Generative AI and AI Overviews: The Evolution of Search
Generative AI and the introduction of AI Overviews to SERPs have dominated this year as search has changed more in the last year than in the last 10 or 20 years. But it might be that many of these changes are coming in spite of Gen AI and not because of.
SEO has been maturing and aligning with classic marketing for many years. AI has been the catalyst that has now created an urgency to rethink SEO strategies and start to approach SEO in a digital marketing holistic way.
SEO is no longer about just being visible in SERPs. Consideration is also needed for visibility in Gen AI apps, social media, and any channel where your audience might be.
Search traffic will likely become more fractured across different channels, and an SEO’s job will become much more complex. The days of easy traffic are well in the rearview mirror.
7 SEO Experts Share Their Thoughts About AI Overviews
The most interesting part about asking the same question to different people is that you get a wide variety of answers – all approaching from different angles.
Pedro Dias: AI Is Raising The Bar For Knowledge
Ex-Googler Pedro has always been focused on user experience, and he believes Gen AI is widening the gap between generalists and true specialists. And that real expertise will be more valuable than ever. It’s the middle ground that will be displaced.
Pedro also believes in building communities and considering the customer journey – where you can give away content for free and where you gate your most valuable resources for your audience.
Erika Varangouli: SEO Cannot Be Independent Of Brand
Erika believes that we have been spoiled previously, as SEO was not as complex as it is today. Search used to focus on keywords and clicks, which is a much more one-dimensional approach than what we face today.
She also believes that creativity and branding are essential moving forward.
Jono Alderson: Understanding The Problems Your Audience Has Will Be Crucial
Jono believes that AI Overviews are a symptom of a bigger change and that it was never Google’s objective to be a list of 10 blue links.
What they have always aspired to is to understand what you want and solve your problem.
Mark Williams-Cook: Branded Search Is The Gold Standard
Mark believes that in its current state, ChatGPT Search would not appeal to the mass market as it felt lacking. He thinks it is still raw and rugged and perhaps not quite ready for a broad audience of non-tech users.
But, he does think this could be a big moment similar to the introduction of Ask Jeeves (for those who remember). It pioneered a different approach to search modeling, and ChatGPT Search will be influential.
Alli Berry: Combining AI With A Strong Sense Of Brand Will Lead The Future
Alli predominantly works in the finance space, so her experience has not been impacted as much as other verticals. Currently, Google limits AI Overviews in Your Money or Your Life (YMYL) SERPs.
Like many others, she believes that a shift to branding is needed and that smaller companies will need to engage audiences directly, and reduce their reliance on Google.
Arnout Hellemans: It’s More About Experience Optimization
Arnout thinks we are on the verge of a big shift. Google must reinvent itself, but its focus right now seems to be on competing with Amazon.
There could be a future where Google integrates its accounts so you can make purchases directly within the search interface.
What We Can Takeaway About AI Overviews
Although we have seven different responses to the same question, the common themes and what we can take away from these conversations are to:
- Leverage your expertise and deep knowledge with your audience.
- Focus on brand building and building your audience.
- Build communities around your brand.
- Create content that solves problems.
- Embrace TikTok in the user journey to find information.
- AIO mostly takes away informational queries that don’t hold any conversion value.
- Focus on conversion and not clicks.
Thank you to all the experts who appeared as guests on IMHO and offered their time and opinions.
