AI companies (e.g., Google, OpenAI) are primarily using high-quality content created by news publishers to train generative AI systems, which then compete directly against those publishers.
That’s the core argument made in a new report from News Media Alliance, a trade association that says it represents about 2,000 publishers in the U.S. and Canada.
Why we care. Since the arrival of Bing Chat, Google Bard and Google’s Search Generative Experience, publishers of all sizes have been concerned about generative AI replacing search, which could lead to a devastating impact on organic traffic, revenue and even the brand’s image.
What News Media Alliance is saying. The report proves the trade association would have a good case in court, according to comments given by Danielle Coffey, News Media Alliance president and CEO, to the New York Times.
“It genuinely acts as a substitution for our very work. You can see our articles are just taken and regurgitated verbatim,” Coffey said.
Successful search marketers need to keep up with the latest trends and tactics while seamlessly executing on a day-to-day basis: Generative AI, PMax, Google’s Search Generative Experience, BERT, MUM, CTV, GA4… the list goes on.
Finish 2023 on a high note – and enter the New Year primed for success: Attend SMX, online November 14-15, to learn actionable, reliable tactics that will give you an edge over the competition and set you up for a winning 2024 and beyond — all for free, and all without leaving your desk.
Get ready for three exclusive keynotes about how you can leverage generative AI to your advantage:
Danny Goodwin, Managing editor at Search Engine Land, sets the stage with his Search marketer’s generative AI survival guide — a 7-part presentation exploring how Google’s Search Generative Experience (SGE) and Microsoft Bing’s Chat will likely impact paid and organic search and what you can do to prepare yourself, your clients, and your C-suite for the still-to-come monumental shifts in search.
Day 2 kicks off with Frederick Vallaeys‘ keynote on how you can become the marketer who knows generative AI better than anyone, setting your skills up to stay in peak demand for years to come. Join Fred as he showcases several easy-to-follow examples you can implement immediately to take your knowledge about this latest technological advancement to the next level.
Wrap up your SMX experience with an exclusive closing keynote from Louisa Frahm, SEO Director at ESPN — where she’ll discuss the history of SGE and how you can adjust your search strategy to prepare for developments from the interface in the future. Stick around for Overtime, live Q&A immediately following this keynote, to get your specific SGE questions answered by Louisa herself!
And that’s just the start. Your free pass also unlocks…
The entire expert-led agenda programmed by the Search Engine Land editors
Actionable tactics to overcome critical SEO and PPC challenges like a pro
Live Q&A (Overtime!) where you’ll get specific answers in real-time
4 live Coffee Talk meetups where you can discuss common issues with like-minded marketers
Free on-demand access for 180 days so you can train at your own pace
A personalized certificate of attendance and a digital badge to post on LinkedIn
Don’t miss your final chance in 2023 to participate in a free online training program designed by search marketers for search marketers. No hidden fees, no travel headaches, no excuses.
Advertisers are moving from search-based channels to social media for eCommerce ads, according to a new report by DataFeedWatch.
The research found that the use of search channels has dropped by over seven percentage points from 2022 to 2023.
However, around 7% of all products submitted to Google Shopping were disapproved due to critical errors.
Below is an overview of the biggest issues impacting merchants, including invalid GTIN values and violation of Google policies.
Invalid GTIN errors affect almost half of all merchants (48.43%) and over 4% of submitted products. Google penalizes accounts for wrong GTIN values, so it’s crucial for merchants to fix identification problems to avoid listing rejections.
Violation of Google policies impact 44%of all merchants. This means that Google’s algorithm flagged a policy violation in your feed. To identify the issue, contact Google for a review. Once you know the problem, make the required changes to your product feed or website.
Common reasons for seeing this error on the product level include:
Products that aren’t allowed to be advertised on Google network.
Having banned words in titles and description.
Images that go against Google’s policies.
Swiftly resolving these problems is essential to minimize their adverse effects on your account and advertising performance.
Promotional overlay on image impact 40% of merchants. If you spot this error, it indicates that one or more of your images have promotional overlays, which Google strictly prohibits. There are three key ways to resolve this issue:
Remove the promotional overlay: If you discover images with promotional text, you can utilize Google’s Automatic Image Improvement feature. It will remove the text automatically, providing you with approved product images. Don’t forget to review the final result to ensure they appear fine.
Replace the image: If most of your product images are free of promotional overlays, it’s quicker to replace the image. The simplest method is to alter the image assignment through a feed management service. Look for the ‘image_link’ attribute and update the provided link.
Create new images: If the previous two solutions are not applicable, you’ll have to generate new images. While obtaining these new images, consider pausing the affected products to prevent them from being listed and safeguard your account from potential harm.
Once you have them, map your feed with the correct image URLs under the ‘image_link’ attribute.
What DataFeedWatch is saying. A spokesperson for DataFeedWatch commented on the report’s findings, saying:
“Disapproved products can harshly hinder your online sales performance, especially when they are bestsellers. Not only will your performance be affected, but the risk of getting your account suspended increases the more you upload products with errors in them.”
Troubleshoot your feed before sending it to a sales channel in order to avoid this issue altogether. Using a data feed tool to catch any errors before submitting your feed makes it a quick and easy process.”
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What is DataFeedWatch? DataFeedWatch by Cart.com is a leading Feed Management Solution that helps global brands and agencies, like Adidas, Decathlon, and KENZO, to maximize campaign performance on more than 2,000 integrated shopping channels, affiliate networks, and marketplaces, including Google, Meta and Amazon.
Google Ads has started serving a pop-up survey that disrupts advertisers when they try to pause campaigns.
The survey asks users whey they want to pause their ad campaign before allowing them to continue.
Why we care. The pop-up survey may annoy and inconvenience busy marketers who lack the time to explain their ad campaign pause to Google. Nonetheless, this feedback will aid Google in enhancing its product, ultimately benefiting advertisers in the long run.
First look. The pop-up was first noticed by digital marketing expert Greg Kohler, who posted about the survey on X. He shared some screenshots of the notification and then asked Google:
“Any chance this added friction could break the scripts or rules people have within accounts to auto-pause once certain budgets are spent?”
“Similar to how the account confirmation popup broke large automated budget increase rules.”
Reaction. After Greg shared his findings on X, fellow PPC expert Greg Finn asked Google Ads to stop disrupting advertisers by displaying the survery. He wrote:
“Kind request to @adsliaison to have this survey show AFTER the pausing occurs. Right now it adds extra steps for advertisers. We don’t need more bloat in Google Ads.”
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Google Ads has confirmed it is trialling a new overview slide metrics feature.
The platform told Search Engine Land this new dropdown tool has been rolled out to a limited number of advertisers to offer more flexibility from the overview page.
Why we care. This new feature simplifies access to essential data for advertisers by allowing you to select the desired metrics on the overview page and easily access additional information.
“Really like this update!” The new feature was first spotted by PPC expert Anthony Higman. Sharing his discovery on X, he wrote:
“New Just SPOTTED!!! Google Ads New Overview Slide Metrics Dropdown/Carousel!!!!! This is actually SUPER cool!!! Lets select ALL the metrics and then click through on the right to see other things in the overview slide!!! Really Like This Update!! Can Still Only Have 4 Highlighted But I Like It!”
“Also looks like they are working on you being able to segment by time right from the overview slide! BOOM, Love it! 1 good change for every 40 bad ones, but gotta take them wins where you can get them!”
Higman also shared a screenshot of his Google Ads account to show what the new dropdown option looks like:
What Google is saying. A Google spokesperson told Search Engine Land:
“We are always exploring new ways to improve the experience for advertisers and users in Google Ads.”
“Currently, we are running an experiment with a limited number of advertisers to offer more flexibility from the overview page. We don’t have more details to share at this point.”
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Meta is rolling out no ads subscriptions for Facebook and Instagram users in Europe.
People in the EU, EEA and Switzerland will be given the choice to either continue using these platforms with personalised ads, or pay a fee to remove sponsored posts completely from November.
Users that opt to pay for a subscription, which will cost €9.99 per month on the web or €12.99 per month on iOS and Android, will not have their information used for ads.
Why we care. The success of ad-free subscriptions could greatly influence reach and, consequently, ROI for this new service in Europe. Nonetheless, the expense of these paid services, coupled with the planned additional fees for next year, may act as a deterrent for potential sign-ups.
Subscription costs. An ad-free experience will be applied to all linked Facebook and Instagram accounts in a user’s Accounts Center, meaning users will only need to pay for one subscription to cover all of their accounts. However, that is set to change next year.
From March 2024, an additional fee of €6 per month on the web and €8 per month on iOS and Android will apply for each additional account listed in a user’s Account Center.
Why now? Providing a choice to subscribe without ads meets European regulations and lets Meta serve users in the EU, EEA, and Switzerland. The CJEU confirmed that a subscription model like ours is a valid way for users to consent to an ad-supported service.
Who is eligible? To begin with, Meta is only rolling out ad-free experiences for people aged 18 years and up. However, the tech giant is continuing to explore new ways to offer teens a “useful and responsible ad experience” in light of the EU’s evolving regulatory landscape.
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What Meta is saying. A spokesperson for Meta said in a statement:
"Advertisers will be able to continue running personalised advertising campaigns in Europe to reach those who choose to continue to receive a free, ad-supported online service."
"Going forward, we will continue to invest to build new tools that preserve the value that both people and businesses get out of personalised advertising, while allowing users to control their ads experience on our platforms."
"We believe in an ad-supported internet, which gives people access to personalised products and services regardless of their economic status. It also allows small businesses to reach potential customers, grow their business and create new markets, driving growth in the European economy."
"And like other companies we’ll continue to advocate for an ad-supported internet, even with our new subscription offering in the EU, EEA and Switzerland. But we respect the spirit and purpose of these evolving European regulations, and are committed to complying with them."
Deep dive. Read Meta's announcement in full for more information.
Google knew as far back as 2010 that Google Chrome would help drive more Google searches. We learned some exact figures today during testimony from Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai at the ongoing U.S. vs. Google antitrust trial.
Users who switched to Chrome from Microsoft’s Internet Explorer performed 48% more Google searches.
Users who switched to Chrome from Mozilla’s Firefox performed 27% more Google searches.
“The correlation was pretty clear to see,” Pichai said, CNN reported. Pichai also said, via WSJ:
“We realized early on that browsers are critical to how people are able to navigate and use the web.”
“It became very clear early on that if you make the user’s experience better, they would use the web more, they would enjoy using the web more, and they would search more in Google as well.”
$26.3 billion. Meanwhile, we also learned Google paid $26.3 billion to be the default search engine on various browsers, platforms and devices, with the biggest share going to Apple. That was according to testimony from Prabhakar Raghavan, a Google senior VP and head of Search, on Friday.
Google Search made $146 billion in 2021 – so that means Google spent around 18% of its search revenue on these deals.
Europe has a choice. Since the 2020 arrival of a search choice screen Microsoft Bing has seen no positive gains in market share in Europe. As of September in Europe, according to Statcounter:
Google: 90.87% (in the U.S., Google’s market share is lower – 88.48%)
Microsoft Bing: 3.4% (in the U.S., Microsoft Bing’s market share is higher – 6.35%)
So yes, Google has spent $26.3 billion to be the search default everywhere it wants, Europe shows that on all platforms, where explicitly given a choice, people still overwhelmingly choose Google.
Instagram Reminder Ads are rolling out new features to help advertisers reach a wider audience:
Instagram Stories visibility: Reminder Ads can now be featured within Instagram Stories, allowing businesses to increase visibility and improve efficiency.
Ads Manager set up: Reminder ads can now be created directly in Ads Manager, which removes the previous requirement of only using organic posts to create a reminder ad.
The new capabilities, which also make it easier to create Reminder Ads, will be launched by the end of October.
Why we care. Expanding your reach to engage with more potential customers can boost brand recognition, leading to more conversions and a better return on investment (ROI). Streamlining the ad creation process also simplifies life for marketers, potentially saving them time and allowing them to concentrate on other important tasks.
What are Reminder Ads? Reminder Ads, launched by Instagram earlier this year, is an ad product designed specifically to enable advertisers to generate awareness, anticipation, and interest in upcoming launches, events, and special moments. Reminder ads give users the option to sign up for notifications about the events they’re interested in. People who opt in will receive three push notifications leading up to the event to help keep them informed and engaged.
Getting started. Once it’s available to your business, advertisers can boost an organic post or create a Reminder ad directly in Ads Manager.
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As the initial buzz around AI dies down, the practical use of generative AI is now well-established in the content creation world.
In theory, this creates a huge content marketing opportunity. However, as we are seeing, there are many pitfalls from an SEO perspective.
This article outlines how we are primed to make such mistakes, ways Google has tackled this historically and how to safely integrate generative AI in your SEO and content marketing.
Generative AI tools seemingly make it easy to write an expert-level article about any topic. This allows websites or authors to assume unwarranted expert status and pump out legions of articles on almost anything.
This is the path of least resistance for content production, and on the surface, it seems an attractive proposition with some huge SEO opportunities.
I have sat in marketing meetings with AI consultants advising this very strategy. One consultant called the approach “automate and dominate.” I was there to temper such blind enthusiasm and ensure no SEO mistakes were made.
This creates a problem for consumers looking for the best information and for search engines who need to ensure that the best information is promoted accordingly.
In the early days, around 1999-2000, it was easy to manipulate Google with links and content.
However, Google soon caught up and plugged the main problems of low-quality links and mass-produced, low-quality content with the Panda and Penguin algorithm updates.
Today, it is easy to look at generative AI and believe these tools provide an opportunity to create lots of content quickly and grab a greater slice of organic search traffic.
However, the battle-hardened Google of 2023 differs from the Google of old.
High-quality and human-first content is already baked into the search algorithm, and recent updates have only served to confirm that.
Google is ahead of the curve here, and we have already reviewed several sites that have seen recent dips in performance after helpful content updates, some with up to a 70% drop in organic traffic.
70% traffic drop – Pop culture site targeting students
There was nothing wrong with this site. It was not spammy, but it also did nothing unique. It was just the same content you could pick up from several sources.
Reviewing the losses, it seems that rankings were lost to sites that were more expert or relevant for the topics.
This is an existential threat to sites of this manner that rely on organic traffic but only pump out relatively generic content that could be found on many other sites.
If SEO is central to your marketing strategy, then sensible integration of generative AI, rather than full automation, is the only sustainable strategy.
What does Google want?
To understand what your content strategy should look like, we must consider what Google is trying to achieve and aim at that.
If you want to do a really deep dive, then take a look at the Search Quality Rater Guidelines (but at 176 pages is a somewhat time-consuming read).
Fortunately, E-E-A-T summarizes the philosophy for the rest of us more concisely.
I don’t want to reinvent the wheel here, but the key points are as follows:
Experience: Personal experience should be clearly demonstrated in content.
Expertise: Content should be based on an individual’s proven expertise.
Authority: The author and website should be an authority on the topic.
Trust: The author and website should be trustworthy.
The key here is to factor this into your SEO goals.
Have content that is based on your real human expertise and experience.
Ensure you have the technical aspects of your UX, website design and SEO in a good place.
An AI analogy
The problem with SEO and generative AI reminds me of a scene in one of my favorite movies: Good Will Hunting.
The protagonist, Will, is a genius who can consume, remember and regurgitate raw knowledge and data unlike anyone else alive – much like ChatGPT.
Will knows everything to know, but it is all book smarts. He has no real-world experience. He has never lived, he has never loved, he has never lost someone close to him. He has never truly experienced any of what he knows.
The AI content tools are a lot like this. They know everything about everything, they have crazy book smarts but no real experience, and they never will have.
That is the opportunity where you can come in and create something unique by integrating these two components – your experience and expertise with the rapid output and breadth of knowledge provided by AI.
A strategy to safely use AI in your content production
The key here is to think of AI as an intelligent assistant rather than a complete means to an end.
If you take the path-of-least resistance approach, as most will, your content will never satisfy Google’s criteria. Worse still, you will create nothing that Google can’t answer directly with their own Search Generative Experience (lose-lose).
By combining your expertise and experience with generative AI, you can create content that is greater than the sum of its parts and almost certainly more significant than anything a generative AI can automate and produce alone.
A simple SEO SWOT analysis that looks at your competitors will allow you to identify SEO opportunities, as most sites are just not doing this as well as they could yet.
The benefits here extend beyond content creation. Whether you rely on SEO or PPC, or some other traffic generation, your engagement and conversion rates will rocket.
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This is not to say that generative AI is not truly helpful.
There are several tasks in the content ideation and creation process where generative AI tools like ChatGPT can radically help you speed up and improve your output.
1. Ideation
ChatGPT simplifies generating ideas and a simple prompt asking for topic ideas will generate several results.
For example: “Can you suggest some article topics around generative AI and SEO?”
This produced around 20 articles in 10 categories in around 30 seconds. Each of these could then be further explored (using your own expertise and experience).
2. Research and information gathering
AI can be used to quickly sift through vast amounts of data or provide summaries of detailed articles or scientific studies. This can help you develop deep, well-researched articles in a short amount of time.
You can also use ChatGPT to cross-check facts and provide sources to ensure the information shared is trustworthy.
It is always worth double-checking before you publish, but even with this step, you will speed up your workflow and cover more ground.
3. Content drafting
With a topic and a rough outline, generative AI can quickly create drafts for you to polish and refine. You can also create variants in different tones, styles or from different perspectives to pick the very best approach.
4. Editing and proofing
AI can check your grammar, review content readability and suggest improvements in flow and structure.
5. SEO
AI can help simplify the optimization of an article by suggesting keywords and optimizing the article and metadata.
6. E-E-A-T
AI tools like ChatGPT can also review your content from the perspective of E-E-A-T criteria and suggest improvements to ensure you hit all of these important points for modern SEO content.
Tip: I would generally recommend tackling each element of the E-E-A-T criteria separately here, as you can get some whacky results trying to get feedback here.
7. A/B testing
AI makes it easy to create multiple versions of content headlines, calls-to-action or even an entire content piece and then use these to split tests for engagement.
How to review your content
Google has outlined what they are looking for with E-E-A-T and also provides a series of questions you can use to review your content at Google Search Central.
Google certainly provides a comprehensive set of questions to review content. Still, for your average content writer or marketing team, this is almost an insane level of overkill that will tie you up in knots.
To make this more actionable, I have created a simple set of 10 questions that covers the author, content, website and E-E-A-T and helps you ensure your content is something that Google will want to surface in the search results.
Author
Is it clear who authored the content?
Is there detailed author information available?
Content
Is the content original, useful and substantive?
Is the content different or substantially better than other pieces out there?
Does the content provide a new viewpoint or way to view the topic?
Website
Is the publishing website credible with a good reputation?
Experience
Does the author have first-hand experience on this topic?
Expertise
Does the author have demonstrable expertise on the subject?
Authority
Is the author (and or website) a known expert and source for this subject?
Trust
Is the page accurate and the facts reliable?
You can also use tools like ChatGPT to help you answer these questions and find out more about the author, review the content, review competing content and much more.
You just have to get creative in your approach, ask these tools questions and review the responses.
AI in SEO: Intelligent assistance
The obvious pitfall with generative AI and SEO is falling into the path-of-least-resistance trap.
SEO history has shown us that these low-value approaches, while you may generate some small, transient wins, won’t win the more significant, long-term battles.
Instead of looking to automate and dominate, use AI tools as an intelligent assistant rather than a complete means to an end.
Automated content will never satisfy Google’s ever more robust criteria. Worse still, you will create nothing that Google can’t answer directly with their own Search Generative Experience, making your content irrelevant.
By combining your expertise and experience with generative AI, you can create content greater than the sum of its parts and almost certainly greater than anything a generative AI can produce alone.
The benefits here extend beyond content creation, and whether you rely on SEO or PPC or something other traffic generation, your engagement and conversion rates will skyrocket.
Marketers often work at a distance from frontline operations.
We may not directly build the product, deal with angry customer phone calls, or be out in the field selling.
We might even be at an agency, an additional level removed from the shop floor or direct interactions with the target customer.
How, then, can you:
Know what to write about?
Insert meaningful insights into your landing pages or ad creative?
Effectively persuade your target audience that you are the clear choice over your competitors?
Digging new wells to find new content
One of the best writing tips I’ve ever received is to “dig new wells.” That is, to get content no one else is writing, you need to establish different sources.
Too often, content writing for the web starts with the search results. While it makes sense to look at what’s ranking for your target keywords, it should not be your only source of information.
The rise of 10x content and the Skyscraper Technique led some content writers to rely on rewording and combining top pages into a long, SEO-focused page. But it’s not getting outside sources of information.
For me, the best type of content for the web comes from outside the web. Pulling content ideas, inspiration, and even language from real-life sources can help your content stand out, resonate with your target audience, and even alleviate any concerns they have.
Plus, combining outside-sourced content with an SEO’s skills in finding keywords, structuring content, and generating links can form a powerful piece of content that performs nicely.
Here are a few ways to dig new wells to find new content.
1. Source content from employees
The single greatest source of content is from front-line employees. Depending on your business, you might have:
Salespeople
Salespeople earn their living by earning trust, highlighting benefits, and alleviating fears of potential customers or clients.
Any successful salesperson has already worked out a script based on common pain points and exactly what message can help convince people to buy.
Customer service representatives (CSRs)
As frontline workers who come in contact the most with existing customers, they know the most common questions and objections people have.
If a CSR gets asked the same question regularly (say once per week or greater), the answer to that question should become content on your site.
Those doing the work
Another great source of content is from those doing the actual work. Visit the factory floor, buy coffee for the production team, or go for a ride along with the installation team.
By spending time with those who actually make your products or carry out your services, you will get a newfound understanding and appreciation for what they do.
Plus, they should be able to provide great insights into how you are different than your competitors – whether it is better materials, unique processes, or attention to detail.
Example of sourcing content from employees
I had a client in the agriculture industry who wanted to grow by getting their brand in front of more farmers. My main contact was a salesperson working in the field six days a week, traveling from farm to farm.
In some ways, he functioned more as a consultant, helping generate ideas and sharing best practices from others to help each farmer expand their operation.
He would be the first to tell you he was not a great choice for writing new content for their website. Here’s what worked for us: I would get him on the phone while driving between farms, and he would rant.
For half an hour, he would brain-dump his thoughts on a certain product or service his company was offering. I was simply there to transcribe and ask follow-up questions.
When it was time to write the website content, I found that the salesperson’s rants would form 80% of the page. I was merely there to edit and shape it into a logical flow and ensure it was optimized for search and conversions.
Another well of great content ideas is from your current customers or clients. They are your best source for entering the buyer’s mind and decision-making process.
If possible, make it a habit to regularly interview some of your current customers. Ask them questions about:
Their pain points.
How they researched options.
What mattered and didn’t matter to them as they made a decision.
You can sometimes use these stories as the basis for case studies or featured project pages for your site. At the very least, you will uncover phrases, words and concepts that can become integral parts of your website content and marketing efforts.
Example of sourcing content from current customers
A few years back, I was working on a branding campaign for a furniture company. Their core business was selling through furniture stores; they saw an opportunity to increase sales by working with high-end interior designers.
As we worked on drafting content for their website and marketing material, our team booked calls with a handful of interior designers with whom they currently worked.
These phone calls were a wealth of information and insights into these interior designers’ pain points, goals and dreams.
Some insights they provided were completely unknown to the furniture company. What we learned from these calls proved invaluable in shaping the website content.
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Past customer reviews are among the easiest yet impactful wells to pull content ideas and language.
Whether past customers have left reviews on your Google Business Profile, Amazon, a third-party review site, or your own internal system, these are great sources of info about how the market views your product or service.
Customer reviews are great because they provide a glimpse into your customer's thinking at scale – no need to interview them. Online reviews also collect the right language, pain points, and angles you may not have noticed.
Whenever I take on a new local SEO client, I make it a point to read every review on their Google Business Profile. I like looking for trends and themes across the reviews and see anecdotally what really matters to customers.
Google does pull out themes by seeing the top 10 topics or phrases mentioned in reviews.
You can take your reviews and put them in a sentiment analysis tool to see topics, trends, and talk points that you can share with your CSR or use in your marketing, advertising and website efforts.
Example of sourcing content from past customers
One time, I was reading reviews for a new client in the home service industry.
A few reviews told a similar story: each mentioned the same salesperson by name and how professional and informational the salesperson was – especially compared to other companies. And each said a surprising detail: the salesperson gave a gift of local jam.
One specific salesperson was doing this to make connections with his prospects, but it was leaving such an impact on customers that they mentioned it in their reviews.
When our client found out about this, they made it a standard across all sales staff, and we mentioned it as part of the online appointment scheduler.
4. Source content from competitors
A surprising source of content ideas can come from your competitors.
As we saw above, if online reviews for your own products or services can provide helpful insights for your marketing efforts, what can you learn from reading the reviews of your competitors? A lot!
Find a few of your competitors and read every review of theirs that is three stars or lower. Bad or mixed reviews can provide a gold mine of information about what people don't like about your competitors.
These points can be used in your marketing efforts, as they are pain points your target audience has, and your competitors are not meeting.
Example of sourcing content from competitors
While conducting competitive research for an outdoor structure company, I noticed their main competitors had a fair amount of indifferent reviews. As I read these reviews, I noticed themes. Most reviews mentioned:
A lack of communication.
Misunderstandings about the delivery and installation process.
I took this to the client, and we discussed how we could make their service better. The client worked on strengthening their already solid customer communication system.
On the website, we invested in content to fully explain how they deliver and install their structures, answering every single question their CSR is regularly asked.
Finally, we created a comprehensive guide on the entire sales process, from initial order through installation. We used this as a target for a remarketing campaign to help reengage with potential customers.
In July, Google released a massive update to the Knowledge Graph. We named it the E-E-A-T Knowledge Graph update and gave it the codename “Killer Whale” because it made a splash in the SERPs twice:
In real time between July 14 and 18.
As part of the September helpful content update.
A Knowledge Graph (Vault) update rarely occurs simultaneously with a ranking update, core or otherwise. SERP volatility has seldom coincided with Knowledge Graph volatility. Kalicube Pro has been measuring volatility since 2015 with our Knowledge Graph Sensor.
The graph below shows a significant uptick in the depth of the Knowledge Graph between July 14 and 18.
As you’ll see, Google’s SERPs were hugely volatile on those days, too – for the first time ever.
Checking the tools that provide historical data for SERP volatility, there is a huge peak between July 14 and 18. Accuranker and Advanced Web Ranking show that the volatility was significantly higher than during the subsequent core updates.
Algoroo indicates that July to August 2023 was the most intense and longest volatility since they started tracking in 2018.
So. Huge.
Some people reported changes to their Knowledge Panel in July. Still, Kalicube data shows changes to Knowledge Panels were not widespread in July (we analyzed over 100,000 rand SERPs containing Knowledge Panels).
Please exercise caution when making assumptions and performing manual checks. The degree I earned in economics and statistical analysis taught me that generalizing from a particular, or several particulars, is a huge mistake.
The changes to Knowledge Panels happened during the September core update, as we will see.
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Knowledge Panels represent Google’s explicit understanding of named entities
Google cannot fully apply E-E-A-T signals to an article's author (writer) if it doesn’t explicitly understand the writer's identity.
The Knowledge Panel is the visual representation of Google’s explicit understanding of the writer. Without a stable, information-rich, and non-duplicated Knowledge Panel, your work building and demonstrating the writer’s E-E-A-T credentials is significantly under-leveraged.
The same approach applies to the company that owns and runs the website.
Sidenote: Google changed some significant terms in its Search Quality Rater Guidelines (SQRG) in December 2022, including changing “website” to “website owner.”
“The website owner is the person, company, or organization responsible for a website,” according to Google’s SQRG. This definition clearly indicates they are looking for the named entity responsible for the website and its content.
2023 core updates, E-E-A-T, Knowledge Panels and the Knowledge Vault update
The September 2023 helpful content update introduced the changes made in the Knowledge Vault on the SERPs in the form of Knowledge Panels.
The percentage of Personal Brand SERPs with a Knowledge Panel increased from 38% to more than 50% (a rise of more than a third).
This is truly a Person update. For Corporations (and Organizations), the figure stayed steady at 40%.
We know that helpful content updates focus on improving Google’s ability to deliver the best solution from the most credible source (a.k.a., E-E-A-T).
Google’s July 2023 Knowledge Graph update added a layer to the September helpful content update. Google talks about “improved classification,” which is exactly what the Killer Whale update did to Person entities in the Knowledge Vault.
A quick aside: we now talk about N-E-E-A-T-T, adding “notability” and “transparency” to the mix. Without niche-level notability, you don’t stand out in your market. And without transparency, neither humans nor bots can understand who you are and why they should trust you.
Importantly, notability does not mean what Wikipedia says it means. Consider notability as having enough impact in a particular field for a specific audience to warrant recognition. Well-targeted digital PR and placement of your content on relevant platforms that are authoritative in your niche are two ways to approach niche notability.
Transparency simply means being open and honest. For example, having an easy-to-find and clear returns policy, privacy policy, cookie policy, About us page, etc.
Reliance on Wikipedia in Knowledge Panels dropped significantly
The percentage of Knowledge Panels on personal brand SERPs using descriptions from Wikipedia dropped from 77.7% in June 2023 to 50.4% in September.
For Corporations, the ratio remained steady: the percentages were 69.8% and 66.8% respectively.
Additionally, Google is expanding its horizons: the number of unique domains providing descriptions in Knowledge Panels or trusted sources has more than doubled.
Importantly, the relative importance of each non-Wikipedia platform has changed significantly.
Crunchbase has become much more important, and Google Books and IMDB are no longer dominant, which makes sense given the Knowledge Vault update I have described.
But before you leap on Crunchbase, remember that Google will prioritize hyper-niche trusted sources for Knowledge Panels.
For example, Google has identified jasonbarnard.com as the trusted source for Boowa and Kwala. So, your strategy needs to be to go “hyper niche.”
The Kalicube Pro database contains over 63,000 unique trusted sources and the 400 trusted sources we provide free on the site.
Avoid handing control of your brand narrative to a third party, like Wikipedia. A source the entity owns and controls, like a website, is ideal.
For example, kalicube.com is the trusted source for Kalicube, and Kalicube controls the information about the business instead of a third-party source.
What you need to do right now
Knowledge Panels are already the next big thing. The July 2023 E-E-A-T Knowledge Graph update is based on expanding, classifying, and identifying E-E-A-T-applicable entities. It is limited to people.
The September 2023 helpful content update also prioritized Person entities and significantly reduced its dependency on Wikipedia for information it shows in Knowledge Panels for people.
For writer/author entities
If you are in any of these three situations:
You missed the boat this time, and a Knowledge Panel still doesn’t trigger on your personal brand SERP.
You see incorrect information in the Knowledge Panel for your Person entity.
You lost a personal Knowledge Panel.
…then it’s time to work on the Knowledge Panels of your key Person entities to leverage as much E-E-A-T goodness as possible.
It’s time to build your personal brand and get your “Google stamp of approval” in the form of a Knowledge Panel.
Take action and actively educate Google about who you are and earn its trust. (Or get lost in the abyss of Internet darkness.
For website owner entities
The next Knowledge Vault update will likely be the expansion, classification, and identification of E-E-A-T-applicable entities for Corporations and Organizations.
For companies, businesses, corporations and people who double up as authors and website owners, it's time to build a brand around your entities, build understanding for Google and get a Knowledge Panel.
Unless Google knows, likes and trusts you (through E-E-A-T), the next update spells disaster.
When will the next update be?
From our historical data, the pattern for Entity updates is clear for the last eight years: December, February (or March), and July have consistently been the critical months.
In each of the last five years, July has seen by far the most impactful updates.
Get ready. Our experience with thousands of Knowledge Panels is that you need to have all your corroboration straight six to eight weeks before the update. That update will be either February 2024 or July 2024.
