Google’s rollout of AI Overviews is beginning to reshape how Indians search for health, treatment and wellness information, with early signs pointing to a sharp impact on organic traffic for clinics, digital health platforms and wellness brands.
By answering medical and lifestyle queries directly on the search results page, Google is reducing the need for users to click through to external websites. While positioned as a way to improve access to quick, summarised information, industry observers say the feature is quietly squeezing organic visibility for healthcare players that have historically relied on search-led discovery.
Abhishek Undale, Group Chief Marketing Officer, Maxivision Super Specialty Eye Hospitals said, “Google’s AI Overviews have definitely altered the way users engage with health-related queries.”
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For hospitals, diagnostic chains, telemedicine platforms and D2C wellness brands, the shift comes at a critical moment. Search has long been one of the most trusted patient acquisition channels, especially for high-intent queries around symptoms, treatments, doctors and supplements. With AI Overviews occupying prime real estate on the results page, brands are finding it increasingly difficult to rank organically or establish authority through content alone.
The impact is already visible in performance metrics. Industry executives say average CPCs have climbed 20–45%, while organic CTRs for informational health queries have fallen 20–30%, forcing brands to lean more heavily on paid media to sustain traffic and leads. While some players report only single-digit CPC increases, CPLs and CPAs have risen in double digits, pointing to mounting pressure on acquisition economics.
Shift in FMCG search economics
Digital marketers in the healthcare space say the immediate fallout is a growing dependence on paid search and sponsored formats to stay visible. As organic impressions decline, brands are being pushed to increase spends on Google Ads to protect traffic, credibility and patient leads. This is particularly challenging for mid-sized clinics and wellness startups that do not have the deep pockets of large hospital chains or pharma-backed platforms.
Undale added that for highly specific queries such as risks of LASIK surgery or early symptoms of glaucoma, users are increasingly seeing summarised answers directly on the search results page, leading to fewer clicks to hospital and clinic websites for basic information.
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In response, Undale noted, healthcare marketers say they are recalibrating strategies by prioritising deeper, E-E-A-T–led content, including detailed condition explainers, doctor-led videos, patient stories and comprehensive guides that serve more advanced stages of the patient journey where trust and credibility matter most. At the same time, brands are expanding engagement beyond traditional search by building presence on trusted third-party health platforms, selective community forums and owned channels, where patients spend more time researching and validating information and which are seen as less vulnerable to AI-driven summarisation.
Similar trends are being observed across large healthcare networks. This was further echoed by Siddharth Bajaj, CMO, Dr Batra’s Healthcare, who said that several organisations are seeing traffic fall by 30–50%, with the steepest drop in informational and generic searches, while transactional and branded queries are down a relatively modest 4–6%. Despite a sharp rise in impressions, this has not translated into proportional clicks or conversions, and the trend is expected to accelerate as telecom providers increasingly bundle LLM access as value-added services.
“We have indeed observed an upward pressure on performance marketing costs. Our CPCs have increased in the single-digit percentage range, while CPLs have risen by double-digit percentages,” he said, adding that that overall acquisition costs have remained relatively stable, driven by aggressive campaign optimisation and a strategic shift towards high-intent keywords that deliver conversions, rather than low-value generic or informational queries.
Agency-side data reinforces these brand-side observations. Sindhu Biswal - CEO and Founder of Buzzlab, a content marketing company, explained that CPCs and CPAs for healthcare clients have risen 20–30% since the expansion of AI Overviews, as organic clicks on informational queries fell by nearly 30%, pushing greater reliance on paid media to sustain traffic and leads. While reduced ad visibility below AI summaries has cut volumes and driven up acquisition costs per consultation, lead quality for bottom-funnel terms has improved by 15–20%.
He further said brands are now being advised to optimise for AI citations by publishing expert-authored, natural language–driven guides on conditions such as knee pain or PCOS, supported by structured data and credible third-party backlinks to improve inclusion in AI summaries. “Paid search complements this by targeting contextual intent below overviews, ensuring brands appear for deliberate clicks on consultations or purchases,” Biswal noted.
However, not all healthcare platforms are equally exposed to search disruption. For Coto, a social community and emotional wellness platform designed for women, Tarun Katial, Founder and CEO said that while the industry is grappling with 35–45% CPC inflation and a 20–25% drop in organic CTRs, Coto has remained largely insulated because its model is built on community-led discovery rather than search-led acquisition.
With users joining for community first and discovering vetted experts organically, acquisition costs are significantly lower than marketplace benchmarks, and expert matching happens without incremental spend. Limited reliance on search and stable Meta costs have kept blended CAC down 18% year-on-year, even as LTV has risen sharply, driven by high retention, repeat engagement and strong organic referrals within the community.
Katial said, “The platforms getting destroyed by AI Overviews are marketplace models dependent on search arbitrage. We're a social platform with an integrated expert community.”
Budget reallocation
These structural shifts are also driving changes in budget strategy. Marketers said budgets are being reallocated away from broad, low-intent awareness spends towards high-intent search, structured content and selective paid formats that protect visibility under AI Overviews. This shift reflects a sharper focus on efficiency, with spends tied more closely to conversion-ready queries and measurable outcomes.
According to Biswal, brands are reallocating 25–40% of SEO budgets towards PPC, AI-led SEO tools and social commerce formats such as Meta Reels to drive symptom-led discovery and reduce dependence on Google. He highlighted, “This mix yields higher ROI through multichannel funnels, with AI traffic converting at 30% for wellness products versus traditional search. Forward-thinking clients test ad placements within overviews for premium high-intent exposure.”
Meanwhile, Undale said the focus remains on paid search for high-intent, category-defining keywords to stay visible at the point of choice, while video-led platforms such as YouTube and Instagram are being scaled up for educative storytelling that explains procedures and sets patient expectations, particularly in eye care.
He said community building and referral-led discovery will play a much larger role as search journeys become increasingly fragmented. “At the same time, we work on strengthening our relationships with reputable wellness platforms and through these partnerships we hope to gain access to highly relevant audiences and at the same time we continue to build trust and medical credibility.”
Bajaj said that as AI Overviews absorb informational and broad category queries, budgets are being redirected towards channels where brands can control the end-to-end user experience and narrative. “Specifically, the investment is shifting from generic and informational category keywords toward branded search terms, Performance Max campaigns, and paid social channels like Meta, where we can drive direct engagement and conversions,” he concluded.