Results Driven Marketing (RD Marketing) has published a guide to help UK B2B firms prepare for a future in which buyers do not always visit their websites. It follows research showing that the UK had the highest rate of zero click searches among six countries studied this year.
The study, by SparkToro using Similarweb panel data from January to April 2026, recorded 69.5% of UK Google searches ending without a click, against 68.0% in the US and 62.1% in Germany. It covers every type of search, rather than business buyers alone. It also recorded about 232 clicks to websites outside Google for every 1,000 UK searches, a figure that includes paid adverts.
British businesses also have a decision coming up. Under a requirement imposed by the Competition and Markets Authority in June, Google has until 3 December 2026 to give publishers effective controls over how its AI search features use their content, with three further months for a page-level control. The regulator's summary describes a publisher as any party that makes content available on the web, so the rules are not confined to news organisations.
When RD Marketing read nine of the top-ranking online guides to the subject on 6 November 2026, none mentioned the regulator's requirement. The company stresses that this was a small sample from one search engine on one day.
"Most of the talk about this is about traffic, but traffic was never the real point," said Iain Irvin, Director of RD Marketing. "What matters is whether the enquiries are still coming in, and from which pages. A guide can lose half its visitors and not cost you a single lead."
The new guide, Zero Click Search, gives firms a way to test this for themselves, by setting enquiries for each page beside the clicks and impressions shown in Google Search Console. In an illustrative example using made-up figures, total clicks drop by 52% while enquiries drop by 21%, and the page losing the most clicks is not the one costing business.
It also rates common types of search by how likely they are to end without a click, and gives the company's view on the new controls. RD Marketing suggests that most B2B firms should keep their whole site available to AI features, while reviewing paid-for original research page by page once that control arrives.
"We sell data and outreach, so we have an interest in telling people not to rely on search alone, and the guide says so," added Irvin. "It's still worth asking how you would reach buyers if the clicks kept falling."
RD Marketing supplies UK B2B data for email, telephone and direct mail campaigns, and manages email and LinkedIn outreach. Details are on its Data Services page. Businesses can ask for a free audience count, quote and sample.
The full guide is available from Results Driven Marketing.
Contact: Results Driven Marketing, Office 118, Cobalt Business Exchange, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE28 9NZ. Telephone: 0191 406 6399. Email: info@rdmarketing.co.uk.