1. LILY RAY & INNA ZEYGER | SMX MUNICH | MARCH 2023
IN 2023 & BEYOND

3. AI entering the SEO discussion in 2023…

4. KEY POINTS ABOUT

5. But they will change and enhance the way
people search.
AI chatbots will
not replace search.

6. “I just want to be very clear:
Bard is not search.”
– Jack Krawczyk,
Bard product lead

7. AI will not replace SEOs…
but SEOs should
learn how to use AI.

8. AI tools can create
significant efficiencies for
SEO, but don’t misuse them.

9. There is more to SEO in
2023 than AI – don’t forget
about the other major
forces at play.

10. Big Trends Affecting SEO

11. Big Trends Affecting SEO
Multiple concurrent ranking systems
BERT Crisis Info Deduplication
Freshness Helpful Content
Link Analysis +
PageRank
Local News
MUM Neural Matching
Page Experience Rankbrain
Site Diversity Spam Detection
Exact Match
Domain
Original Content Removal-based
demotion
Passage Ranking Reliable Info

12. Big Trends Affecting
SEO:
Competition from
Amazon & TikTok

13. SEARCH
CHATBOTS:
What we know

14. The
New
Bing

15. Bard
• Initial release uses LaMDA
• Not released yet and we don’t know when it will be
• Google is focused on AI ethics & responsibility
• Jack Krawczyk, product lead for Bard: “Bard Is not
search.”
• Bard is a “creative companion” to help spark creativity,
explore curiosity

16. The chatbots have room for improvement…

17. What does
Google say
about AI?

18. AI content can be OK if…
01
IT IS original &
high-quality
IT DEMONSTRATES
E-E-A-T
02
IT SATISFIES
the Helpful Content
System
03
IT DOESN’T
propagate misinformation
04
IT ISN’T created with
the primary purpose of
manipulating search results
05

19. However, there are 3 important caveats
Google recommends
including author names
(for some content)
Google recommends
disclosing use of AI
Google recommends
against listing AI as
the “author” of the
content

20. If tools like Copyleaks
can instantly detect
ChatGPT content,
Google probably can
too.

21. AI Content | A Cautionary Tale
• Published brand new niche site
• Scraped relevant People Also Ask
questions & used GPT3 API (not ChatGPT) to
answer across ~10k URLs
• Added a few links from other sites

22. AI Content | A Cautionary Tale

23. Big Updates to QRG & E-E-A-T
in December 2022

24. Expertise
Experience
Expertise
Expertise vs. Experience

25. Waiting for the next core update:
quality raters are busy

26. REMEMBER:
we haven’t seen the full manifestation of the
new “Experience” signal
in the algorithms yet

27. The Product
Reviews Update

28. From my keynote last year
Coming Soon to
a Country near you

29. The Product Reviews Update
has arrived in Germany

30. No evidence of first-hand experience
or thorough testing of products
The Product Reviews Update

31. The Helpful
Content Update

32. Launched in August 2022

33. Updated in December 2022

34. CREATED A NEW SITE-WIDE SIGNAL
The “unhelpful content” classifier

35. If the majority of site content is
“unhelpful”,
a site-wide ranking demotion is
applied
…even for “helpful” content.

36. actually
What
means:
SEO spam
“In search of content with little
value, low-added value, or that
is not particularly helpful”
speak
What the classifier looks for…

37. The (un)helpful content
classifier:
• Is automated
• Uses machine learning
• Runs continuously
• Is not a manual action
• Can affect a site at any time
• Can be “lifted” after unhelpful content is
removed

38. Categories Impacted
Lyrics sites
Guitar chords
Adult sites
Travel blogs
Grammar sites Aggregator sites
Product manuals (duplicate content)
Low-quality affiliate sites

39. Rapid Growth Before Decline
Many affected sites exhibit this pattern…

40. What makes the content
“unhelpful”?

41. Sites pretend to be experts on too
many topics

42. Information is generic without unique or
expert insights

43. Information lacks detail
or specificity

44. Content velocity & topic selection
seem to reflect an “SEO-first”
approach

45. Overwhelming ads & affiliate links
(correlation, not causation)

46. Using ChatGPT
effectively
for SEO

47. When used carefully,
ChatGPT & AI content tools can be
tremendously
valuable for SEO
…but they come with risks.

48. Excel formulas
Robots.txt directives
Regex commands
JSON
CSV
HTML
Markdown
Tables
Generate:
Using ChatGPT effectively for SEO

49. Excel formulas
Robots.txt directives
Regex commands
JSON
CSV
HTML
Markdown
Tables
Generate:
Using ChatGPT effectively for SEO

50. Summaries
FAQs
Grammar/spelling review
Translation
Key takeaways
Opportunities for improvement
Fact checking
Generate:
Using ChatGPT effectively for SEO
[paste entire article]

51. Summaries
FAQs
Grammar/spelling review
Translation
Key takeaways
Opportunities for improvement
Fact checking
Generate:
Using ChatGPT effectively for SEO

52. Summaries
FAQs
Grammar/spelling review
Translation
Key takeaways
Opportunities for improvement
Fact Checking
Generate:
Using ChatGPT effectively for SEO

53. What not to do…
• Copy-paste ChatGPT content
• Especially on Your Money, Your Life
(YMYL) topics!

54. What not to do…
Assume ChatGPT actually knows
what it’s talking about

55. Takeaways
• Use AItoincrease efficiency, butbecareful
misusing AIcontent
• Helpful contentrequires effort
• Takingshortcutscancatchuptoyou
• Insteadoffocusing on scale, focus oncontent
qualityandE-E-A-T
• Stayinyour lane
• Investinyourauthors’online reputation&build
outtheirKnowledge Graphs

56. PAID SEARCH

58. The sobering reality of
uncertainty

59. Me finally making
enough money to
make a living
Inflation

60. Inflation Rates & Recession Fears

61. Shifting consumer behavior
• Trading down
• Reticence to invest in high-ticket items or
services
• Investing in products and services for
longevity

62. In a world gone mad…
Major layoffs
Thanks
ChatGPT!
Zoom = crime
against
humanity
Cookies
go away
Robots
take over
RECESSION!
UK does
something...
again
Big news from
Antarctica
Elon buys
Google
Lily in NYC
> 2 weeks

63. At the beginning of the pandemic, how
many of you had to reduce media spend?

64. In the last 6 months,
how many of you or your clients have pulled back
on media investment?

65. Continue to invest in
search advertising

66. Don’t Stop Advertising.
Pull back if necessary, but please don’t stop.

67. Outcomes
Results from many
companies who did
not pull back spend &
increased investment
How long it took
companies that
pulled spend by 50%
to return to pre-
recession sales
revenue
How long it took
companies that
pulled all media
spend to return to
pre-recession sales
revenue

68. Optimize with a scalpel, not a
sledgehammer

69. You don’t have to outspend your
competition,
…you have to
outsmart them.

70. Get a Better Conversion
Rate
• Better Qualify Your Traffic
• Optimize to Deeper KPI’s
• Consider Lead Quality

71. Diversify your search
portfolio

72. “Nearly 40% of Gen Z prefers
using TikTok
& Instagram for search over
Google.”
– Prabhakar Raghavan,
SVP, Google

73. In late 2022,
TikTok launched an
UK ad campaign
positioning it as a Google
replacement

74. •Access to Gen Z & Millennials
•Competitive pricing, possibly better ROI
•Expansive reach and unparalleled
engagement
•Clunky UI
•Rollout?
TikTok Search Ads – The Future?

75. Automation & AI

76. Google, Microsoft, Facebook
& most platforms have already embraced…

77. Core marketing
principals
& process
Enabled
Technologies for AI
& ML
Skilled People
Manu-Automation
Strategic Marketers + Machine learning = Results
Intelligent Delivery
This powerful combination
maximizes digital spend for the
highest ROI.

78. Invest in Landing Page Experiences
• Personalize the user experience
• Ensure landing page fulfills the
promise of the ad
• Prioritize by conversion potential
/ volume

79. Takeaways
• Don’tstop investing insearch
• Get abetterconversion throughoffline conversion
trackingandintegration
• Algorithmic biddingis your friend,aslong as you
havequalitydata
• Optimizewithascalpel, not asledgehammer

80. How SEO &
Paid
Work
Together

81. Visualizing SEO & PPC Data

82. GSC keyword data for paid search keyword expansion / remarketing
Sharing is Caring

83. Organic & paid overlap & expansion
opportunities
• Multi language keyword
expansion
• Identify and prioritize
keywords too expensive for
paid search but able to rank
organically

84. Organic & paid overlap & expansion
opportunities
• Sharing top performing search
ads and top titles &
descriptions
• GMB listings

85. Top content / organic landing
pages
•Remarketing to top
content/SEO ranking pages
with specific ad copy related
to content
•Drive them to more
conversion friendly landing
pages

86. We're working with the same search demand…
Measure & Analyze
•If both align, it's likely a marketplace / demand challenge
•If one or the other is markedly different, paid media challenge