A new analysis from Peak 10 Marketing found that manufacturers ranking on page one of Google were not cited in 72.2% of AI Overviews that appeared for the same searches. The agency reviewed organic keyword and SERP data for 100 manufacturers from the FABTECH 2025 exhibitor list, identifying 3,116 qualifying keyword records where a manufacturer ranked in Google's top 10 results and an AI Overview appeared for the same query. The manufacturer's own website was cited as a source in just 865 of those cases.
Of the 100 manufacturers analyzed, 93 had at least one page-one keyword with an AI Overview recorded. Among those 93, 87 had their own website omitted from a majority of the recorded AI Overviews, and 11 were not cited in any of them.
Page-one rankings don't guarantee AI citations
Google AI Overviews appear above traditional organic results, which means a buyer sees the AI-generated answer before any page-one listing. A manufacturer can rank on page one and still be absent from the answer the searcher sees first.
That distinction matters for traffic. Pew Research Center found that users clicked a traditional search result during 8% of visits when an AI summary appeared, compared with 15% of visits when no AI summary appeared.
"Page-one rankings and AI citations are now two different outcomes," said Kevin Cahill, founder of Peak 10 Marketing. "Manufacturers need to measure both."
The analysis measured a gap, not a formula
Peak 10 does not claim that any specific website characteristic causes inclusion or exclusion from AI Overviews. Google doesn't publish a formula for citations, and AI-generated results change over time.
The study identified a measurement gap instead. Traditional SEO reporting tracks rankings, impressions, organic traffic and conversions. Those metrics don't show whether a company is used as a source inside AI-generated results.
For clarity, "not cited" means the manufacturer's own domain did not appear as a source in the AI Overview. The company may still have been mentioned by name, referenced through a third-party source or visible in traditional organic results.
"This distinction matters because the manufacturer may possess the deepest expertise on the subject while a publisher, directory or competitor receives the citation and resulting visibility," Cahill said. "The knowledge exists inside the company, but it must also be documented in a form buyers and search systems can find, understand and use."
Peak 10 recommends manufacturers track where AI Overviews appear, whether their domain is cited, which competitors or directories get cited instead, and which of their pages consistently earn citations. Cahill suggests documenting internal expertise - application guidance, engineering tradeoffs, testing data, failure modes, product comparisons and recurring customer questions - as useful, authoritative resources.
"The answer is not flooding the website with generic AI-generated articles," Cahill said. "Manufacturers possess original knowledge that generic publishers do not. The opportunity is to turn that knowledge into useful, authoritative resources organized around the questions buyers ask while evaluating a purchase."
The analysis used an Ahrefs data snapshot from June 9, 2026, and was a database review rather than 3,116 manual Google searches. AI Overviews vary by time, location and user, and the sample is not statistically representative of all US manufacturers.
For marketing professionals, the takeaway is that standard rank-tracking reports no longer show the full picture of search visibility. Marketers who serve technical or niche industries should add AI citation tracking to their reporting and treat page-one rankings and AI sourcing as two separate key performance indicators - because buyers can now get their answer without clicking any result. AI Learning Path for SEO Specialists offers a structured approach to understanding how AI-generated search results are affecting traditional optimization work. For a broader view of how these changes affect marketing roles, AI for Marketing Courses covers similar ground.
Why this matters for marketers
B2B marketing teams typically report ranking improvements and traffic growth to leadership. This study suggests those numbers can coexist with a 72% citation gap - meaning clients or internal stakeholders could be losing visibility in AI answers without any change in traditional rankings. The practical fix is to start tracking two metrics separately: where a website ranks, and where it appears as a source. That data will show whether content earns citations and where the gaps are, regardless of whether the ranking itself is strong.
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