How to adapt your SEO strategy to AI search

This post is a sibling to my previous piece on AI in SEO work. Go check that out if you are interested in what opportunities and challenges generative AI tools bring for content creation teams.

AI features in search engines are not a new thing – Microsoft already implemented ChatGPT to Bing back in early 2023. However, with its over 90% search engine market share, we all know that Google is the one really moving the needle.

In May 2024, Google’s AI FOMO reached a boiling point. Much like a teenager seeking validation by purchasing the same trendy clothes as others, Google couldn't resist jumping on the AI bandwagon. As a surprise move to many, generative AI features were publicly launched in the United States with more countries expected to follow suit.

What does this all mean for companies and digital marketers? Here’s what to expect based on our experience, interviews and general discussion in the SEO industry:

1. Expect a decrease in organic traffic

Thanks to AI overviews, especially with straight-to-the-point, informational content, users are less likely to proceed to a website to read more. This will impact keyword strategies as some top-of-the-funnel queries become irrelevant in a traditional sense. 

Controversially, AI overviews are also served for Your Money or Your Life (YMYL) queries related to themes like health, finance, legal and safety.

So far, the quality of AI overviews has left much to be desired. Adding fuel to the fire, mainstream media and internet memes have joined the fray. Due to low public trust, the initial impact on organic traffic might not be as significant as many SEO professionals have anticipated.

On top of this, the frequency of AI overviews is a lot lower than the 80% of queries in initial tests. At the moment, the figure is closer to 10-20%. Future will show whether Google will bump up the frequency after the dust has settled.

Currently, AI overviews are not shown as much for queries with a high cost per click. This might change in the future as Google is looking to open up AI overviews for advertisers.

In addition to AI overviews, Google is gradually rolling out completely AI-generated results pages that might result in bigger organic ranking and traffic fluctuations. Expect to be affected by this change if your content is about dining, recipes, movies, music, books, hotels or shopping.

2. Focus on in-depth content

While AI-generated answers might satisfy the user for simple queries, with more complex, niche and multilayered topics the situation is different. Companies should strive to create best-of-class content with unique first-hand knowledge. While factors like expertise and topical authority have been driving content creation for a long time, AI search and generative AI writing tools make their importance even more emphasised.

3. Know the questions your customers are asking

With AI search, information seeking becomes more conversational and questions more specific. If you haven’t already, this is the time to put less emphasis on very broad keywords and focus on knowing your users. What are their common pain points? What questions do they have?

I recommend you to check out our recent post about customer journey operations and ask/look around (sales, customer service, marketing, discussion forums, people also ask sections…) for insights. Customer data is everything. By creating content that addresses the most common questions, you increase your chances of getting content included in the AI snippets.

At the moment, Google seems to prioritise short, one-paragraph answers in their AI overviews. For this reason, once you know what your customers are asking, optimise your content to answer these questions in a compact form.

Note that this does not mean you should repurpose all your articles to question-answer lists! Instead, focus on eliminating unnecessary fluffiness from text, especially if the content is created to answer specific questions. Along with identifying the primary question, it is equally important to address any potential follow-up questions in your content.

4. Adjust your keyword rank tracking

Tracking AI overviews is a pain at the moment. Google’s CEO Sundar Pichai has publicly mentioned how they are not looking to add AI overview data to Search Console anytime soon.

This is problematic in many ways. First, it makes the work of SEO professionals significantly harder. Second, it makes Google even more of a black box. Third, it is not a positive sign in terms of AI overview click-through rates. While Google claims that the CTR for AI overview links is higher than with traditional blue links, SEO professionals are not convinced. Blocked access to click data only fuels this scepticism.

Luckily there are third-party tools available. The issue is however that most tools only show incognito data. Since AI overviews are served for logged-in users, the data from these tools is not currently accurate. Thus, I’d advise to err on the side of caution with the first wave of AI overview tracking solutions.

Another option is to use a keyword tool that views SERPs as a logged-in user. However, in this instance you currently sacrifice scale and are limited to a smaller, more targeted set of keywords with less frequent updates. This is still better than nothing though.

The knowledge on AI search features’ performance will be crucial as the strategies for ranking in AI snippets versus in traditional blue links will differ. In some tests, only half of the content in AI overviews is from traditional top 10 positions so fluctuations in SERPs are to be expected.

FINAL WORDS

Phew! There you go, a quick (or not so quick) overview of Google’s new AI search features. Hopefully, you learned something new and are better prepared for what the future holds. It is important to remember that the features are still fresh from the oven and many questions remain. While we wait to see how things pan out, feel free to be in touch to discuss how you can prepare for the looming turbulence ahead.