You may have noticed (and been annoyed by) changes in how search engines now work. Instead of entering a series of keywords and getting a selection of pages that cover all or most of them, you’re now met with a block of content generated by artificial intelligence (AI) at the top of the results page. This is followed by a flood of sponsored content, and then, maybe, a few scattered links that might actually be useful.
Getting seen in the age of predictive search
For individuals, this shift is frustrating. For businesses that rely on search engines to get their products or services in front of potential customers, it can be catastrophic. Many managed service providers (MSPs) depend heavily on users discovering their services through search.
If your company has built a strong brand and users include your name in their search, you’re in luck. The new, “improved” search engines will likely show several pages from your site below the AI-generated and sponsored content, giving you visibility. But if users already know your company’s name, wouldn’t they just go directly to your website?
Adapt your strategy to match how AI interprets queries
So, how can you make AI-driven search engines work in your favor?
You’ll likely need to unlearn much of what you know about traditional search engine optimization (SEO). AI doesn’t just match keywords—it tries to understand the intent behind a user’s query. This allows it to predict desired outcomes and deliver results that better meet user needs.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t make it any easier to figure out how to land on the first or second page of an AI-powered search engines. MSPs could throw money at the problem. Next-gen SEO companies are emerging that audit your existing content and offer insights into what’s required. Some even take over parts of your content strategy to ensure everything runs smoothly. If you go this route, structure your contract around outcomes. Identify common searches in your market and ensure your MSP ranks highly across major search engines.
Alternatively, you might prefer to go your own way. In that case, you’ll need to understand how AI algorithms work and adapt your strategy accordingly.
The rise of AI in search engine optimization
A good example is Google RankBrain, which has been around for over a decade. It gradually replaced much of the manual coding Google used to build its search engine. RankBrain was designed to assess user satisfaction with search results and automatically adjust the algorithm to improve outcomes. It uses metrics like click-through rates, dwell time (how long users stay on a page), bounce rate (users who leave without interacting), and pogo-sticking (users jumping between multiple pages before finding one that meets their needs).
As AI became more mainstream and affordable, RankBrain’s capabilities grew exponentially. Google introduced its Search Generative Experience (SGE), which digs deeper to understand what a searcher really means. SGE generates the AI content block at the top of the results page, and other search engines now offer similar features.
Tailored content beats generic messaging
AI-powered search engines now consider many more factors when deciding whether a website or page should appear in search results. Speed of opening, how personalized the content is, and how engaging the content is.
This is where MSPs now need to concentrate.
- Clean up websites by removing unnecessary clutter to improve page load speed.
- Create content that is specific to certain markets. Forget general content that tries to be everything to everybody. Instead, focus on creating content that explores one aspect of your work in depth or targets a specific vertical, regional group, or business size within your prospective audience.
- Ensure that the content is engaging. Instead of involving large groups in the process of reviewing and modifying content until it becomes bland, it’s more effective to identify trustworthy content creators. Give them creative freedom, while ensuring only that the content is accurate and legally compliant before publishing. By all means, use generative AI to create the outline of content, but I would recommend still using humans to better polish it to meet the end requirements.
Maintain tracking what’s happening on your website: use the findings to continually feedback as to what is working and remove content that just isn’t finding any traction with the public.
Prompting skills will define future search success
Finally, remember this is a moving target. Currently, the level of advanced usage of AI prompts is low. Most users still start by typing a few words into a search engine and building from there. As time progresses, however, users who have grown up with AI will come through who understand that carefully crafting AI prompts will lead to much better search results. As this happens, you will need to ensure that your strategies have also changed with the times. Make sure that you employ people who have an ongoing understanding of the world of AI.
Photo: voronaman / Shutterstock
This post originally appeared on Smarter MSP.