We measured what businesses in the United States search for when they need a website, SEO or help with AI search: 3,324 searches, chosen from 36,279 ideas in Google Keyword Planner and measured on 28 September 2026. Across all of them, average monthly Google searches fell 42% between the year to August 2025 and the year to August 2026, from 2,172,455 to 1,252,779. Of fourteen topics, one grew: searches about AI search, up 39%, from 22,738 to 31,584 a month. The fastest-rising searches in our shortlist are review management service (up 890%), AI visibility (up 836%) and AI SEO agency (up 254%), and the most valuable are for law firms, at about $82 a click. Below are the figures, how we measured them, and their limits.
Are fewer people searching Google for web design?
By Keyword Planner's figures, yes, and across every topic but one. The table sums the average monthly searches of every search in each topic, for the twelve months to August 2025 and the twelve months to August 2026. The largest falls are in SEO and online stores, about half in a year; the only rise is in searches about AI search itself.
| Topic | Year to Aug 2025 | Year to Aug 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI search | 22,738 | 31,584 | +39% |
| Google Business Profile | 86,168 | 58,545 | −32% |
| Website cost | 52,528 | 34,939 | −33% |
| Web design | 429,376 | 275,943 | −36% |
| Maintenance and hosting | 43,150 | 27,235 | −37% |
| Small business websites | 30,269 | 18,217 | −40% |
| Apps | 220,908 | 129,861 | −41% |
| Fixes and audits | 265,094 | 153,210 | −42% |
| Migration | 13,407 | 7,805 | −42% |
| Monthly plans | 2,875 | 1,680 | −42% |
| Industries | 54,907 | 31,204 | −43% |
| Redesign | 12,372 | 6,984 | −44% |
| SEO | 844,589 | 428,221 | −49% |
| Online stores | 94,074 | 47,351 | −50% |
| All 3,324 searches | 2,172,455 | 1,252,779 | −42% |
Which searches are growing?
Searches about getting recommended by AI assistants, and about managing a business's reputation and Google listing. Of the 211 searches in our shortlist, these rose most among those with at least 390 searches a month. Most describe a service someone wants to buy, such as an agency or a service, rather than a question, which is why we built our plans around them.
| Search | US searches a month | 12-month change |
|---|---|---|
| review management service | 3,600 | +890% |
| ai visibility | 880 | +836% |
| ai seo agency | 1,600 | +254% |
| geo seo | 2,900 | +231% |
| ai search optimization | 1,300 | +213% |
| answer engine optimization | 2,400 | +121% |
| ai seo services | 1,300 | +80% |
| generative engine optimization | 4,400 | +69% |
| google business profile management service | 390 | +67% |
| google business profile optimization | 6,600 | +44% |
| affordable website designer | 1,000 | +41% |
| local seo agency | 4,400 | +39% |
| web design agency | 12,100 | +18% |
Which searches are worth the most?
Cost per click is what advertisers pay Google for one visit from a search, so it is a fair measure of what a customer from that search is worth to them. Legal, ecommerce and reputation searches lead; law firm searches cost about $82 a click, which is why a law firm's website has to earn its visitors rather than rent them.
| Search | US searches a month | Average cost per click |
|---|---|---|
| legal website design | 390 | $132.13 |
| ecommerce seo services | 1,300 | $123.78 |
| review management service | 3,600 | $120.79 |
| app development company | 5,400 | $98.91 |
| seo services for small business | 4,400 | $89.22 |
| law firm website design | 2,400 | $82.68 |
| lawyer website design | 1,600 | $81.92 |
| law firm seo | 4,400 | $81.79 |
What ranks for these searches?
For 97 of the shortlisted searches we recorded what kind of page fills Google's first page of results. Guides and articles lead, service pages follow, and directories and lists take the broad searches such as "web design company". A new website does not win those broad searches head-on; it wins with service pages for specific services and with guides that answer specific questions, and it earns its place in the directories with reviews.
| Kind of page ranking first | Results pages |
|---|---|
| Guides and articles | 43 |
| Service pages | 29 |
| Directories and lists | 15 |
| Tools and platforms | 6 |
| Other (Google's and Bing's own pages, a gallery, a forum) | 4 |
How we measured it
- Ideas. 36,279 search ideas from Google Keyword Planner for the United States, grown from seed searches about websites, redesigns, maintenance, SEO, AI search, Google listings, online stores, apps and industries.
- Relevance. 3,324 of them describe something a business would buy or ask about a website, SEO or AI search; the rest were dropped.
- History. Monthly volumes for the last 24 months from the Google Ads API's historical metrics, which Google describes as metrics "on how keywords have previously performed on Google Search" (Google Ads API documentation, read 28 September 2026).
- Shortlist. 211 searches scored on demand, cost per click, trend and how hard the first page is to enter.
- First pages. For 97 of them, the kinds of page ranking and the domains behind them, each scored by its position in the Tranco list 64X3X (generated 27 September 2026), a research ranking of the most visited websites.
What are the limits of this data?
Three, and they matter. Keyword Planner reports approximate volumes, not counts. It also gives some closely related searches the same figure: "website redesign services" and "web design services" share 6,600 searches, the same cost per click and the same trend, so we never add variants together and never quote a figure that is shared. And a fall this even across unrelated topics may partly reflect how Google reports volume, not only how people search, so read the 42% as a direction rather than an exact size. The United States only; other countries may differ.
What this changed for us: our plans now name AI SEO, an AI visibility report, local SEO and Google Business Profile management, and our pages are built for the searches above. See what AI SEO is and our pricing.
Common questions
- Are fewer people searching Google for web design?
- By Google Keyword Planner's US figures, yes: across 3,324 web design, SEO and related searches, average monthly volume fell 42% between the year to August 2025 and the year to August 2026, and every topic fell except searches about AI search. Keyword Planner reports approximate volumes, so read the size as a direction.
- Which web design and SEO searches are growing?
- Searches about AI search rose 39% over the same years. In our shortlist, review management service rose 890%, AI visibility 836%, AI SEO agency 254% and Google Business Profile optimization 44%.
- How was this search data measured?
- With Google Keyword Planner's historical metrics for the United States, 24 months per search, for 3,324 searches chosen from 36,279 ideas, measured on 28 September 2026. For 97 of the shortlisted searches we recorded what kind of page ranks and scored each ranking domain with the Tranco list.