Google has given publishers a new tool to combat traffic losses caused by AI search features. On Thursday, the company enabled a button on publisher websites that lets readers mark them as “favorite sources” for better visibility in Google Search, Discover, and Google News.
The tech giant made this interactive “Preferred Sources” button available for embedding directly on online sites.
Google rolled out the Preferred Sources feature in May for its AI experiences, including AI Mode and AI Overviews. The option was previously available in Top Stories.
The goal is to help readers find links from known and trusted sites when searching for content or using Google’s AI to learn about a topic. By May’s launch, the company said users had already selected over 345,000 unique sources through this method.
To add a site as a favorite publisher, visit Google’s source preferences page, then search for a publisher by name or website.
Google says becoming a preferred source can drive more traffic to publishers. Earlier studies found people are twice as likely to click through to a preferred source when available. These tools aim to reduce the damage the rapid growth of AI-powered search features has done to traffic-dependent businesses.
Alongside the new button, Google said readers will soon be able to customise their Discover feed in the Google app using their own words. Users tap any three-dot menu in the feed and tell Google what topics they want more or less of, using natural language commands. This helps Google refine the feed in real time.
The search giant is not the only company turning to AI for feed-tuning tools. In recent months, several top social media apps launched user-controlled algorithms that allow people to fine-tune recommended content.
In addition to personalising the Discover feed, Google says Android users will be able to customise their audio daily briefings in the Google News app.
What it means
For writers and newsrooms, this is a direct response to the shift in how people consume information. The ability for a user to explicitly flag a site as a preferred source creates a tangible signal that algorithms can use to prioritise human-written content over generic AI summaries. It moves the power of curation partially back to the reader, offering a way to bypass automated overviews when a specific, trusted voice is needed.
