29 Jul
After the blockbuster announcement of Chat-GPT in fall of 2022, the SEO and copywriting worlds were thrown into chaos. With AI able to generate blocks of mostly solid content (mostly) in seconds, what would this mean for the future of SEO – where for years copywriters have commanded triple digit hourly wages to generate content meant to game Google search results?
It was only a matter of time before Google would enter the AI race, and in May 2024 the expected announcement of the integration of Google’s Gemini AI into broader search arrived. Immediately, people started to see AI overviews in Google search, providing summaries and answers to queries, incorporating links, and most importantly to SEO profs – occupying a ton of prime search real estate at the top of the page.
While Google has been cautious in rolling out AI overviews to all queries, and has experienced some hiccups likely to make them even more cautious, any SEO professional worth their salt knows that the time to learn and strategize for optimizing for Google AI search is already here. The question is – how do you do that? While it’s still early, there are already some signs on what types of content are commonly returned in Google AI overviews – which should provide an early road map for how content creators can proceed. Let’s break down some early best practices for creating content designed for Google AI overviews and search results.
Tip #1: Always Answer the Question
One of the most obvious early trends when examining different Google AI overviews is how often they are designed to answer a specific question. This was supported by the initial rollout of AI search, with questions being far more likely to generate an AI overview than simple keywords or phrases. This is a reflection of the conversational nature of AI tech – since AI is designed to be interacted with, it’s far more likely people will ask it complete questions like “How do I optimize content for Google AI search?” than simple keywords like “optimize content for Google AI”.
Additionally, the rise of voice search (via tech like Siri or Alexa) further supports the idea that query-centered content is the future of search. What does this mean for SEO professionals? It means every piece of content you create must answer a question, not simply include an important keyword. Google had already shifted beyond a keyword focus in search rankings even before the rise of Chat-GPT, so the old methods of keyword density and use of keywords in headers and meta information is not enough for an AI search future.
Tip #2: Be Picky With External Links
In the past, people often focused on link quantity or domain authority as the primary reasoning behind the external links they’d choose. This is why so many “old SEO” articles are seemingly stuffed with hyperlinks, even if the anchor text was often brief or not quite relevant to the link transition itself. While Google algorithm updates had already adjusted against this before the rise of AI search, AI overviews do still return a handful of links – and considering those while choosing your links to include can be a smart play. If Google is already recognizing these links as relevant to a query, joining your content to them where it makes logical sense is another little trick to start incorporating.
Tip #3: Research, Research, Research
Since generative AI overviews are still so new, the truth is that no SEO clickbait article really has the secret sauce for optimizing content for Google AI search. As SEO professionals await new updates from proven tools like AHRefs and SEMRush (if they are even possible), you should ignore anyone attempting to sell you GEO optimization software – because Google is clearly still in a testing phase itself in terms of how the overviews are rolled out, formatted, and created.
This means that for many SEO profs, the best thing they can do right now is monitor the evolution of AI overviews around targeted queries or keywords themselves. Create a spreadsheet full of key terms and track what links and sites are being returned on a weekly basis. Visit those links and sites to identify the common elements of content that Google is choosing to return. And most importantly, set up content monitoring software to identify changes or additions that these sites are making. While no one knows the secret formula yet, the more competitive intelligence you can gather, the more likely you’ll catch the wave when people figure out the next best practice to optimize for Google AI search.
