Lily Ray presented at the 2023 Engage PDX conference in Portland, Oregon about Google's Search Generative Experience (SGE), how it works, and concerns about SGE and its impact on SEO.

1. SGE, New Features
in Google Search
& How to Respond
Aug 2023
| |

3. AI entering the SEO discussion in 2023…

4. How it feels to
keep up with AI
developments
this year.

5. GoogleIO Keynote:
Introducing SGE
(Search Generative
Experience)

6. Important Disclaimers About SGE:
• SGE is still being tested, and is changing and
improving every day
• Google is actively collecting feedback from SGE testers
• SGE is only available to a select number of testers in the
U.S. (Chrome desktop / Google App on iOS & Android)
• SGE data does not appear to show in Search Console
(yet)

7. Google Actively Collecting SGE Feedback

8. Feedback in SGE
https://searchengineland.com/snippets-link-attribution-sge-search-430235
These reviews are
GBP reviews of the
Portland Airport 🙄

9. Feedback in SGE
No option to leave
feedback just about
this feature 🙄

10. Feedback in Google Labs

11. How SGE Works

12. How SGE Works
Loads automatically for
some queries
“Opt-in” for other queries

13. Pulls images from Google
Business Profile
Even for non-localized queries
(Connects entities across
Google products)
SGE combines
information from
multiple Google
products

14. Using SGE (before links were added)

15. Google Is Now Testing Links in SGE!

16. How is SGE Being Received?

18. Do you find SGE to
consistently provide
a significant
improvement to
Google search,
compared to non-
SGE search results?
@lilyraynyc Twitter survey | August 2023
281 responses
54% Meh
36%
10%
Significant
improvement
No
improvement

19. 90% of respondents don’t
think SGE is a significant
improvement to search.
In other words:

20. Meanwhile, at Google…

21. “We've obviously been focused on
bringing [SGE] and making sure it
works well for users.
- Sundar Pichai, Alphabet 2023 Q2 Earnings Call
And it's very clear to me, first of all, as a
user myself, there are certain queries
for which the answers are so, so
significantly better.
It's a clear quality win.
And so I think we are definitely headed
in the right direction, and we can see it
in our metrics and the feedback we're
getting from our users as well.”

22. 5.7% increase in stock price overnight

23. Actual footage of me hearing Sundar
call SGE a “clear quality win”

24. When Does SGE Appear?

25. Impacted Categories*
• Informational content
• Review content
• Shopping & commerce queries
• Location & maps content
• Branded keywords
• Travel content & things to do
• Many health & wellness queries
*changes all the time

26. Review Content
• Product reviews

27. Review Content
• Product reviews
• Reviews of people,
places and things

28. Shopping & Commerce Queries
• Often shows localized results (where to buy)

29. Shopping & Commerce Queries
• Google seems to be testing
a connection with
Merchant Center/shopping
• Not working consistently

30. • best coffee shops near me
• restaurants in Madrid
• things to do in Brooklyn
Maps & Travel Queries

31. Branded Queries: disruptive to navigational search

32. When Does SGE *Not* Appear?

33. When SGE Won’t Show: According to Google

34. Sidenote: Google Is Still Showing SGE for This YMYL Query

35. Recipe Queries: No SGE

36. Dangerous & Controversial Topics

37. There are some
questions it would
rather not answer

38. Adult Content: no SGE

39. Sidenote:
Google just added automatic
SafeSearch blurring for some
adult images

40. 10 Concerns About SGE

41. 1. Redundancy & Unhelpfulness

42. SGE Is Often Redundant With Other SERP Features
(Maps, Featured Snippets)

43. The SERP Features Below SGE Stay the Same
Tom Capper @thcapper
The SERP is Dead, Long Live the SERP
Mozcon 2023

44. Tries To Be Helpful, but Isn’t Always Helpful

45. Vague, unhelpful
relationship advice

46. SGE overlooks
user intent…

47. 2. Factual Inaccuracies

49. Less Than
Authoritative
Answers

50. SGE Often Combines Information About Entities
That Share the Same Name

51. SGE Often Pulls From Results Not Ranking in Top 10
Tom Capper @thcapper
The SERP is Dead, Long Live the SERP
Mozcon 2023

52. 3. Attribution Concerns

53. Plagiarism Concerns?

54. Plagiarism Concerns? (+ Google’s Response)

55. More Plagiarism Concerns
(h/t @gregoryflorin)

56. Provide Google With Feedback About SGE Links
(And Click on Them!)

57. 4. Linking Issues

58. When SGE Does Include Links:
• The link sourcing is
not always intuitive
• Inconsistent linking
• Whether users click
on them is still to be
determined

59. Link Mismatch Issues
(Links don’t point to the
place to download the font)

60. Excessive Linking
• 27 links to the same source
(*not complaining!)

61. 5. Links to Other Google
Products

62. Google Often Links to Itself as a Source
• Links to Google Maps
locations
• References to Knowledge
Graph results
• Links to Google shopping
h/t Glenn Gabe & Barry Schwartz

63. 7. Ethical Concerns & Bias in AI

64. Apparently, all the best musicians, hip hop artists,
rock stars, CEOs and chefs are all men.

65. Risk of demonstrating
subtle opinions and
biases, not always facts.

66. 8. Lack of Clear Reporting for
Sites

67. SGE is not yet
showing in GSC
at all.
Shows up in GA
as google/
organic.

68. Sidenote: Bing Has Been Solving for This

69. 9. Feasibility & Profitability for
Google

70. SGE Is Expensive, Plus:
If users won’t click on an
organic result after reading
SGE…
…why would they click on
an ad?

71. Tom Capper @thcapper
The SERP is Dead, Long Live the SERP
Mozcon 2023

72. h/t Greg Finn

73. Ads in SGE

74. 10. Easily Spammable

75. The selected
results are
filled with
fake GBP
reviews.

76. Important: It’s still early.
SGE changes every day.

77. Influencing SGE
Answers

78. Is promoting consistent &
reliable answers for AI
the new linkbuilding?

79. Process:
• Collect frequently asked questions
about yourself or your brand
• Answer questions clearly and
concisely on your site(s) in FAQs,
About page, homepage, etc.
• Support facts with structured data
(you can use AI tools)
• Leverage IndexNow for instant
indexing in Bing (Yoast premium)
• Submit URL in GSC; ensure content
is crawled/indexed by Google
• Monitor SGE & Bing Chat results

80. Generate Person/Organization structured data with
ChatGPT plugin Webpilot, Claude or ChatGPT browser
mode

81. Affecting SGE Answers
Before website change
After
website
change
Website change (1 week after)

82. Affecting SGE Answers
Before website change
2 weeks after website change
Website change

83. Affecting AI Answers
Before website change
After website change (Bing

84. SGE Finally Got It Right (Yesterday!)

85. Provide clear and
direct answers to
questions

86. SGE Is Confused Between Multiple Lily Rays
NOT MY DAD!
MY DAD

87. SGE Can “Know” About Complex Queries
(Sufficient mentions on 3rd party sites)

88. Monitor how your pages appear in SGE
& include optimized featured images

89. One answer on one page might not be sufficient.

90. Promote consistent & reliable information
across mentions on external sites.

91. 1. Collect relevant questions
about your brand (People
Also Ask, question research)
2. Provide clear, concise and
consistent answers to these
questions wherever
possible
3. Pay attention to GBP
photos and reviews
4. Monitor 3rd party mentions
& set up brand alerts
Steps to Respond Now
4. Ensure information
accuracy across 3rd party
sites whenever possible
5. Try to build additional
mentions to promote
consistency in answers
6. Use high-quality imagery
on every page you want to
appear in SGE
7. Remember that AI can pull
from Twitter, LinkedIn &
other social sites

92. Be everywhere search engines can find you.

93. SEO Is More Than 10 Blue Links
• Create short videos (Google Perspectives, TikTok, YouTube,
video tab, Discover)
• Analyze your Discover performance & drive more traffic
and visibility on Discover
• Consider podcasts, audio recordings, interviews - upload to
Soundcloud, Spotify, Bandcamp etc.
• Focus on your expert contributors and authors - build out
their online presence

94. THANK YOU