Search is changing
When 68% of Google searches end without a click, what answers for your business?
By BrandBoost Digital · October 2026
SparkToro and Similarweb looked at US Google searches from January to April 2026 and found that 68% ended without a click to any website. Rand Fishkin put it plainly: In the first four months of 2026, a whopping 68.01% of Google searches ended without a click.
Read it carefully. It is a US panel estimate, not a number from Google, and it measures browser searches. It does not say your customers have stopped searching. It says the answer is increasingly given on the results page, in a summary or by an assistant, instead of on a business website.
What changes for a local business
When the answer is given for the customer, the question becomes what the answer is built from. An AI assistant looking for a plumber, an accountant or a dental clinic reads what it can find about each business and what it can trust. If your services, prices, service area and credentials are scattered across old pages and listings, the assistant has little to work with. If they sit in one clear, current, verified place, it has something to quote.
What you can do about it
- Write down what customers actually ask you: price ranges, where you work, what is included, how booking works.
- Make sure those answers are the same everywhere your business appears.
- Publish them in a structured form that machines can read, not only in marketing copy.
That third step is what a Knowledge Catalog is: a structured, verified record of your business, written from your information and approved by you. It helps AI systems understand your business. It does not guarantee a recommendation, and nobody can honestly promise one.
Knowledge Catalog
Give AI assistants one verified source for your business
Services with pricing guides, areas, credentials and the questions customers really ask. Built from your answers, approved by you before anything is published. Foundation from $975, one time.
Sources
Third-party figures belong to their publishers and are linked above. BrandBoost Knowledge Catalog is an independent product, not affiliated with or endorsed by Google. A Knowledge Catalog helps AI systems understand your business; it does not guarantee a recommendation.