SEO
The 9 Most Important SEO KPIs You Should Be Tracking
If you ask 10 SEOs what their top SEO Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are, you’ll likely receive 10 different answers.
The reason is that KPIs are situational; they are specific to each type of business.
Accordingly, the following are nine KPIs that can be considered important for a wide variety of online monetization models.
An interesting thing about KPIs is that KPIs aren’t always metrics that show where you are winning. They can also be metrics that show where improvement is needed.
Many people rightly focus on metrics related to winning and focus on improving those in order to increase sales, conversions, and other metrics of winning. It’s a good approach.
But there are also KPIs related to failure, and those can be useful for identifying new areas to find success.
So, this survey reviews KPIs related to success and failure, investigates shortcomings in popular KPIs, and introduces additional KPIs that may not be widely known.
1. Customer Lifetime Value (CLV)
Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) is a metric that measures the earnings each customer brings.
In the context of SEO, CLV helps a business identify which SEO activities result in the greatest positive financial impact.
Jeff Coyle, co-founder of AI-based content strategy SaaS company MarketMuse, is passionate about CLV and feels it is an important KPI for many businesses to be aware of.
Jeff Coyle said this about the CLV KPI:
“My perspective on using CLV and why it connects to core KPI is because it’s a Unifying metric.
I love unifying metrics because all teams, all silos, have to support it.
It forces people who typically focus only on one stage of the funnel to think bigger, to think customer-centric.
So in terms of content, it typically means all teams have to think about the entire funnel, all personas, all levels of expertise of the future and present customers.
An SEO focused on a myopic one keyword to one webpage SEO hack or publishing low-quality content may be able to get lucky with a ranking every once in a while.
But that type of strategy isn’t going perform well with CLV growth.
Similarly, a PPC person or a demand generation marketer who isn’t willing to support full funnel content at awareness stage and all the way down but they should, especially for support and customer content.
They get paid on leads and conversions.
Customer Lifetime Value makes them have to care about all the content. It makes them care about customer success, renewals, support and exponential viral growth.”
According to Jeff, focusing on CLV forces all parts of the company to hone what they do toward keeping the company growing year over year.
2. Content Efficiency
Jeff had one more KPI he wanted to share, and this one is Content Efficiency.
Content Efficiency is a fascinating metric because it’s about optimizing content not just for search engines but for achieving company goals for that content.
Jeff explains it like this:
“My other favorite KPI is content efficiency. It’s about how many content items you publish, how many content items you update and/or optimize versus how often those pages meet their goals and predicted ROI.
Average content teams create content that reaches 10% of their goals, 10% of their content is successful.
I get teams operating 40% or more, where 40% or more of their content achieve their intended goals. That percentage defines good content teams.
Looked at another way, the company with the team performing at 10% Content Efficiency is a company that is spending 10 times what they think they are spending on content to achieve their goals.
How much does content cost? $400 to $500 a page? They only get meaningful results from 10% of that content.
So, their effective cost per successful content motion (publication and updating the content) is like $5,000 for the average team.
For a team operating at peak Content Efficiency, the cost is around $2,500 to $3,000 to achieve their goals.
Using Content Efficiency as a KPI, that’s when people really start wanting to improve their content strategy and transition to data-driven decision making for what to create and what to update.
Content Efficiency is one of the core MarketMuse value propositions. Personalized Difficulty metrics. You know what to build and how much you need to invest to make an impact.”
3. Average Engagement Time
I next asked someone who specializes in analytics, Kayle Larkin, about KPIs.
Kayle is an Analytics and SEM consultant for B2B and ecommerce sites in the U.S., Canada, Europe, and Asia, as well as a Content Writer here at Search Engine Journal.
She shared about a KPI available in Google Analytics 4 that tracks user engagement with a website, something that can be difficult to accurately measure.
Kayle shared:
“GA4 (Google Analytics 4) improved our ability to measure whether or not a user engaged with the website.
Average engagement time tells us the average length of time that the site had focus in the user’s browser. That means the user was most likely looking at it.”
4. Conversion Goals By Percent-Based Metrics
Kayle next advised reviewing KPIs as percent-based metrics:
“The most important KPI is conversions/goals. Which should only be that which makes your company money.
However… Don’t forget to look at goals by percent-based metrics, not solely raw event values.
Because if your traffic is increasing, the number of goals will naturally increase too.
But, if the goal conversion rate (expressed as a percentage) is dropping then maybe the organic campaign is not as efficient as it could be.
Or, on the flip side maybe traffic is decreasing but goal conversion rate is increasing because you’re better focused/speaking to your target audience.”
Those two are the main KPIs from an “Is this organic strategy performing well over time?” viewpoint.
5. Accurate Search Visibility KPIs
Next, I asked Cindy Krum, and she shared two KPIs that are proprietary to her company, MobileMoxie.
The KPIs she shared are improvements to accurately assessing search visibility.
Most search ranking reports operate on the old model of 10 blue links. But, the search results are not 10 blue links anymore, they’ve evolved.
Cindy shows how there are more accurate KPIs to track that will give a better idea of search visibility.
Cindy shared metrics that provide a more accurate view of the search engine results pages (SERPs):
“At MobileMoxie, we are looking more and more at metrics that tell the story of the SERP – especially on important head terms.
We know that ranking in ‘Position 1′ isn’t what it used to be, so in our toolset we also look at things that give us more information about the ranking, such as ‘Pixels from the Top.’
We also compare the ‘Traditional Rank’ with ‘Actual Rank’.
Traditional Rank is what SEO’s are used to using, which excludes things like PPC, Knowledge Graph, and other Google assets in the SERPs.
So, what we do is compare Traditional Rank with Actual Rank, which counts everything in the SERPs that can push an organic ranking down, including PPC, Knowledge Graph, Answers, and other Google elements in the search.
This comparison tells us more about the value of each ranking and how visible a search position really is to a searcher.”
6. Brand Visibility In Search KPIs
Cindy next shared another metric that tracks brand visibility in a way that includes all of a brand’s assets, particularly off-site brand assets.
“We have also started caring much more about a brand’s over-all representation in a search result.
That includes how much of the SERP is dominated by brand assets, including content on the main site, and also other content, such as social media profiles and posts, YouTube videos, images, Knowledge Graph results, and everything else that could be a good representation of the brand, and help drive sales and awareness.
For years, SEOs have been optimizing off-site content, and we want them to start getting credit for that work too.
Off-site optimized assets are useful because they crowd competitors out of the SERPs.
So, we developed a score that we call the MoxieScore, that represents how much of a SERP a brand owns.
These are all important KPIs that we care about more now than ever before.”
7. New And Returning Users As KPIs
Jim Hedger, one of the hosts of the popular Webcology podcast, had an interesting take on using new and returning users as a KPI for optimizing web pages for more conversions, particularly for B2B websites.
Many KPIs are situational and depend on the type of site and who the visitors are. This idea about new and returning users as a KPI is no different in that regard.
Jim explains it like this:
“Most of us have clients with varying success metrics but each of those metrics have one thing in common, the site visitor must take a specific action, a conversion event, generally via a click.
Understanding how users get to the conversion event is critical to moving more users towards conversions.
Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and Bing Webmaster Tools can give us relatively good event metrics representing page value in relation to those conversion points.
In Google Analytics, it’s easy to separate site users into new and returning segments.
This gives a wildly different view of which pages in a site are most valuable to which segment of visitors.
Returning users tend to convert at a far higher rate than new users, even though new users tend to heavily outweigh returning users.
New users and returning users tend to enter the website on different landing pages.
Knowing new users are more likely visiting the site for discovery and returning users are frequently visiting to convert, and learning which pages each segment tends to move through on their conversion journey helps SEOs craft content that better suits the site visitor’s intent.
You may be surprised by looking at any KPI while segmenting between new and returning visitors. Since I’ve been doing that, I’ve noticed how very different the actions of each segment are.”
According to Jim, looking at site visitors as a KPI and segmenting the traffic into New and Returning visitors, one will attain a better view of which users are most valuable, and why.
8. Average Time On Site – A Caveat
Average time on site seems like a no-brainer KPI to use for trying to measure the effectiveness of the content on different webpages.
But there are actually some limits to be aware of regarding this KPI that need to be considered before using this as a way to measure the engagement success or lack of success of website content.
Jeff Coyle shared this:
“The average time on site can be a little misleading because if they don’t exclude bounces the data is terrible.”
I asked analytics expert Kayle Larkin about it, and she cautioned that Average Time on Site needs to be justified with data before using it as a KPI.
Kayle said:
“I don’t use Average Time on Site as a KPI so I’d have to see how they’re excluding bounces.
I guess this is one of those where and why things because it’s so situational.
Maybe if it was an affiliate site? Where you want people spending time on your page.
Maybe if they’ve found that people who spend between X and Z time have an increased conversion rate?
Otherwise, I’d ask why is this a KPI? How does this achieve business objectives?”
9. Revenue Per Thousand (RPM) And Average Position
Revenue Per Thousand (RPM) is a way to calculate how valuable your traffic is, particularly for ad-supported websites.
And, Average Position is a keyword ranking metric provided by Google Search Console.
Both of these KPIs can work together for identifying keywords and webpages that need improvement. This is one of those cases where two metrics working together can yield better insights.
RPM KPI
I wouldn’t use this KPI in isolation to determine the effectiveness of a webpage. But, it’s a good way to measure changes over the course of time to evaluate how a change to a webpage affects earnings.
You can do things like make a webpage faster or swap in a different kind of ad unit and through the RPM KPI get an idea of how well or poorly the change affects earnings.
A Google AdSense help page describes it like this:
“Revenue per 1,000 impressions (RPM) represents the estimated earnings you’d accrue for every 1,000 impressions you receive.
RPM doesn’t represent how much you have actually earned; rather, it’s calculated by dividing your estimated earnings by the number of page views, impressions, or queries you received, then multiplying by 1,000.”
Revenue Per Thousand may not seem like an SEO KPI but ad-derived earnings can be tracked to SEO via the RPM metric.
The keyword and traffic choices made on the SEO side will determine the performance on the revenue side.
For example, a common SEO approach is to focus on high-traffic keywords.
But some high traffic keywords don’t have a sales-related intent and this can be reflected in a lower RPM metric.
The most valuable keywords to bid on, for advertising purposes, are the ones with a strong sales intent.
The RPM metric is a good starting point for evaluating which kinds of topics have a good blend of traffic and high earnings.
Average Position KPI
This is a Google Search Console metric that shows the average position of a keyword phrase in the search results.
Google defines this metric like this:
“Average position [Chart only]-
The average position of the topmost result from your site.
So, for example, if your site has three results at positions 2, 4, and 6, the position is reported as 2.
If a second query returned results at positions 3, 5, and 9, your average position would be (2 + 3)/2 = 2.5. If a row of data has no impressions, the position will be shown as a dash (-), because the position doesn’t exist.”
KPIs tend to focus on where a website is winning. And, if the KPI isn’t “winning enough” then the effort is made to improve the KPI scores.
But KPIs that show low performance can be helpful, too.
For the Google Search Console average position report, the keywords at the bottom provide goals for increasing traffic and expanding search visibility.
The first step is to match the low-performing keywords to webpages to see if maybe the page needs an additional paragraph to expand on a topic or maybe a new webpage is necessary.
If Google thinks your website is relevant for a certain keyword but not relevant enough to show it on page one of the search results, then that may be a sign that your website already has one toe on page one of the SERPs for that keyword.
Keywords listed at the bottom of the average position report can be an inspiration for new ideas for growing search visibility.
Top SEO KPIs
The concept of top SEO KPIs seems to me almost not possible to iterate because every business model has different goals. This is why I (and others) say that KPIs are situational.
Marketing Analytics Expert and Canadian Search Awards Judge Alan Knecht makes the observation that because every business is different, each business must begin formulating their KPIs based on their specific goals.
Alan shared:
“Know what you want from your site, then measure that success. See if these successes improve at the same rate or faster than your SEO success.”
These top nine KPIs are not meant to be the absolute top KPIs. They are top because they are worthy of consideration and inspirational for developing your own KPIs that are relevant for your business.
More Resources:
Featured Image: TommyStockProject/Shutterstock
SEO
How To Use ChatGPT For Keyword Research
Anyone not using ChatGPT for keyword research is missing a trick.
You can save time and understand an entire topic in seconds instead of hours.
In this article, I outline my most effective ChatGPT prompts for keyword research and teach you how I put them together so that you, too, can take, edit, and enhance them even further.
But before we jump into the prompts, I want to emphasize that you shouldn’t replace keyword research tools or disregard traditional keyword research methods.
ChatGPT can make mistakes. It can even create new keywords if you give it the right prompt. For example, I asked it to provide me with a unique keyword for the topic “SEO” that had never been searched before.
“Interstellar Internet SEO: Optimizing content for the theoretical concept of an interstellar internet, considering the challenges of space-time and interplanetary communication delays.”
Although I want to jump into my LinkedIn profile and update my title to “Interstellar Internet SEO Consultant,” unfortunately, no one has searched that (and they probably never will)!
You must not blindly rely on the data you get back from ChatGPT.
What you can rely on ChatGPT for is the topic ideation stage of keyword research and inspiration.
ChatGPT is a large language model trained with massive amounts of data to accurately predict what word will come next in a sentence. However, it does not know how to do keyword research yet.
Instead, think of ChatGPT as having an expert on any topic armed with the information if you ask it the right question.
In this guide, that is exactly what I aim to teach you how to do – the most essential prompts you need to know when performing topical keyword research.
Best ChatGPT Keyword Research Prompts
The following ChatGPT keyword research prompts can be used on any niche, even a topic to which you are brand new.
For this demonstration, let’s use the topic of “SEO” to demonstrate these prompts.
Generating Keyword Ideas Based On A Topic
What Are The {X} Most Popular Sub-topics Related To {Topic}?
The first prompt is to give you an idea of the niche.
As shown above, ChatGPT did a great job understanding and breaking down SEO into three pillars: on-page, off-page & technical.
The key to the following prompt is to take one of the topics ChatGPT has given and query the sub-topics.
What Are The {X} Most Popular Sub-topics Related To {Sub-topic}?
For this example, let’s query, “What are the most popular sub-topics related to keyword research?”
Having done keyword research for over 10 years, I would expect it to output information related to keyword research metrics, the types of keywords, and intent.
Let’s see.
Screenshot from ChatGPT 4, April 2024Again, right on the money.
To get the keywords you want without having ChatGPT describe each answer, use the prompt “list without description.”
Here is an example of that.
List Without Description The Top {X} Most Popular Keywords For The Topic Of {X}
You can even branch these keywords out further into their long-tail.
Example prompt:
List Without Description The Top {X} Most Popular Long-tail Keywords For The Topic “{X}”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4,April 2024List Without Description The Top Semantically Related Keywords And Entities For The Topic {X}
You can even ask ChatGPT what any topic’s semantically related keywords and entities are!
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 2024Tip: The Onion Method Of Prompting ChatGPT
When you are happy with a series of prompts, add them all to one prompt. For example, so far in this article, we have asked ChatGPT the following:
- What are the four most popular sub-topics related to SEO?
- What are the four most popular sub-topics related to keyword research
- List without description the top five most popular keywords for “keyword intent”?
- List without description the top five most popular long-tail keywords for the topic “keyword intent types”?
- List without description the top semantically related keywords and entities for the topic “types of keyword intent in SEO.”
Combine all five into one prompt by telling ChatGPT to perform a series of steps. Example:
“Perform the following steps in a consecutive order Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 4, and Step 5”
Example:
“Perform the following steps in a consecutive order Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, Step 4 and Step 5. Step 1 – Generate an answer for the 3 most popular sub-topics related to {Topic}?. Step 2 – Generate 3 of the most popular sub-topics related to each answer. Step 3 – Take those answers and list without description their top 3 most popular keywords. Step 4 – For the answers given of their most popular keywords, provide 3 long-tail keywords. Step 5 – for each long-tail keyword offered in the response, a list without descriptions 3 of their top semantically related keywords and entities.”
Generating Keyword Ideas Based On A Question
Taking the steps approach from above, we can get ChatGPT to help streamline getting keyword ideas based on a question. For example, let’s ask, “What is SEO?”
“Perform the following steps in a consecutive order Step 1, Step 2, Step 3, and Step 4. Step 1 Generate 10 questions about “{Question}”?. Step 2 – Generate 5 more questions about “{Question}” that do not repeat the above. Step 3 – Generate 5 more questions about “{Question}” that do not repeat the above. Step 4 – Based on the above Steps 1,2,3 suggest a final list of questions avoiding duplicates or semantically similar questions.”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 2024Generating Keyword Ideas Using ChatGPT Based On The Alphabet Soup Method
One of my favorite methods, manually, without even using a keyword research tool, is to generate keyword research ideas from Google autocomplete, going from A to Z.
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Screenshot from Google autocomplete, April 2024
You can also do this using ChatGPT.
Example prompt:
“give me popular keywords that includes the keyword “SEO”, and the next letter of the word starts with a”
Screenshot from ChatGPT 4, April 2024Tip: Using the onion prompting method above, we can combine all this in one prompt.
“Give me five popular keywords that include “SEO” in the word, and the following letter starts with a. Once the answer has been done, move on to giving five more popular keywords that include “SEO” for each letter of the alphabet b to z.”
Generating Keyword Ideas Based On User Personas
When it comes to keyword research, understanding user personas is essential for understanding your target audience and keeping your keyword research focused and targeted. ChatGPT may help you get an initial understanding of customer personas.
Example prompt:
“For the topic of “{Topic}” list 10 keywords each for the different types of user personas”
Screenshot from ChatGPT 4, April 2024You could even go a step further and ask for questions based on those topics that those specific user personas may be searching for:
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 2024As well as get the keywords to target based on those questions:
“For each question listed above for each persona, list the keywords, as well as the long-tail keywords to target, and put them in a table”
Screenshot from ChatGPT 4, April 2024Generating Keyword Ideas Using ChatGPT Based On Searcher Intent And User Personas
Understanding the keywords your target persona may be searching is the first step to effective keyword research. The next step is to understand the search intent behind those keywords and which content format may work best.
For example, a business owner who is new to SEO or has just heard about it may be searching for “what is SEO.”
However, if they are further down the funnel and in the navigational stage, they may search for “top SEO firms.”
You can query ChatGPT to inspire you here based on any topic and your target user persona.
SEO Example:
“For the topic of “{Topic}” list 10 keywords each for the different types of searcher intent that a {Target Persona} would be searching for”
ChatGPT For Keyword Research Admin
Here is how you can best use ChatGPT for keyword research admin tasks.
Using ChatGPT As A Keyword Categorization Tool
One of the use cases for using ChatGPT is for keyword categorization.
In the past, I would have had to devise spreadsheet formulas to categorize keywords or even spend hours filtering and manually categorizing keywords.
ChatGPT can be a great companion for running a short version of this for you.
Let’s say you have done keyword research in a keyword research tool, have a list of keywords, and want to categorize them.
You could use the following prompt:
“Filter the below list of keywords into categories, target persona, searcher intent, search volume and add information to a six-column table: List of keywords – [LIST OF KEYWORDS], Keyword Search Volume [SEARCH VOLUMES] and Keyword Difficulties [KEYWORD DIFFICUTIES].”
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Screenshot from ChatGPT, April 2024
Tip: Add keyword metrics from the keyword research tools, as using the search volumes that a ChatGPT prompt may give you will be wildly inaccurate at best.
Using ChatGPT For Keyword Clustering
Another of ChatGPT’s use cases for keyword research is to help you cluster. Many keywords have the same intent, and by grouping related keywords, you may find that one piece of content can often target multiple keywords at once.
However, be careful not to rely only on LLM data for clustering. What ChatGPT may cluster as a similar keyword, the SERP or the user may not agree with. But it is a good starting point.
The big downside of using ChatGPT for keyword clustering is actually the amount of keyword data you can cluster based on the memory limits.
So, you may find a keyword clustering tool or script that is better for large keyword clustering tasks. But for small amounts of keywords, ChatGPT is actually quite good.
A great use small keyword clustering use case using ChatGPT is for grouping People Also Ask (PAA) questions.
Use the following prompt to group keywords based on their semantic relationships. For example:
“Organize the following keywords into groups based on their semantic relationships, and give a short name to each group: [LIST OF PAA], create a two-column table where each keyword sits on its own row.
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Screenshot from ChatGPT, April 2024
Using Chat GPT For Keyword Expansion By Patterns
One of my favorite methods of doing keyword research is pattern spotting.
Most seed keywords have a variable that can expand your target keywords.
Here are a few examples of patterns:
1. Question Patterns
(who, what, where, why, how, are, can, do, does, will)
“Generate [X] keywords for the topic “[Topic]” that contain any or all of the following “who, what, where, why, how, are, can, do, does, will”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 20242. Comparison Patterns
Example:
“Generate 50 keywords for the topic “{Topic}” that contain any or all of the following “for, vs, alternative, best, top, review”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 20243. Brand Patterns
Another one of my favorite modifiers is a keyword by brand.
We are probably all familiar with the most popular SEO brands; however, if you aren’t, you could ask your AI friend to do the heavy lifting.
Example prompt:
“For the top {Topic} brands what are the top “vs” keywords”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 20244. Search Intent Patterns
One of the most common search intent patterns is “best.”
When someone is searching for a “best {topic}” keyword, they are generally searching for a comprehensive list or guide that highlights the top options, products, or services within that specific topic, along with their features, benefits, and potential drawbacks, to make an informed decision.
Example:
“For the topic of “[Topic]” what are the 20 top keywords that include “best”
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, April 2024Again, this guide to keyword research using ChatGPT has emphasized the ease of generating keyword research ideas by utilizing ChatGPT throughout the process.
Keyword Research Using ChatGPT Vs. Keyword Research Tools
Free Vs. Paid Keyword Research Tools
Like keyword research tools, ChatGPT has free and paid options.
However, one of the most significant drawbacks of using ChatGPT for keyword research alone is the absence of SEO metrics to help you make smarter decisions.
To improve accuracy, you could take the results it gives you and verify them with your classic keyword research tool – or vice versa, as shown above, uploading accurate data into the tool and then prompting.
However, you must consider how long it takes to type and fine-tune your prompt to get your desired data versus using the filters within popular keyword research tools.
For example, if we use a popular keyword research tool using filters, you could have all of the “best” queries with all of their SEO metrics:
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Screenshot from Ahrefs Keyword Explorer, March 2024
And unlike ChatGPT, generally, there is no token limit; you can extract several hundred, if not thousands, of keywords at a time.
As I have mentioned multiple times throughout this piece, you cannot blindly trust the data or SEO metrics it may attempt to provide you with.
The key is to validate the keyword research with a keyword research tool.
ChatGPT For International SEO Keyword Research
ChatGPT can be a terrific multilingual keyword research assistant.
For example, if you wanted to research keywords in a foreign language such as French. You could ask ChatGPT to translate your English keywords;
Screenshot ChatGPT 4, Apil 2024- The key is to take the data above and paste it into a popular keyword research tool to verify.
- As you can see below, many of the keyword translations for the English keywords do not have any search volume for direct translations in French.
Screenshot from Ahrefs Keyword Explorer, April 2024But don’t worry, there is a workaround: If you have access to a competitor keyword research tool, you can see what webpage is ranking for that query – and then identify the top keyword for that page based on the ChatGPT translated keywords that do have search volume.
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Screenshot from Ahrefs Keyword Explorer, April 2024
Or, if you don’t have access to a paid keyword research tool, you could always take the top-performing result, extract the page copy, and then ask ChatGPT what the primary keyword for the page is.
Key Takeaway
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ChatGPT can be an expert on any topic and an invaluable keyword research tool. However, it is another tool to add to your toolbox when doing keyword research; it does not replace traditional keyword research tools.
As shown throughout this tutorial, from making up keywords at the beginning to inaccuracies around data and translations, ChatGPT can make mistakes when used for keyword research.
You cannot blindly trust the data you get back from ChatGPT.
However, it can offer a shortcut to understanding any topic for which you need to do keyword research and, as a result, save you countless hours.
But the key is how you prompt.
The prompts I shared with you above will help you understand a topic in minutes instead of hours and allow you to better seed keywords using keyword research tools.
It can even replace mundane keyword clustering tasks that you used to do with formulas in spreadsheets or generate ideas based on keywords you give it.
Paired with traditional keyword research tools, ChatGPT for keyword research can be a powerful tool in your arsenal.
More resources:
Featured Image: Tatiana Shepeleva/Shutterstock
SEO
OpenAI Expected to Integrate Real-Time Data In ChatGPT
Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, dispelled rumors that a new search engine would be announced on Monday, May 13. Recent deals have raised the expectation that OpenAI will announce the integration of real-time content from English, Spanish, and French publications into ChatGPT, complete with links to the original sources.
OpenAI Search Is Not Happening
Many competing search engines have tried and failed to challenge Google as the leading search engine. A new wave of hybrid generative AI search engines is currently trying to knock Google from the top spot with arguably very little success.
Sam Altman is on record saying that creating a search engine to compete against Google is not a viable approach. He suggested that technological disruption was the way to replace Google by changing the search paradigm altogether. The speculation that Altman is going to announce a me-too search engine on Monday never made sense given his recent history of dismissing the concept as a non-starter.
So perhaps it’s not a surprise that he recently ended the speculation by explicitly saying that he will not be announcing a search engine on Monday.
He tweeted:
“not gpt-5, not a search engine, but we’ve been hard at work on some new stuff we think people will love! feels like magic to me.”
“New Stuff” May Be Iterative Improvement
It’s quite likely that what’s going to be announced is iterative which means it improves ChatGPT but not replaces it. This fits into how Altman recently expressed his approach with ChatGPT.
He remarked:
“And it does kind of suck to ship a product that you’re embarrassed about, but it’s much better than the alternative. And in this case in particular, where I think we really owe it to society to deploy iteratively.
There could totally be things in the future that would change where we think iterative deployment isn’t such a good strategy, but it does feel like the current best approach that we have and I think we’ve gained a lot from from doing this and… hopefully the larger world has gained something too.”
Improving ChatGPT iteratively is Sam Altman’s preference and recent clues point to what those changes may be.
Recent Deals Contain Clues
OpenAI has been making deals with news media and User Generated Content publishers since December 2023. Mainstream media has reported these deals as being about licensing content for training large language models. But they overlooked a a key detail that we reported on last month which is that these deals give OpenAI access to real-time information that they stated will be used to give attribution to that real-time data in the form of links.
That means that ChatGPT users will gain the ability to access real-time news and to use that information creatively within ChatGPT.
Dotdash Meredith Deal
Dotdash Meredith (DDM) is the publisher of big brand publications such as Better Homes & Gardens, FOOD & WINE, InStyle, Investopedia, and People magazine. The deal that was announced goes way beyond using the content as training data. The deal is explicitly about surfacing the Dotdash Meredith content itself in ChatGPT.
The announcement stated:
“As part of the agreement, OpenAI will display content and links attributed to DDM in relevant ChatGPT responses. …This deal is a testament to the great work OpenAI is doing on both fronts to partner with creators and publishers and ensure a healthy Internet for the future.
Over 200 million Americans each month trust our content to help them make decisions, solve problems, find inspiration, and live fuller lives. This partnership delivers the best, most relevant content right to the heart of ChatGPT.”
A statement from OpenAI gives credibility to the speculation that OpenAI intends to directly show licensed third-party content as part of ChatGPT answers.
OpenAI explained:
“We’re thrilled to partner with Dotdash Meredith to bring its trusted brands to ChatGPT and to explore new approaches in advancing the publishing and marketing industries.”
Something that DDM also gets out of this deal is that OpenAI will enhance DDM’s in-house ad targeting in order show more tightly focused contextual advertising.
Le Monde And Prisa Media Deals
In March 2024 OpenAI announced a deal with two global media companies, Le Monde and Prisa Media. Le Monde is a French news publication and Prisa Media is a Spanish language multimedia company. The interesting aspects of these two deals is that it gives OpenAI access to real-time data in French and Spanish.
Prisa Media is a global Spanish language media company based in Madrid, Spain that is comprised of magazines, newspapers, podcasts, radio stations, and television networks. It’s reach extends from Spain to America. American media companies include publications in the United States, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Mexico, and Panama. That is a massive amount of real-time information in addition to a massive audience of millions.
OpenAI explicitly announced that the purpose of this deal was to bring this content directly to ChatGPT users.
The announcement explained:
“We are continually making improvements to ChatGPT and are supporting the essential role of the news industry in delivering real-time, authoritative information to users. …Our partnerships will enable ChatGPT users to engage with Le Monde and Prisa Media’s high-quality content on recent events in ChatGPT, and their content will also contribute to the training of our models.”
That deal is not just about training data. It’s about bringing current events data to ChatGPT users.
The announcement elaborated in more detail:
“…our goal is to enable ChatGPT users around the world to connect with the news in new ways that are interactive and insightful.”
As noted in our April 30th article that revealed that OpenAI will show links in ChatGPT, OpenAI intends to show third party content with links to that content.
OpenAI commented on the purpose of the Le Monde and Prisa Media partnership:
“Over the coming months, ChatGPT users will be able to interact with relevant news content from these publishers through select summaries with attribution and enhanced links to the original articles, giving users the ability to access additional information or related articles from their news sites.”
There are additional deals with other groups like The Financial Times which also stress that this deal will result in a new ChatGPT feature that will allow users to interact with real-time news and current events .
OpenAI’s Monday May 13 Announcement
There are many clues that the announcement on Monday will be that ChatGPT users will gain the ability to interact with content about current events. This fits into the terms of recent deals with news media organizations. There may be other features announced as well but this part is something that there are many clues pointing to.
Watch Altman’s interview at Stanford University
Featured Image by Shutterstock/photosince
SEO
Google’s Strategies For Dealing With Content Decay
In the latest episode of the Search Off The Record podcast, Google Search Relations team members John Mueller and Lizzi Sassman did a deep dive into dealing with “content decay” on websites.
Outdated content is a natural issue all sites face over time, and Google has outlined strategies beyond just deleting old pages.
While removing stale content is sometimes necessary, Google recommends taking an intentional, format-specific approach to tackling content decay.
Archiving vs. Transitional Guides
Google advises against immediately removing content that becomes obsolete, like materials referencing discontinued products or services.
Removing content too soon could confuse readers and lead to a poor experience, Sassman explains:
“So, if I’m trying to find out like what happened, I almost need that first thing to know. Like, “What happened to you?” And, otherwise, it feels almost like an error. Like, “Did I click a wrong link or they redirect to the wrong thing?””
Sassman says you can avoid confusion by providing transitional “explainer” pages during deprecation periods.
A temporary transition guide informs readers of the outdated content while steering them toward updated resources.
Sassman continues:
“That could be like an intermediary step where maybe you don’t do that forever, but you do it during the transition period where, for like six months, you have them go funnel them to the explanation, and then after that, all right, call it a day. Like enough people know about it. Enough time has passed. We can just redirect right to the thing and people aren’t as confused anymore.”
When To Update Vs. When To Write New Content
For reference guides and content that provide authoritative overviews, Google suggests updating information to maintain accuracy and relevance.
However, for archival purposes, major updates may warrant creating a new piece instead of editing the original.
Sassman explains:
“I still want to retain the original piece of content as it was, in case we need to look back or refer to it, and to change it or rehabilitate it into a new thing would almost be worth republishing as a new blog post if we had that much additional things to say about it.”
Remove Potentially Harmful Content
Google recommends removing pages in cases where the outdated information is potentially harmful.
Sassman says she arrived at this conclusion when deciding what to do with a guide involving obsolete structured data:
“I think something that we deleted recently was the “How to Structure Data” documentation page, which I thought we should just get rid of it… it almost felt like that’s going to be more confusing to leave it up for a period of time.
And actually it would be negative if people are still adding markup, thinking they’re going to get something. So what we ended up doing was just delete the page and redirect to the changelog entry so that, if people clicked “How To Structure Data” still, if there was a link somewhere, they could still find out what happened to that feature.”
Internal Auditing Processes
To keep your content current, Google advises implementing a system for auditing aging content and flagging it for review.
Sassman says she sets automated alerts for pages that haven’t been checked in set periods:
“Oh, so we have a little robot to come and remind us, “Hey, you should come investigate this documentation page. It’s been x amount of time. Please come and look at it again to make sure that all of your links are still up to date, that it’s still fresh.””
Context Is Key
Google’s tips for dealing with content decay center around understanding the context of outdated materials.
You want to prevent visitors from stumbling across obsolete pages without clarity.
Additional Google-recommended tactics include:
- Prominent banners or notices clarifying a page’s dated nature
- Listing original publish dates
- Providing inline annotations explaining how older references or screenshots may be obsolete
How This Can Help You
Following Google’s recommendations for tackling content decay can benefit you in several ways:
- Improved user experience: By providing clear explanations, transition guides, and redirects, you can ensure that visitors don’t encounter confusing or broken pages.
- Maintained trust and credibility: Removing potentially harmful or inaccurate content and keeping your information up-to-date demonstrates your commitment to providing reliable and trustworthy resources.
- Better SEO: Regularly auditing and updating your pages can benefit your website’s search rankings and visibility.
- Archival purposes: By creating new content instead of editing older pieces, you can maintain a historical record of your website’s evolution.
- Streamlined content management: Implementing internal auditing processes makes it easier to identify and address outdated or problematic pages.
By proactively tackling content decay, you can keep your website a valuable resource, improve SEO, and maintain an organized content library.
Listen to the full episode of Google’s podcast below:
Featured Image: Stokkete/Shutterstock
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