Google is testing a program that pays publishers when their content shapes an AI-generated answer. The AI contribution pilot runs inside Google Search Console, where invited publishers can accept the terms and see what they've earned.
Digiday reported the payments on September 14, publishing screenshots of Google's help documentation and interviews with publisher executives in the pilot. Barry Schwartz of Search Engine Roundtable spotted the feature in Search Console in April, before it was clear that money was involved. Google confirmed the pilot to Digiday and described it as an early test of how to reward high-quality content on top of the traffic and tools it already gives sites.
How the pilot works
Google's help documentation, shown in screenshots Digiday published, says publishers earn money when their pages "contribute significantly" to a response in the Gemini app, AI Overviews, or AI Mode. Participants accept a set of program terms in Search Console, and the documentation says they can leave at any time from the same settings page. A report in Search Console shows earnings by month and tracks payments separately.
Payment applies only to the generation stage, when web content shapes the answer. The documentation says pages that are linked in a response, or used to confirm a fact after the response is written, don't qualify. Google hasn't published how it decides what counts as a significant contribution or how it calculates a payout. One executive in the pilot told Digiday the calculation is opaque, and another source described early earnings as small compared to ad revenue.
Digiday reported that Google has approached at least dozens of publishers, including sites outside news, and couldn't confirm a total. Digiday reported that small and mid-sized publishers have shown more interest than large ones.
The trade-off for publishers
Google already pays for some content. It signed a licensing deal with Reddit in 2024, which Reuters reported at about $60 million a year, and one with the Associated Press in 2025 to feed Gemini. In a June 18 post on its public policy blog, Google said it was piloting a way to partner with sites whose content contributes to the freshness and factuality of AI responses. Google pointed Digiday to that post when asked about the Search Console program.
The pilot arrives with Google under pressure. Penske Media, which owns Rolling Stone and Variety, sued Google in September 2025, arguing that Google uses its search monopoly to take content for AI Overviews without paying for it. At a hearing on August 25, Judge Amit Mehta, who ruled against Google in the search antitrust case, said the arrangement seemed unfair to publishers. As of publication, he hasn't ruled on Google's motion to dismiss.
In June, the UK's Competition and Markets Authority required Google to give publishers controls to keep their content out of AI Overviews and out of model fine-tuning, with nine months to comply.
The people Digiday interviewed split on what the pilot is for. A publishing executive said accepting could weaken a publisher's hand in later negotiations, because Google could point to the pilot as compensation already paid.
Luke Stillman, managing director at the consultancy Madison and Wall, said publishers have little leverage over how AI changes content discovery and are better off building a new revenue stream while they can. David Buttle, founder of the publisher AI coalition Spur and the consultancy DJB Strategies, went further and said paying for contribution rather than usage lets Google avoid a model where it pays every time it uses content. One participating publisher told Digiday the opposite, describing Google as collaborative, with weekly partner calls, and hoping the pilot becomes a precedent for paying publishers directly.
Large publishers can negotiate their own deals and smaller sites have few other ways to earn from AI usage, which may be why the smaller ones are more interested. One executive outside the program said the amounts offered so far are too low to bother with, and that talks are continuing.
The program terms haven't been made public, so it’s unknown what rights a publisher grants Google by accepting.
How to track your visibility in Google's AI answers
Only invited sites can join for now. Google says links and citations don't qualify for payment, so citation data tells you where your content is visible and can't tell you what it would earn.
Position Tracking, part of the SEO Toolkit, shows which keywords a site ranks for in AI Overviews, so you can watch whether that changes over time.
The AI Visibility Toolkit's Visibility Overview report tracks how often your site is mentioned and cited in AI Overviews, AI Mode, Gemini, and ChatGPT. The Gemini data is useful because the pilot pays for contributions to the Gemini app, and Search Console's generative AI performance report currently lists only AI Overviews and AI Mode.
In the same report, the Cited Pages tab lists which of your URLs get cited and how many prompts cite them.
