All signs point to ChatGPT launching a search feature soon. When? That remains the big question. Rumor has it. OpenAI is developing a ChatGPT feature that searches the web and cites sources in its results, Bloomberg reported (subscription required):
And. “OpenAI has been aggressively trying to poach Google employees for a team that is working hard to ship the product soon,” according to the Verge. Why we care. Search has quickly evolving in a new direction since the emergence of generative AI – with OpenAI seemingly perceived to be ahead of Google in many ways (not yet including Search), even though ChatGPT’s user base is still much smaller than Google. However, there is clearly growing frustration with all aspects of Google – from the quality of Search results to its abundance of advertising. Not to mention Google’s alleged monopolistic practices that have hurt advertisers, users and competitors. X things we know about ChatGPT search. ChatGPT doesn’t want to copy Google’s model or layout (he hates ads). OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said as much earlier this year:
ChatGPT’s version of Search wouldn’t be traditional, or classic, general web search. Altman’s vision is integrating ChatGPT with Search:
Dig deeper. Is ChatGPT the Google Search killer we’ve been expecting? Other ChatGPT search developments. We first heard rumors about OpenAI’s search product in February. Other stories Search Engine Land has covered:
More evidence. search.chatgpt.com appeared in the log files for some servers, as reported In Report: OpenAI To Launch Search Engine on Search Engine Roundtable by Barry Schwartz. There were rumors that ChatGPT’s search product would launch as early as tomorrow (May 9), but that seems unlikely at this point. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/JF8LMah
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March 2024 disrupted the SEO industry. Websites were deindexed, and manual penalties were delivered—all to produce more helpful, more trustworthy search results. How did your website fare? Join us for an insightful webinar as we delve into the seismic shifts brought about by Google’s March 2024 updates and explore strategies to not just survive but thrive in this dynamic digital landscape. In this session, we’ll dissect the implications of the latest algorithm changes on content creation, link building, and SEO practices. Register now for Surviving and Thriving in the New Google: Navigating March 2024 Updates for Content Creation, Link Building, and SEO Success to secure your spot and unlock the secrets to thriving in the new Google era. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/V2N5AIs
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SEO and user experience (UX) are critical components of modern digital marketing strategies. While SEO focuses on improving a website’s visibility in search engine results, UX aims to optimize the overall experience for users visiting the site. At first glance, these two objectives may seem contradictory. However, as search engines like Google continue to prioritize user satisfaction, the lines between SEO and UX are blurring. This article explores the SEO-UX paradox and how businesses can achieve visibility and user delight through a holistic approach that aligns with search engine algorithms and human needs. Investing in UX and SEOEvery $1 invested in UX delivers a return of $100, according to a Forrester report. There are mixed reports on the return for SEO ranging from $3 to $5 for every $1 spent. Understandably, the impact for UX is much greater, as UX is focused on optimizing the experience to drive better results. Still, without SEO, the website could be missing the traffic required to convert. Therefore, focusing on both SEO and UX within your digital marketing strategy is critical. In recent years, Google has made SEOs’ lives much easier by focusing on UX through E-E-A-T and Core Web Vitals. Both initiatives focus on user experience, and although they are not the critical component of the algorithm, they are still factors to consider. Why you should focus on delighting your usersDelighting users should be a core focus for all websites. When you delight a user, you create a much stronger opportunity for that user to buy from your business or continue to interact and advocate for your business. From a psychological perspective, there is a cognitive bias known as “the peak-end rule.” The peak-end rule refers to the fact that, as humans, we are much more likely to remember the peak (emotionally) of an experience and the end of it. So whether that be a frustrating or disappointing experience like this: Or, a really fantastic, happy experience like this: Many purchases include a digital element or are solely completed online. So, if your website makes it hard for the user to find what they are looking for or the site does not work well on the device they are using, you could be creating the wrong type of memories that will be hard to erase. With this in mind, we know our lasting impression can be influenced by the highest point of emotion, so we need to design journeys that bring joy during and in conclusion to our audience. Dig deeper: 4 SEO tips to elevate the user experience What can SEOs do to ensure we delight our audience?As an SEO, your goal is to optimize your website to meet users’ needs when they search online. Understanding user intent is key to this. Simply driving traffic isn’t enough; you must provide value by aligning with what users are searching for. If you prioritize your own agenda over user needs, you can frustrate them and harm your brand’s reputation. Instead, focus on delivering what users are seeking and building a positive relationship with your audience. The link between meeting user needs and your tasks is clear. Even better, there’s a strong alignment between what search engines prioritize and what you should focus on. 8 top tips to delight and optimize at the same time1. Match the user intent and measure success based on what the user is trying to doIf you can match the intent between the user’s search query and your landing page, you are on track to delight the user. Sometimes, your response might not be what users want, but that’s alright as long as you’re genuine and transparent, providing a way forward. Ensure you have clear success measures that match what the user is trying to achieve. This will help you to understand your leading indicators for success, as the more positive actions you can measure ahead of the sale/inquiry, the more predictable the sale becomes. Matching intent should incorporate demonstrating experience. Every piece of content should be a narrative. The most effective way to promote information, products or services is through stories. They should highlight your brand’s expertise in your field, making it clear to users and Google that you’re relevant to their search. Dig deeper: How to optimize for search intent: 19 practical tips 2. Demonstrate expertise in what you do or sellYou might have been able to rank your website for a search term or match intent in your content, but that is not always enough. With so much choice and the ease of hitting “back” and looking for another website, the user needs to see that your website is run by experts in what you do. Humans have an innate fear of screwing things up. It goes back to our need to survive, so they need to be sure they are considering working with or buying from an expert. This perfectly aligns with Google’s E-E-A-T assessment criteria. The user and Google want to know what gives your website the credibility to answer their query and what qualifications, history or case studies you have shared to demonstrate expertise in your field. 3. Build authority in your relevant communitiesLinks have long been a powerful method of demonstrating authority to Google, but good link building strategies should also have a foundation in demonstrating authority to your audience. Building links on websites that your audience does not frequent is, in my mind, as useful as putting a sign up on a street with no footfall. Your link building strategy should be about building authority in communities relevant to your audience and product or service. This adds value by signaling to Google that you’re an authority and helps attract relevant users to your website. When users turn to a search engine to ask questions, they don’t always want to land on a brand website. Sometimes, they are looking for content hosted on a media site, a third-party blog, etc. If every site a user turns to refers back to your brand somehow, then the same will be true for Google, an extremely powerful signal that your website is an authority on a topic. Dig deeper: Modern link building starter guide 4. Be a trusted resourceAnyone can publish anything on the web, sometimes with harmful intentions. Every week, there are stories of people losing money, falling for false information, or being deceived. This has made users more cautious and skeptical, especially with new brands. Even Google is cautious, seeking signals of trustworthiness from websites. The previous three points all help from a trustworthiness perspective. When implemented correctly, they ensure the user (and Google) can see you’ve got experience doing what you do, you have the relevant experience and qualifications (where required) and that other relevant, trusted sources are willing to support you. Trust is also formed by ensuring your content is kept up to date and has clear sources to back up claims where required. An example I keep seeing crop up that flags a concern with me is websites that still talk about their COVID-19 measures, which would have been relevant to the lockdowns. This clearly demonstrates that the website content has not been reviewed in a long time. Include reviews from a third-party provider and transparent links to contact information, policies and “About us” information. Featuring humans on your website as authors can help build trust with your audience. The key theme is authenticity. Simply checking off boxes won’t suffice; it must be genuine and in line with your company’s vision, which should resonate with your audience. 5. Map the user emotions across your buying journeyAs demonstrated by the “peak-end rule,” understanding users’ emotional journey on your website is crucial for a positive experience. Researching various user scenarios can reveal important insights that might not be apparent to your team, as your website may seem intuitive to you but not necessarily to your target audience. You can conduct this process in multiple ways, such as using eye-tracking and facial analysis as users navigate online or gathering qualitative and quantitative data through surveys conducted by a behavioral team. It’s crucial to include a diverse range of your audience in these studies. For instance, if your target audience spans different age groups, focusing only on Gen Z won’t give you insights into how it affects older generations like boomers. Eye-tracking and facial analysis, in particular, can often match up with some Google Core Web Vital scores. For example, website speed and page loading are bugbears for many. That frustrating moment when you click on the wrong item because the page loads gradually is so frustrating to humans but also Google. The answer to some of the issues this research raises can be related to the technical health of your website, but it can also come back to behavioral science. If it is possible to identify a customer becoming anxious, you may not be able to change the reason, but you can ease their worries through better signposting or clearer content. Dig deeper: 5 behavioral strategies to make your content more engaging 6. Take advantage of content layout and structured dataSince Google’s inception, title tags have played a vital role in organizing content. They aid search engines and users by allowing them to quickly scan and find relevant information on a page. Incorporating page layout and titles, along with understanding user intent, results in more valuable content. This enhances user experience by simplifying information consumption and also assists Google’s crawlers in better understanding and indexing content. This can be advanced even further by incorporating structured data, making it easier for Google to understand the context of the content. This can lead to improved rankings and the opportunity to achieve featured snippets, which are also great from a UX perspective. 7. Optimize your visual, audio and video contentWebsites now offer more diverse content, which benefits users with different preferences and needs. However, from an SEO standpoint, it’s crucial to maintain balance. For example, solely having videos without accompanying content isn’t helpful for Google. It’s important to prioritize user experience while also providing transcripts for videos, audio like podcasts and alt text for images to enhance accessibility and meet Google’s requirements. 8. Accessibility to delight your userPrioritizing accessibility ensures that your website is inclusive for everyone, benefiting both users and search engines. The upcoming European Accessibility Act 2025 makes accessibility a legal requirement for many websites. However, there are broader benefits beyond legal compliance. Improving accessibility expands your audience, reaching users who may have previously struggled to access your content. These enhancements also make it easier for search engines to navigate and understand your website, similar to how screen readers operate. Humans and search engines are more aligned than everHumans and search engines are becoming closely aligned in their website preferences. This trend will likely continue as search engines rely on human satisfaction. If search engines prioritize the wrong websites, trust will diminish, leading to lost users and revenue. The moral here for SEO teams is to work closely with your UX colleagues, and if no one is assuming that role, start taking time to learn about this yourself. Traffic alone is a vanity metric; the business value is in ensuring that the traffic takes the right actions to drive revenue and growth. This happens through good UX and continuing investment to improve the website experience. Something we know Google will thank us for as well. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/wsJtWdn “Google is not about blue links. It’s about organizing the world’s information,” according to former executive chairman and CEO of Google Eric Schmidt, speaking earlier today on CNBC. Schmidt was asked about the “blue link economy,” and all the brands and businesses that have benefited from Google Search. But Google is changing. In the new world, AI will provide answers, not a list of websites for people to click on and find the answer for themselves. Why we care. While Schmidt is no longer in a leadership role at Google, he knows better than most what Google is likely to look like in the next few years. Meanwhile, current Google CEO Sundar Pichai has indicated search as we’ve known will substantively change within the next decade – including most recently when he said it is evolving toward Search Generative Experience. AI and advertising. Schmidt believes Google will be able to monetize AI answers and AI will improve advertising:
AI underhyped. Also of note, the arrival of a non-human form of intelligence is almost here. Schmidt thinks AI is actually “underhyped”:
The interview. You can watch the full interview here. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/7LKrhp2 Meta today introduced new generative AI features to help businesses create more engaging ad content across Facebook and Instagram. The big picture. Meta’s latest update will allow advertisers to automate parts of ad creation using brand products and guidelines to inspire the creations. Why we care. Automating the ad-creation process frees up time for advertisers to work on other parts of account management tasks that can’t be automated. Key updates. This update comes in two parts:
Advantage+. By centralizing its generative AI tools under Advantage+ creative, Meta is streamlining the ad creation journey from ideation to optimization, promising faster workflows and better results for advertisers. Availability. The company plans to roll out the new features globally by year-end as it doubles down on AI to improve ad relevance and performance across its apps. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/rlzg2I4 Technical SEOs aren’t concerned that the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) will negatively impact their job security. That’s one insight from the State of Technical SEO Report 2024, released by digital marketing agency Aira and the Women in Tech SEO community.
Why we care. All the overwhelming developments in generative AI over the past 18 months have caused concern and stress among SEOs. While AI will undoubtedly eliminate some jobs, it will also create new jobs. AI is a great assistant, but it can’t replace the work done by technical SEOs – a.k.a., humans. Google SGE fears. While the majority weren’t worried about job security, 70% of respondents were worried about the impact of Google Search Generative Experience (SGE) on regular organic search results.
In-house and agency. Only 20% of in-house, agency and freelancer respondents haven’t changed their SEO planning and roadmaps due to AI developments. Of the remaining 80% of respondents:
AI and machine learning (ML) tools. Fifty-two percent of survey respondents used AI and ML tools to generate metadata (e.g., titles, descriptions) daily, weekly or monthly. Other ways SEOs used the tools:
Other findings. Google seems safe:
About the data. The survey was conducted between Jan. 15 and March 5. It received 382 responses – 56% of respondents were from the U.S. and UK. The report. The report also digs into the impact of SEO, tools and more. You can read the full report here: The State of Technical SEO Report 2024 Dig deeper. Technical SEO report reveals what matters in 2023 via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/TMA4JNu Have you ever clicked on a brand’s ad and ended up on a website you weren’t expecting? That’s ad hijacking. And it hurts advertisers and users. Keep reading to learn how ad hijacking works, the risks it poses and how to protect your brand. What is ad hijacking?Ad hijacking is when an affiliate mimics a brand’s ads to steal clicks and revenue on their trademarked keywords. Affiliates do this to trick you into clicking on their ad instead of a real one from the brand. How does ad hijacking work?Imagine you search for [your favorite clothing brand]. Normally, the first ad you see should be the brand’s official one, taking you straight to its website. Here’s how ad hijacking disrupts that:
What does ad hijacking look like?In this example, a brand violation instance has been captured using Adthena’s Ad Hijacking Detection for a hotel brand (the brand name has been changed for anonymity). A search for “brandhotels.com” has returned the ad shown, which features the brand name in the display URL and site links. However, the ad has not been placed by the hotel brand. It was placed by an affiliate bidding on “brandhotels.com.” Why is ad hijacking harmful to your brand?Ad hijacking can harm both advertisers and users. Here’s a breakdown of the main challenges it can cause: For advertisers:
For users:
Spot and stop ad hijacking attemptsCatching ad hijacking can be tricky, but there are tools to help. Adthena’s Ad Hijacking Detection catches instances of ad hijacking instances from 50+ affiliate networks and sub-networks, by:
See Ad Hijacking Detection in action in a self-guided platform tour. Get started. How to spot ad hijacking in your campaignsBeing proactive is key to fighting ad hijacking. Here are some red flags to watch out for in your branded ad campaigns:
These warning signs can help you catch ad hijacking early and take action to protect your brand. Prevent ad hijacking before it strikesWhy wait for trouble? By being vigilant and monitoring your campaigns closely, you can take steps to identify and address ad hijacking attempts by affiliates. 1. Secure your brand identity:
2. Manage your affiliate program:
3. Paid search defense:
4. Advanced protection solutions:
Learn more about PPC brand protection and how to do it in the complete guide to PPC brand protection. 5. Take action:
Fight back against ad hijackingAd hijacking can be sneaky, stealing clicks and damaging your brand reputation. By understanding how it works, you can take proactive measures to:
By staying informed and implementing these strategies, you can reclaim control of your online presence and ensure a positive experience for your customers. Do you know if your branded keywords are being hijacked by your affiliates? Take a self-guided platform tour of Adthena’s Ad hijacking detection or Book a demo to get started. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/PQubnMo The Killer Whale is back. The latest Knowledge Graph update, released in March, continued the laser focus on person entities. It appears Google is looking for person entities to which it can fully apply E-E-A-T credibility signals and aims to understand who is creating content and whether they are trustworthy. In March, the number of Person entities in the Knowledge Graph increased by 17%. By far, the biggest growth in new Person entities is people to whom Google is clearly able to apply full E-E-A-T credibility signals (researchers, writers, academics, journalists, etc.). Reminder: The original Killer Whale updateThe“Killer Whale” update started in July 2023 as a huge E-E-A-T update to the Knowledge Graph. The key takeaways from the July 2023 Knowledge Graph are that Google is doing three things:
We concluded that the March Killer Whale update was all about Person entities, focused on classification and designed to promote E-E-A-T-friendly subtitles. The Knowledge Graph is Google’s machine-readable encyclopedia, memory or black box. It has six verticals and this article focuses on the Knowledge Vault vertical. The Knowledge Vault is where Google stores its “facts” about the world. The Killer Whale update increased the facts and entities in the Knowledge Vault to over 1,600 billion facts on 54 billion entities, per Kalicube’s estimate. What happened in the March 2024 Knowledge Graph update?
The Killer Whale update is all about Person entitiesBetween May 2020 and June 2023, the number of Person entities in Google’s Knowledge Vault increased steadily, which is in line with the growth of the Knowledge Vault overall. In July 2023, the number of Person entities tripled in just four days. In March, Google added an additional 17%. In less than four years, between May 2020 and March 2024, the number of Person entities in Google’s Knowledge Vault has increased over 22-fold. Between May 2020 and March 2024, the number of Corporation entities in Google’s Knowledge Vault has increased 5-fold. In the last year, however, the number of Corporation entities decreased by 1.3%. Google is focusing on Person entities to a stunning degree, almost exclusively. Data: Kalicube Pro was tracking a core dataset of 21,872 people in 2020 and our analysis in this article uses that dataset. As of 2023, Kalicube Pro actively tracked over 50,000 corporations and 50,000 people. Why is Google looking for people to apply E-E-A-T (N-E-E-A-T-T) signals to?Google is looking for people. However, it specifically focuses on identifying people to whom it can apply E-E-A-T signals because it wants to serve the most credible and trustworthy information to its audience. We use N-E-E-A-T-T in the context of E-E-A-T because our data shows that transparency and notability are essential in establishing the bonafide of a brand. The types of people Google is focusing on are writers, authors, researchers, journalists and analysts. In March, the number of people Google can apply E-E-A-T signals to increased by 38%. You can safely ignore Wikipedia and other ‘go-to’ sourcesGoogle added over 10 billion entities to the Knowledge Vault in four days in July 2023, then followed that up with another 4 billion entities in a single day in March. At that scale, it is safe to assume that the Knowledge algorithms have now been “freed” from the shackles of the original human-curated, seed set of trusted sites (Wikipedia only has 6 million English language articles). That means an entry in traditional trusted sources such as Wikipedia, Wikidata, IMDB, Crunchbase, Google Books, MusicBrainz, etc., is no longer needed. They are helpful, but the algorithms can now create entities in the Knowledge Vault with none of these sources if the information about the entity is clear, complete and consistent across the web. Anecdotally, I received this message on LinkedIn the other day For a Person entity, simply auditing and cleaning up your digital footprint is enough to get a place in Google’s Knowledge Vault and get yourself a Knowledge Panel. Anyone can get a Knowledge Panel. Everyone with personal E-E-A-T credibility that they want to leverage for their website or the content they create should work to establish a presence in the Knowledge Vault and a Knowledge Panel. You aren’t safe (until you are)Almost one in five entities created in the Knowledge Vault is deleted within a year, and the average lifespan is just under a year. That should make you stop and think. Getting a place in Google’s Knowledge Vault is just the first step in entity optimization. Confidence and understanding are key to maintaining your place in the Knowledge Vault over time and keeping your Knowledge Panel in the SERPs. The confidence score the Knowledge Vault API provides for entities is a popular KPI. But it only tells part of the story since it is heavily affected by:
In addition, Google is sunsetting this score. Much like PageRank, it will continue to exist, but we will no longer have access to the information. As such, success can be measured by:
You aren’t alone (but you want to be)This update shines a light on entity duplication, which is a particularly thorny problem for Person entities. This is due to Google’s approach to the ambiguity of people’s names. Almost all of us share our names with other people. I share mine with at least 300 other Jason Barnards. I hate to think how many John Smiths and Marie Duponts are there. When Google’s algorithms find and analyze a reference to a Person, they assume this person is someone it has never met before unless multiple corroborating facts match and convince it otherwise. That means a duplicate might be created if there is a factually inaccurate reference to a Person entity or the reference doesn’t have sufficient common traits with an existing Person entity. If that happens, then any N-E-E-A-T-T credibility equity that references the duplicate is lost. This is the modern equivalent of link building but linking to the wrong site. When will the next update be?From our historical data, for the last nine years, the pattern for entity updates is clear: December, February (or March) and July have consistently been the critical months. In each of the last five years, July has seen by far the most impactful updates. Get ready. Our experience building and optimizing thousands of entities is that you need to have all your corroboration straight 6 to 8 weeks before the major updates. The next updates might be in July and December. Google’s growing emphasis on Person entities in its Knowledge GraphLooking at the data from the Killer Whale updates of July 2023 and March 2024, I am finally seeing the first signs that Google is actually starting to walk the talk of “things, not strings” at scale. The foundation of modern SEO is educating Google about your entities: the website owner, the content creators, the company, the founder, the CEO, the products, etc. Without creating a meaningful understanding in Google’s “brain” about who you are, what you offer and why you are the most credible solution, you will no longer be in the “Google game.” In a world of things, not strings, only if you can successfully feed Google’s Knowledge Graphs with the facts will Google have the basic tools it needs to reliably figure out which problems you are best in the market to solve for the subset of its users who are your audience. Knowledge is power. In modern SEO, the ability to feed the Knowledge Algorithms is the path to success. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/5Seuijz Google Search now has made it harder to find the number of search results for a search query. Instead of it being displayed under the search bar, at the top of the search results, now you need to click on the âtoolsâ button to reveal the results count number. What it looks like. Here is a screenshot of the top of the search results page: To see the results, you need to click on âToolsâ at the top right of the bar and then below that you will see Google show you the estimated results count: Here is what it looked like before: Previous testing. Google has been testing removing the results count for years, as early as 2016 and maybe before. Google also removed them from the SGE results a year ago. So, this seems to be on Googleâs roadmap to remove the feature. In fact, Google has said numerous times that the results count is just an estimate and not a good figure to base any real research and SEO audits on. Why we care. Many SEOs still use the results count to estimate keyword competitiveness, audit indexation, and many other purposes. If this fully goes away, many SEOs wonât be happy. Although, I doubt Google cares too much if SEOs are happy. If the results count is not accurate, Google may decide to do away with it anyway. via Search Engine Land https://ift.tt/Dh71YBf |
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