Content creators who are just starting to work for themselves think that the hardest part is earning money. In reality, the difficulties begin after the income is received, because the money needs to be properly distributed, invested, and not “eaten up” before the next month. This is usually where problems arise, since money can come from 2–3 sources but leave through 10, and in the end, it’s unc

Google says its AI-powered advertising tools are starting to deliver meaningful results, including major revenue gains for some retailers, as it experiments with how ads work in AI-driven search. The big picture . Fears that AI chatbots like ChatGPT would disrupt Google’s core search business haven’t materialized, and instead the company’s ads business continues to grow, suggesting AI may be expa

Google Search is evolving beyond links and answers into a system that completes tasks, potentially fundamentally changing how users interact with the web. That’s according to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai, speaking on the Cheeky Pint podcast. Why we care. Google is signaling a move from information retrieval to task execution. Search becoming agentic. Traditional search behavior is already changing

Google’s AI Overviews answered a standard factual benchmark correctly 91% of the time in February, up from 85% in October, according to a New York Times analysis with AI startup Oumi. However, Google handles more than 5 trillion searches per year , so that means tens of millions of answers every hour may be wrong. Why we care . We’ve watched Google shift from linking to sources to summarizing the

Google has begun placing sponsored ad units directly inside the Images tab of mobile search results — a new placement that eligible campaigns can access without any changes to existing keyword targeting. What’s happening. When a user navigates to the Images tab within Google Search on mobile, they may now see sponsored units appearing within the image grid. Each unit shows a full image creative a

Over 30% of outbound clicks go to just 10 domains, with Google alone taking more than 20%, according to a new Semrush study published today. ChatGPT also relies less on the live web, triggering search on 34.5% of queries, down from 46% in late 2024. The big picture . ChatGPT’s growth has plateaued, and its role in how users navigate the web is evolving unevenly. Referral traffic from ChatGPT grew

Google is rolling out new Google Maps features that make it easier to contribute photos, reviews, and local insights, while adding Gemini-powered caption suggestions. Local Guides redesign. Contributor profiles are getting more visibility. Total points now appear more prominently, Local Guide levels are easier to spot, and badge designs have been refreshed. Top contributors will also stand out mo

Google once attributed two of Barry Schwartz’s Search Engine Land articles to me — a misclassification at the annotation layer that briefly rewrote authorship in Google’s systems. For a few days, when you searched for certain Search Engine Land articles Schwartz had written, Google listed me as the author. The articles appeared in my entity’s publication list and were connected to my Knowledge Pa

WordCamp Asia 2026 will be available to watch live across three days of streaming, making it easy for the global WordPress community to follow along from anywhere. This year’s live streamed programming begins with a special Contributor Day broadcast, followed by two full conference days of presentations from across the WordPress community. This post gathers each official stream in one place so yo

Many of today’s PPC tools were designed to be easily accessible to ecommerce. That doesn’t mean lead gen can’t take advantage of them, but it does mean more intentional application is required. Lead gen with AI still requires a creative approach, and many conventional ecommerce tools still apply — but not always in the same way. Here are the priorities that matter most for succeeding with lead ge

New research shows AI Mode is reshaping buying decisions. Learn how to secure visibility, trust, and top placement. The post How Consumers Navigate High-Stakes Purchases In AI Mode appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

For most people, “Mad Men” means the TV show. But the phrase points to something more specific: Madison Avenue in the 1950s and ‘60s, when agencies grew brands through persuasion, positioning, and earned trust in a world of scarce media channels and powerful gatekeepers. If you wanted attention, you bought your way in, then made your product the obvious choice. When the internet arrived and Googl

Search results used to be a doorway. You ranked, someone clicked, and they landed on your site. But today, that model is eroding faster than most marketing teams are equipped to move. Bain & Company research found that about 80% of consumers now rely on “zero-click” results in at least 40% of their searches. For some businesses, this means more impressions, but across the board, it’s reducing org

PPC professionals commanding higher compensation are moving beyond T-shaped skill sets toward M-shaped expertise with multiple deep, complementary disciplines. The post appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

This is a programming note that I am completely offline for the last days of Passover holiday Wednesday and Thursday. I am likely not going to schedule any stories, I apologize (still in recovery mode). So I apologize for the lack of stories here. I hope to come back soon…

I’m getting a mid-career executive MBA. Last week, in class, we discussed the interaction between automation and advertising. The lecture covered why A/B testing in Meta is less valuable now, since Facebook can auto-optimize faster and better than marketers can on their own. A classmate took the logical leap and asked the professor, “If digital channels have more data and more processing power, w

Google explains why it doesn’t matter if websites are getting heavier and the takeaway has everything to do with SEO. The post Google Explains Why It Doesn’t Matter That Websites Are Getting Larger appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

For years, Salesforce Marketing Cloud was the safe choice. Powerful. Enterprise. Trusted. But lately, we’re hearing something different: “Our data is too tangled to activate.” “We’re locked into contracts.” “We’re stuck sending the same emails on repeat.” “Everything is Band-Aids and duct tape — I don’t know how we can move without breaking everything.” “We feel stuck.” Sound familiar? If so, thi

If you’re running client sites, you already know that the real challenge isn’t building the sites themselves – it’s scaling your business and handling multiple projects without burning out. That’s exactly what the shiny new and improved Premium Plan is designed to help you do. You spoke, we took notes… and then we got to work. These new Premium Perks are built around what you actually need day-to

Are you avoiding video because you think the production is too time-consuming or expensive? Want to use AI video tools to create and edit quality marketing videos? In this article, you’ll discover a step-by-step breakdown of the video editing workflow, the specific AI tools that handle each stage, and how to put it all together […] The post appeared first on Social Media Examiner .

Every writer has all of them. 26 in most Western languages. But no writer knows all the words. That’s the gap where creativity, effort and possibility lie–between the universal letters and the unlimited words. This is an analogy for arenas as diverse as sports and commerce. Sometimes, we work on a project where our competitors have access to more letters than we do. It’s unlikely you’ll win that

Google’s John Mueller says that those who self-identify as SEO gurus are clueless imposters. The post Google’s Mueller On SEO Gurus Who Are “Clueless Imposters” appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

We tested 300 prompts to measure how common brand mentions are in LLM responses. See the data on how brand, soft-brand, and non-brand queries impact visibility, including a surprising look at the volume of brand mentions generated by Gemini.

If it’s just the right amount of necessary kindness, it’s not really kindness. It’s pleasantness. If the people in our circle begin to experience behavior that’s kinder than necessary, the expectations for what’s necessary will ratchet forward, making everything more pleasant. And… being kind is a lovely way to spend your day. [Compare this to an alternative: “be as selfish as you can get away wi

Find out why Googlebot is no longer the only dominant crawler as OpenAI’s ChatGPT-User takes the lead in web requests. The post appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

As NASA’s Artemis II crew made history today by traveling farther from Earth than any humans ever have, another unexpected passenger quietly drifted into frame: a jar of Nutella. During NASA’s livestream of the mission , the hazelnut spread could be seen floating around the Orion spacecraft cabin just minutes before Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, Mission Specialist Christina Koch,

An Ipsos survey of U.S. adults found 63% say ads in AI search results would reduce trust. Early advertiser data offers limited, mixed signals. The post Trust In AI Search Could Drop With Ads, Survey Shows appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

If you rank your own product #1 in “best of” listicles , it’s not just a search-quality issue — it may violate FTC rules that took effect in October 2024. Driving the news . As Lily Ray noted on LinkedIn , the FTC’s Consumer Review Rule (16 CFR Part 465) prohibits several deceptive practices tied to reviews and testimonials, including: Presenting company-controlled content as independent reviews.

Human-written content dominates Google’s top rankings, appearing in the No. 1 position 80% of the time versus just 9% for purely AI-generated pages, based on a Semrush analysis of 42,000 blog posts. The details . Semrush analyzed 20,000 keywords and their top 10 results, classifying content with an AI detector. Human-written pages outperformed AI and mixed content across all top 10 positions. The

For the first time in decades, astronauts are heading back toward the moon. And for the first time ever, they are doing it with their iPhones. NASA’s Artemis II crew — Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, Mission Specialist Christina Koch, and Mission Specialist Jeremy Hansen — are not only documenting one of the most historic missions in modern spaceflight, but also turning it into socia

In this case study, we went deep instead of broad. We focused on one question: why wasn’t a brand present in a single ChatGPT prompt across ~70 iterations? We chose one prompt: “What are the best hotels in New York City?” We analyzed mentions, citations, fanouts, and SERPs in Google and Bing. We also planned to analyze GPT memory, but it made no discernible difference to mentions, citations, or f

Is it possible to get an accurate view of the current state of SEO ? There have been multiple attempts to reach consensus on what works, predict what might be coming, and identify the factors that may play a role in “good” (or “bad”) SEO. As useful and productive as some of this may be, none of it offers the same grounded data as the Web Almanac, a project I was honored to be a part of. With the

Most guidance on optimizing for AI still focuses on how content is written. But AI systems don’t read content the way humans do. These systems extract information, break it into parts, and reuse it in new contexts. What matters is whether your content can be pulled into an AI-sourced answer cleanly. Where traditional SEO has centered on ranking pages, AI systems prioritize retrievable units of me

ChatGPT Search is citing fewer websites per response after GPT-5.3 Instant became the default experience. The post ChatGPT Search Is Citing Fewer Sites, Data Shows appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

AI-referred traffic has increased by 600% since January 2025, and marketers are racing to understand what that means for brand discovery. For teams seeking clarity on how AI impacts brand and pipeline means investing in new tools like Profound or Athena AI for Answer Engine Optimization (AEO). This guide provides a comprehensive comparison between Profound and AthenaHQ, covering what each platfor

Every few years, marketing headlines announce the demise of one foundational strategy or another. First, email; then blogging; then search engines. Now, with the rise of AI comes the question, “Is AI killing web traffic?” — But the curiosity is actually warranted. As of December 2025, AI Overviews chop organic click-through rate (CTR) for position-one content by an average of 58% , and that’s no

Workflow automation tools automate repetitive business tasks across systems using defined triggers and logic. These platforms link apps, CRM data, and communication channels to execute multi-step processes without manual handoffs — routing a new lead through email nurture, scoring it, and assigning it to a rep in a single automated sequence. By replacing manual if/then steps with automated workfl

Email personalization drives measurable revenue impact. According to HubSpot’s 2026 State of Marketing report , 93.2% of marketers say personalized or segmented experiences generate more leads and purchases, and nearly half are exploring AI to scale those efforts. Many teams still rely on static merge tags or broad segments for personalization, which limits relevance and downstream conversion. Th

For a long time, links were the primary signal of authority in search. If you wanted visibility, you built backlinks. If you wanted credibility, you earned placements. That still matters — but it’s no longer enough. In AI-driven search, authority is shaped by how often your brand is mentioned, cited, and clearly associated with a topic. Visibility comes from being referenced in AI-generated answe

Declining Google share and rising AI search usage signal a shift in where discovery happens and how SEO teams should allocate resources. The post The Top 6 Search Engines Market Share & The AI Search Engines To Watch appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

Since 2021, I’ve worked on more than 350 published guest posts. In that time, I’ve refined a repeatable guest posting outreach process that consistently drives approvals without ever paying for a placement. Although guest blogging is becoming more difficult, the basics of personalized guest posting outreach remain the same. If your mindset is to create mutual value, this process will work for you

Sending emails back and forth with potential customers just to find an appointment time is a huge waste of time that often leads to lost sales. When you’re stuck managing a calendar all morning, you can’t focus on actually serving your clients. That’s why I recommend accepting appointments directly on your WordPress website. This can save you hours every week and keep leads from falling through t

Google announced a logging error on Friday, April 3rd in the data anomalies report and explained that error prevented the accurate logging of impressions in GSC since May of 2025. That’s right, almost a full year of inaccurate impressions…

Will WordPress’s troubled real-time collaboration feature be worth delaying the release of WP 7.0? The post WordPress’s Troubled Real-Time Collaboration Feature appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

Maximize your marketing potential with powerful lead gen techniques to drive engagement and sales effectively.

The agentic web is taking shape through shared protocols, and they matter more than most businesses realize. The post MCP, A2A, NLWeb, And AGENTS.md: The Standards Powering The Agentic Web appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

If you want to drink more herbal tea, get a hot water dispenser that keeps it handy and on tap. On the other hand, if you want to watch less television, disconnect the TV after every viewing session. Convenience leads to consumption.

More AI-generated content isn’t the answer. This guide outlines how to balance scale with authenticity to create content audiences actually value. The post The 5-Pillar Framework For AI Content That Audiences Actually Trust appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

We all make them from time to time. You might not know what you need to know. This is where experience is created. You might have an identity that pushes you to make those choices. If you’re determined to act like the person you have assumed you are, the choices come with the role. Or, you might prioritize short-term benefits over the long-term costs of a bad choice. In this sense,

Google is fixing a long-running Search Console bug that inflated impression counts. As the fix rolls out, reported impressions will decrease. What happened . A logging error caused Google Search Console to over-report impressions starting May 13, 2025. Google today updated its Data anomalies in Search Console page : “A logging error is preventing Search Console from accurately reporting impressio

Customer journeys are collapsing into a single moment of evaluation. David Edelman recently described this shift as the convergence of behaviors that used to happen separately. As decisions compress, brands need to be clearer about what they are trying to solve for the customer. Many organizations are increasing activity instead, without sharpening the underlying strategy. The shift behind the co

Over the course of my three-decade career, the keyword drove paid search. Today, it’s one of many signals. Strategy is what determines performance. Keywords were what you researched for weeks, then built your strategy around based on what you uncovered or hypothesized. You managed everything from bids to matched search terms to negatives and the audiences you targeted. Your career was built and m

Agentic AI shopping may not be good for SEO. But there’s a reason why SEOs won’t need to worry about it. The post Why Agentic AI Shopping Feels Unnatural And May Not Threaten SEO appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

Paid search is often the highest-leverage ecommerce growth channel, delivering strong conversion rates and efficient spend when structured effectively. Google Shopping and Amazon Ads capture high-intent demand while generating the data needed to scale it. These platforms connect search queries directly to revenue, enabling you to identify which terms drive sales and allocate budget accordingly. T

Google’s March core update is rolling out. Illyes explains Googlebot’s crawling architecture, and Gemini referral traffic doubles. The post Google Core Update, Crawl Limits & Gemini Traffic Data – SEO Pulse appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

It used to be that Google searches opened up a world of questions. You searched, sifted through links, and came to your own conclusion. Today, AI Overviews , ChatGPT , Perplexity, and other AI platforms compress multiple sources into a single, synthesized response. In the process, nuance is flattened, and certain viewpoints can be overrepresented. This marks a fundamental shift in online reputati

In February I shared how Grokipedia started dropping heavily in Google after initially surging. It became yet another example of what I call “Mt. AI”. That’s when sites scaling heavily with AI-generated content initially surge in Google, but then drop heavily as Google’s systems…

OpenAI is expanding ChatGPT Ads and launching self-serve access. Here’s what PPC managers should know before deciding whether it deserves real budget. The post ChatGPT Ads: New Acquisition Channel Or Just Another Brand Tax? appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

Many website owners collect user feedback but never act on it, so they keep making the same guesses about what to build, write, or fix next. A customer feedback loop changes that by turning survey responses into a clear list of the improvements that will actually grow your business. It takes the guesswork out of your strategy by letting your users tell you exactly what they need. We have used a s

Learn how to build a Reddit brand strategy for AI search. Victory Umurhurhu explains how to navigate Reddit communities to boost visibility and build audience trust.

Matt Mullenweg invokes Will Smith’s Oscars slap in response to Cloudflare’s boat that EmDash is a successor to WordPress. The post Mullenweg To Cloudflare: Keep WordPress Out Of Your Mouth appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

There’s a moment, familiar to anyone who has spent time in basketball corners of the internet, where someone drops a name into the chat — Kosta Koufos, Sundiata Gaines, Jamario Moon — and the room either goes electric or shakes its head in disappointment. On social media, this is called “ball knowledge.” The term has evolved from casual sports-bar shorthand into something closer to a culture and

Google’s John Mueller answers question of whether splitting a sitemap is worth the extra work. The post Google Answers Why Some SEOs Split Their Sitemap Into Multiple Files appeared first on Search Engine Journal .

TINA! This is what Margaret Thatcher said about her draconian free market policies. It’s an easy thing to tell ourselves about compliance to any dominant system. But it’s incomplete. The complete sentence is, “There is no alternative unless we’re prepared to endure short-term discomfort as we push back against the dominant system.” So the real question isn’t, “what’s the alternative?” The questio

Vulnerability reports and responsible disclosures are essential for website security awareness and education. Automated attacks targeting known software vulnerabilities are one of the leading causes of website compromises. To help educate website owners