Every time the internet shifts, communities are forced to ask: does this change make us less relevant, or more? Zero-click search and the rise of AI-driven answers might look like another threat, but I see it differently. My friend Brian Oblinger recently made the case that communities are more essential than ever because they’re fueling AI itself. I find myself squarely in that camp.
To me, this moment is a reminder of why I fell in love with community work in the first place: it’s where real people share real knowledge, and that’s something AI can’t replicate. What’s changing is not the value of community, but how we measure it, protect it, and make sure it shows up in the new ways people are finding answers.
Zero-Click, AEO, GEO: The New Rules of Visibility
Let’s be real: search traffic is dropping, and that feels unsettling. For years, those numbers have been the proof point we leaned on to show community value. But less traffic doesn’t mean communities are failing. It just means the way people find answers is changing.
Today, answers show up right on Google’s results page or within seconds on ChatGPT. That’s what people mean when they talk about zero-click search; you get the solution without needing to visit the destination site. And it’s happening a lot. Around 60% of Google searches end without a click, which shows just how often people are getting everything they need without leaving the results page.
To make sense of this shift, let’s break things into three pieces:
- Zero-click search: Think about searching in Google, Bing, or even tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Claude. The answer pops up instantly on the page, which is great for users but means they don’t always make it to your community.
- Answer Engine Optimization (AEO): This is about making sure your community content shows up cleanly in Google snippets, Bing AI overviews, or voice assistants – basically anywhere people expect a direct answer.
- Generative Engine Optimization (GEO): This takes it a step further, making sure your content is discoverable and properly attributed when tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Gemini generate responses on the fly.
The conversations, solutions, and stories we’ve been cultivating for years are now powering AI. Ironically, AI is finally getting more eyes on community content, even if fewer clicks come through!
From SEO to AEO: Communities as the Source of Truth
Communities are still where the best answers live. That hasn’t changed. What’s changed is how people get to those answers. In the old world, Google scraped our content and then sent people back to us. Now, answers show up before they ever land on our page.
| Old Model (SEO Era) | New Model (AEO/GEO Era) |
| Google indexes and sends traffic back | AI extracts and displays answers upstream |
| Value measured by visits, clicks, conversions | Value measured by impressions, assumed deflections, and visibility |
| Optimize long-form, keyword-driven threads | Optimize concise, authoritative answers and structured data |
AI tools themselves recognize communities as critical sources of input. Reddit’s partnership with OpenAI is a perfect example. Reddit essentially said: “Fine, if you’re going to use our content to power AI, let’s formalize it.” And they’re right. AI tools wouldn’t be half as useful without communities feeding them.
Instead of just chasing SEO, communities need to think about AEO: how do we write and structure our content so it’s the thing that shows up in those snippets and AI-generated answers?
Research shows that AI Overviews can reduce clicks by 34.5%. Despite that, Google leans heavily on community content. Reddit shows up in about 7% of AI Overviews and Quora in nearly 4%, meaning more than 1 in 10 AI overviews feature user-generated answers. Google’s AI is putting community voices in front of billions of searchers every month.
AI’s Role in Community Value
Some people are quick to suggest that community is losing its place in the age of AI, but I see the opposite.
AI’s reliance on community knowledge shows just how indispensable these spaces are. Every model, from ChatGPT to Gemini, is only as good as the data it’s trained on. And guess where the richest, most specific, most human data comes from? Communities.
Here’s what AI can’t do: it can’t tell you a personal story, share the nuance of a lived experience, or show empathy in a tough situation. Communities do that every single day. That’s why I think human-generated content is about to become a premium. In a world drowning in AI output, people will crave authenticity. And communities are where they’ll find it.
- For executives, this validates investment in community as a knowledge engine.
- For community managers, it’s a call to double down on authenticity and structure.
- For advocates, it’s proof their voices carry more weight than ever in shaping AI-generated results.
Rethinking Measurement Strategies
This is where it gets tricky. For years, traffic was our proof. More visits = more value. But now, people are getting their answers without ever visiting us. The value is still there, it’s just harder to see.
Richard Millington calls these “ghost deflections.” Think of it like this: someone searched, found their answer in a snippet pulled from your community, solved their problem, and never showed up on your site. That’s still a win, even if your analytics don’t capture it.
In Richard’s article, there’s a fantastic diagram that shows how his friend Dennis Pollett, who works at Microsoft Answers, shared their exact methodology for estimating hidden traffic loss. It’s a really smart approach and definitely worth reading.
I’ve talked to community leaders who say they’re seeing fewer first-time posters because new folks just ask Gemini or ChatGPT first. That’s why I firmly believe measurement can’t just be about traffic anymore; it has to evolve to include impressions, reach, and influence across platforms.
That brings us to some practical steps you can take right now:
- Look at impressions, not just clicks. If your content shows up in a Google snippet or an AI overview, that’s reach—even if no one lands on your page.
- Ask your users directly. A short survey like “Where did you find your answer?” can uncover the invisible impact your community is having.
- Use feedback channels. Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools, and most AI tools have feedback/reporting mechanisms. Submitting consistent, specific feedback about missing attribution or lack of visibility does get tracked.
Shifting Toward Owned Channels
If fewer people are finding us through Google, then we can’t just sit around waiting for SEO to deliver. We need to meet people where they already are—inside the product, in the app, in the workflows they’re using every day.
Imagine this: instead of leaving your SaaS platform to Google a fix, the answer from your community pops up right in the admin dashboard. Problem solved, without ever breaking flow. That’s the future. Owned channels give us more control, more personalization, and more immediate impact than SEO ever did.
Think about embedding community in three core places:
- In-product: surface community answers inside workflows.
- In-app: integrate FAQs, peer tips, and solved threads in mobile experiences.
- On-site: weave community discussions across marketing and support portals.
Knowing where a user is in their journey lets you serve exactly the right content at the right time.
Collaboration and Advocacy as Multipliers
Community doesn’t exist in a vacuum. Support needs it to reduce tickets. Marketing needs it for authentic stories. Product needs it for user feedback.
And then there are our advocates. In a sea of AI-generated sameness, the humans who show up with real expertise, context, and care? You can’t get anything better than that! They’re mentors, connectors, and culture carriers. When they share, people listen, and AI tools pay attention too.
I’d go as far as to say that in the age of AI, advocates become your differentiator.
What Community Leaders Should Do Next
The future of community management in a zero-click world isn’t smaller – it’s more influential. But what should we actually do with all this? Here’s where I’d start:
Six Actions to Take:
- Don’t panic. Dropping traffic isn’t failure—it’s change. Take an honest look at whether it’s your community strategy that needs to evolve or just the way you’ve been measuring it.
- Get proactive. Talk to your leadership about how value is shifting. Show them that impact is real, even if it looks different.
- Work across teams. Community isn’t the only team feeling the pressure of measurement changes. Marketing is facing it with web traffic, knowledge teams with documentation, and support with self-service metrics. Lean on shared learnings and align where it makes sense.
- Get your data in order. Make sure you’ve got Google Search Console (GSC) set up for your community. It’s the baseline for understanding impressions and search visibility. Richard Millington pointed out that Microsoft’s team combined GSC data with third-party tools to estimate when their answers were appearing in snippets and AI overviews. The exact numbers require some assumptions, but without GSC you don’t even have a starting point.
- Invest in member connection. Community isn’t just about answering questions faster—it’s about building connection. Support and self-service are core pillars, but not the whole picture. The magic happens when members feel belonging, share wins, or rally around a bigger purpose. That’s the piece AI can’t copy. Invest in programs and experiences that strengthen those bonds—because those relationships are what keep people coming back.
- Elevate your advocates. Over-invest in your most valuable community members—the MVPs, super-users, and everyday champions who bring energy and credibility. Advocacy programs now have the chance to grow well beyond a group of “answerers. The question to ask is: how else can you tap into the enthusiasm they already bring?
Final Thoughts
Zero-click search, AEO, and GEO don’t have to be threats to community. If anything, they shine a brighter light on community’s role. Our content is powering AI, our voices are showing up in more places than ever, and the human side of what we do is becoming even more valuable in a noisy, AI-saturated internet.
Yes, it’s going to take work. We’ll have to measure smarter, make sure community shows up inside the products and apps our customers use every day, and lean on the people who make it all thrive. But that’s exactly the kind of challenge community people are built for. And, it’s why I’m more optimistic than ever about where we go from here.
Follow Jon Wishart for thoughtful, grounded takes on how communities work, why they matter, how to scale them well—and reminders that at the heart of every community are people, not platforms.
