With the arrival of Artificial Intelligence (AI), many businesses are pondering how they can make this new technology work for them. Each industry is unique, of course, but one thing is for certain: AI has made quite an influence on the nature of digital marketing.
While AI has been impressive, it is just the latest innovation within the entire digital marketing landscape. In fact, Google has evolved and changed slowly over time, where marketers must pay special attention to these new innovations and adjust their efforts accordingly.
Let’s review some tips for digital marketing, along with how we can find success during AI’s arrival.
The Changing Landscape of Digital Marketing
AI continues to be utilized by the public to discover and explore information of all kinds. It leverages the information found on Google search engines to curate lists and publish them exclusively for the searcher. You can see it on Google’s search platform, where quick results provide information that is pulled from the many indexed sites within Google itself. This is a new feature added in recent months, helping users find what they are looking for without ever clicking on a link or having to scroll through hundreds of search results.
Just in the same way that it is important to have your website arrive high in search results, the same can be said for these AI-curated search results. Now, users can access information faster than ever, including details about businesses, local services, and details about major purchases. Your digital marketing efforts now have to focus on visibility in AI-focused search results, rather than just publishing traditional content.
Don’t Reinvent the Wheel, But Instead, Improve on Your Efforts
AI’s arrival does not mean you need to totally reshape your digital marketing efforts, but it could benefit from some tweaks and adjustments. Arriving in AI-focused search results means that you will need to write FOR AI, rather than letting AI do it for you.
This means that you will need to publish content that is meant for AI’s consumption. This includes content that looks and feels a lot like AI’s search results found at the top of Google’s search panel. Instead of publishing just narrative blogs, consider publishing pages dedicated to arriving in AI search results. This can include a mix of narrative, point-form notes, lists, tables, how-to-guides, and even pros and cons. These pages will remain important to arriving in AI search results, calling for marketers to gently adjust their efforts but stick to the main fundamentals of articulate storytelling.
The Nature of Local Search Results
One important detail that is often overlooked is the local focus that continues to be emphasized in search results. At one point, marketers would work to ensure that a website would shine in specific search results, spending most of their time on optimizing existing websites for Google’s rulebook, but also publishing relevant content that would help a website arrive high in search results.
Even with the arrival of AI, the nature of local search hasn’t changed much. Marketers must consider more than just a website, but also remain dedicated to publishing unique work through Google’s Google My Business Profile features.
Having a presence in search results is just the first step, but nowadays, having a presence on Google Maps remains just as important. That is why GMB, social media, and websites need to be married together in one cohesive unit, where GMB posts are published regularly, and websites also make mention of their local business profile. When all of these elements are tied together, that is when digital marketing magic begins.
Human-First Storytelling For an AI World
Original, articulate, and well-crafted content remains a key element to attracting target audiences and appearing in search results. With the arrival of AI, your storytelling efforts should remain focused on writing content for humans, by humans. As AI continues to churn out formulaic content, it continues to republish what is already found online. Publishing AI-written content runs the risk that Google will deem it to be “duplicate content,” punishing your website as a result.
This is the opposite of what your digital marketing team is looking to achieve, and penalties applied by search results can result in your business’ website seeing significantly reduced web traffic. By continuing to offer a balance of content in many different forms, with work that is entirely original and unique, remains the very best way to achieve your marketing goals and attract relevant attention online.
Time and Persistence Matter
Websites that have a significant online presence have remained dedicated to digital marketing work for many years, continually publishing content that is relevant to their target audience over time. This work is not only complex, but it also requires extensive time and effort. Many SEO agencies lean on specialists who can craft long-term strategies that are focused on specific goals of increasing web traffic over time. Not only is the regular publishing of content challenging, but there is a whole other effort related specifically to measuring the success of your work.
Just in the same way that it takes time to build a great physique in the gym, the same concept applies to marketing. Little by little and over long periods of time, your online presence can grow to be more visible and also attract new customers to your website.
The Role of SEO Agencies
SEO is an art form that calls for a unique balance of technical skill and writing abilities. Business leaders are likely overwhelmed with enough work related to their business, and as such, they rely on the services of an SEO agency that can handle these sometimes complicated tasks. Importantly, hiring a local agency to work alongside you to better understand your needs, but also understand your challenges as a local business that is looking to attract a local audience.
For instance, a Pittsburgh SEO agency can help you with your needs to attract locals in this city, carefully offering digital marketing consultation that considers your needs as a local business.
