, write compelling ads, manage bids, win clicks. Brands with the best data won; the rest lost ground slowly, then all at once. 

What AI Overviews Are Doing to Paid Search 

An Adthena analysis of over 21 million SERPs across five major industries found paid search click-through rates decline by 8-12 percentage points, a relative drop of 20-40%, when AI Overviews appear on the page. With AI Overviews now impacting up to 57% of search results, that click loss is something most campaigns encounter on the majority of their queries. 

For CMOs managing significant paid search budgets, those numbers translate directly into lost visibility and lower conversion volume, and most legacy reporting tools are built to confirm performance, not expose what's quietly slipping through the cracks. Cost-per-clicks are climbing year-over-year. The SERP that marketers spent years learning to optimize, a predictable, structured surface, has been replaced by a multi-layer, AI-controlled environment with visibility determined not by keyword density or bid logic alone, but by how well brands show up across paid, organic, and AI-generated results simultaneously. 

A Fast-Moving, More Fragmented Search Landscape 

The shift isn't contained to Google. OpenAI launched ChatGPT ads for logged-in Free and Go users on February 9, 2026, and by early May had already onboarded more than 600 advertisers, with the rollout expanding to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, and the UK following shortly after. The pace has only accelerated since. In late July, OpenAI shipped eight ChatGPT Ads Manager updates in a single week, including conversion-optimized campaigns, automatic advanced matching, integrations with AppsFlyer and Adjust, and richer product cards with pricing and star ratings. That's not a platform quietly testing the waters; it's one iterating at a pace that rivals mature ad platforms. 

Google's advertising model has always been built on the premise that search is imperfect: users need to sort through results, and that gap creates commercial opportunity. Conversational AI is built to eliminate that gap entirely, delivering the best possible answer first, with monetization following from quality. That's  a fundamental structural difference that inverts how digital advertising has worked for 25 years, and it's something every CMO allocating budget across search channels needs to be thinking about now, not next planning cycle. 

The Search Intelligence Gap 

Traditional paid search tools were designed around keyword-level performance, built for short, discrete keywords rather than the longer, prompt-based queries that now carry full context and intent. They track rankings, auction dynamics, and ad placement within a structured SERP. They cannot surface what's happening inside AI Overviews, LLM-generated results, or conversational ad placements. The data is accurate but incomplete in ways that distort budget decisions. Market share shifts and competitive threats now originate in AI-generated results that legacy tools don't index. Search data has become a business-wide strategic asset that extends well beyond PPC reporting. 

Three Moves That Deliver ROI 

Know Your Data 

Build a complete picture across the full search landscape, including AI Overview appearances, LLM-generated results, the ChatGPT ad landscape, and conversational ad placements alongside conventional keyword and bid data. 

Target Wisely 

Queries that don't trigger AI Overviews remain where paid ads hold the strongest visibility. Shifting budget toward those terms, while developing a distinct strategy for AI Overview-dominated queries, is an immediately actionable reallocation move. 

Study the Competition 

Understanding who is gaining visibility inside AI Overviews and conversational results, including competitors who don't yet appear in traditional rank-tracking or auction insight reports, is now foundational competitive intelligence, especially as platforms like ChatGPT ship new formats and features on a near-monthly basis. 

The Brands That Will Win 



These moves reflect a pattern that has played out before. When mobile search emerged, the brands that built mobile-first intelligence strategies captured share while others waited. When shopping ads transformed retail search, early adopters built advantages that deepened over time. That dynamic is playing out again now, at a speed and scale that demands a faster response.