Tuesday, at Google I/O, Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai keynote led with how AI is transforming Google Search, Liz Reid, Google’s head of Search, called AI Mode the future of search (see video). With all this change to Google Search quickly approaching, SEOs are wondering where this leaves them.
Will SEO die again? Are we all out of jobs? What changes do we need to make to adapt to the future of Google Search, AI search engines and new AI experiences?
The video. A number of search marketers asked my thoughts, so I thought I’d put together a video with my thoughts on all of this and them summarize it below:
After attending Google I/O, watching the keynote, speaking with Google executives at I/O and also chatting with the search industry both in person at I/O and on social media, I felt it would be a good thing to put my thoughts together on all these changes happening in our industry. Of course, this is all super early, especially the agentic experiences, but it is important we all start thinking about how search is changing and what we need to be doing about it.
Future of Google Search. There is no doubt that Google Search is changing in a big way. This is likely the biggest change Google Search ever made in its history, it is bigger than the universal search change in 2007, bigger than featured snippets and even bigger than AI Overviews. AI Mode, which is fully live in the U.S. and coming to more countries and regions soon, is the biggest change to Google Search ever.
And Liz Reid, Google’s head of Search, said, “This is the future of Google Search, a search that goes beyond information to intelligence,” when talking about AI Mode (see video 54 seconds in).
Plus, Google is showing the AI Mode tab before the “All” tab and it will always be in the same position, unlike other tabs, like News, Videos, Images and others.
These are the changes that Google set out to make when younger searchers were going to TikTok over Google a couple of years ago. AI Mode is the answer to OpenAI and its ChatGPT Search. It is the more snackable and consumable searcher experience, Google has been talking about.
The problem. The problem is, AI Mode and AI Overviews, according to several third-party studies, do not send traffic organically to websites. At least, they all show huge drops in click-through rates and drops in traffic to websites.
AI Mode is currently untrackable, and we are told AI Mode and AI Overviews won’t be individually trackable within Google Search Console (or Google Ads) from the main search results. So we all see less traffic from Google with AI Overviews and now AI Mode, we aren’t able to properly track them to validate that and see what changes we can make, it is a very troubling time for search marketers.
Google must change. Google isn’t going to keep its search engine the way it was for the past two decades. Google knows it has to change, despite them making an absolute fortune from search ads. Google is worried about TikTok, worried about, ChatGPT, worried about searchers going to something new and better.
So AI Mode is the future of Google Search because Google wants to give searchers what they want. It doesn’t hurt that AI Overviews led to 10% growth in search queries on Google. Wall Street loves that and advertising is baseline with AI Overviews on the page, than without them.
So the ad and revenue problem seems resolved. Searchers, according to Google, are happier. It just sends us less traffic and less conversions. And, to be real, you know Google cares primarily about making the searcher happy, because without happy searchers, they don’t have people clicking on search ads.
Future of SEO. So where does that leave SEOs? We know AI Mode is the future and we know traffic to our sites and client sites are down. What do we do?
Brand mentions: Imagine you do a search and AI Mode gives you this long answer. In the answer, the same two brands are mentioned over and over again. Do you think you might reach out to that brand to buy something they have to offer for your query? You want to be the brand mentioned in the AI Mode or AI Overview answer. Sure, you will get less traffic and probably fewer conversions but this is the space we are in now.
Agentic integrations: Eventually, Google will recommend where you buy your products or services from directly from your queries. It has been called “Agentic” integrations or AI Agents. Google technically can have AI Mode automatically integrate with your site and buy directly from your site based on the query and a confirmation from the searcher. Do you build integrations of these AI agents into your site? Will Google pick you over a much larger brand; like a mom and pop shoe store versus a Footlocker or a small travel agent over Expedia or Travelocity or direct integration with United, Delta or American Airlines? I even asked Hema Budaraju, the Senior Director of Product at Google about this and she responded that it is all very early in the journey and it is yet to be seen, in short, we don’t know yet.
Adapt or die. There are a lot of concerned people in the search marketing industry right now. The bottom line is while many of us like to complain and we honestly have good reason to be upset, complaining won’t help. We need to adapt and change and experiment. Experiment with these new experiences, keep on top of these changes happening in Google and at other AI and search companies. Then try new things and keep testing.
If you do not adapt, you will die. SEO won’t die, but you will become irrelevant.
The good news, SEOs are some of the best at adapting, embracing change and testing new strategies out. So you are all ready and equipped for the future of search.