Old MacGoogle Had A Farm, AI, AIO! What does Google adding LaMDA AI Chat functionality mean for SEO? Daily Dose of Digital - 07/02/23

Finally, the Search Wars have been resurrected! SEOs everywhere will have to stop 'just' talking about Google when it comes to optimising for search (come on, let's be honest, you all do it!) as Microsoft are adding OpenAI's ChatGPT tech and functionality to the Bing search engine.

Both tech giants have invested?$billions in the exploration of AI technology, and Microsoft's partnership with ChatGPT creators OpenAI reportedly caused a "code red" panic at Google in late 2022.

This means the fight is back ON - and Google are going down swinging, rapidly taking that "code red" panic and announcing that Google Search will launch "Bard" imminently, an?experimental conversational AI service leveraging LaMDA.

Google announces new Bard Chat functionality for Search

Sundar Pichai, Google CEO, announced in a blog post that Bard "seeks to combine the breadth of the world's knowledge" with the "power, intelligence and creativity" of Google's AI technology. Pichai continues: "It draws on information from the web to provide fresh, high-quality responses".

"Bard can be an outlet for creativity, and a launch pad for curiosity, helping you to explain new discoveries from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope to a nine-year-old, or learn more about the best strikers in football right now, and then get drills to build your skills."

Pretty cool. In his blog, Pichai continues to explain: "When people think of Google, they often think of turning to us for quick factual answers, like 'how many keys does a piano have? But increasingly, people are turning to Google for deeper insights and understanding — like, 'Is the piano or guitar easier to learn, and how much practice does each need?'"

"AI can be helpful in these moments, synthesising insights for questions where there's no one right answer. Soon, you'll see AI-powered features in Search that distil complex information and multiple perspectives into easy-to-digest formats, so you can quickly understand the big picture and learn more from the web."

Ok, so what does this new Search War mean for SEO?

The title of this article wasn't just a trite (and childish) play on words, the implementation of this new technology and new ways of thinking about search is probably going to represent one of the most seismic shifts in search for years. So, what does this mean for SEOs?

For me, it initially feels very similar to the introduction of voice search, or an extension of it. In a similar way to the impact smart devices started to have on semantic search, whereby users have started to look for answers to questions (rather than combining keywords to find results), but more specifically, have started to ask increasingly complex questions which means a need for deeper understanding and richer answers.

The impact on SEO in this regard was primarily seen through the demand for position zero featured snippet content, where Google (and Amazon and co via Bing) could answer the users question in-search, meaning a reduction in actual clicks through to the content/website. This shifted the way many SEOs thought about content creation and optimisation and I can't help but think this latest change in search will only serve to amplify this.

The impact on SEO? In truth, I don't have the answer to this question yet, I don't think any of us do - the affect this is set to have on SEO will ultimately be dictated by the evolution and mass adoption of the tech BUT what I do know is that anyone working in digital marketing and SEO in particular (be it tech or content side), will have to fundamentally adapt their approach to search in the very near future. What do you think the main impacts will be?

The elephant in the room - When will Yahoo! return?

In war, it's not always just two parties battling it out - and the same can be said for the battle for search dominance as there have also been a number of rumours around Yahoo! returning to the fight.

Yahoo had been seen dropping a number of hints throughout the start of 2023 related to this return to search, the most obvious of which featuring a tongue-in-cheek tweet:

Let battle commence.

With the addition of AI tech into both leading search engine providers and the return of Yahoo Search, it looks like things are hotting up again the this arena and SEOs globally are going to need to recognise and respond to this sooner rather than later. (Or can we all agree that we should be creating valuable, insightful and helpful content regardless of optimisation? Heheh!)

What impact do you think this will have on your approach to search?

Let me know in the comments.