17 Jul

Guide to Google generative AI search

GEO vs SEO - What to Know

Since the landmark rollout of Chat GPT by Open AI in fall of 2022, SEO professionals have been doing their best to make sense of the future of search. The content generating capabilities of AI-powered engines offered a variety of immediate questions for SEO pros:

  • Would copywriters be needed anymore in a world where AI can now generate extensive copy on its own?
  • Would traditional search adopt AI results, and how soon?
  • How would Google determine elements like content quality and E-E-A-T in a world of AI-generated content?

The questions only multiplied when Google rolled out the news that generative AI search results would become a normal part of search in spring of 2024. While Google continues to test and tinker with how many search results feature generative experience, the future seems to be clarifying – generative experience optimization, or Google GEO, is the future for SEO professionals.

 

But what is GEO? How does it work? How can SEO professionals apply current best practices, while also adjusting content strategy and more to better position themselves and their clients for a GEO future? What SEO monitoring tools will be essential as search continues to shift? Let’s dive into everything we know so far to help.

GEO vs SEO - What's the Difference?

What to Know About Generative AI Search

While it’s hard to make firm predictions about the best strategies for generative search performance, we do have some conclusions we can draw based on both the results of the various Google core updates that have happened in the past year (both before and after the announcement of generative AI results becoming mainstream), as well as assumptions we can make based on how Google is marketing its AI-powered Gemini product. Here’s what we know so far:

E-E-A-T Still Matters

Many SEO professionals lamented the fact that “big name” websites and brands seemed to come through recent algorithm updates strongly, and appear more prominently in generative AI overviews. What does this tell us? That Google more than ever is valuing the authority component of E-E-A-T when deciding how to award the limited space in a given AI overview. However, authority remains a flexible term.

Engagement Metrics Are Important...

For years, Google obfuscated about whether user engagement metrics (like clicks, scrolls, or time spent viewing a page) was a key factor in search results. However, based on what content appears in GEO results, it seems clear that authority is being determined not only by traditional metrics (like brand recognition or backlink profile), but also by how users have previously found a site’s content informative or helpful. To put in plain terms, content that has historically received more engagements from users (via these metric points) is being prioritized over keyword-optimized or heavily backlinked content.

...But Links May Not Be As Important As Before

This last one we can turn to Google’s own updated search documentation, where the removal of a single word (strongly) has turned SEO professionals on their heads. Until recently, Google emphasized that backlinks were a strong factor in determining site or content authority and thus likelihood of placement for key search queries. However, with Google subtly deemphasizing link importance, the years-old playbook of farming out backlinks from high-quality sites (that may or may not be relevant to the target page) appears to be outdated.

Key Questions Are More Important Than Keywords

This point is most emphasized by the searches where Google has continued to incorporate generative AI overviews, after pulling back from its initial widespread rollout due to examples of clearly flawed AI search results. Currently, AI overviews are most commonly returned in responses to full questions or queries in the search bar (as opposed to singular terms or phrases). If we continue to expect (based on Google’s extensive marketing of Gemini) that AI search will take a more prominent position again in the future, focusing content on answering important questions as opposed to featuring prominent keywords seems like an important step for future search strategy.

Beware of Relying on AI Content

With the advent of Chat GPT, there was a correlated surge in website owners and marketers turning to AI to avoid expensive copywriting costs for SEO purposes. Freelancer sites like Upwork showed noticeable declines in the amount of copywriting jobs, along with a significant rise in projects requiring individuals to oversee AI content generation to populate landing pages, blog posts, reviews, and more with an intent on gaming the Google algorithm. Then, in spring of 2024, the hammer dropped. Google’s massive April core update gave weighty punishments (including thousands of manual actions) to sites relying heavily on AI-generated content, and left many site owners despondent at significant and in some cases total losses of SERP positioning. The message is clear for SEO/GEO professionals – AI is great for outlining and topic ideas, but not what you want Google indexing.

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