Hey friend!

We’ve got lots of algorithm-related updates in today’s roundup, with the takeaway that SEO volatility probably isn’t slowing down anywhere in the near future. 

Also, remember when just a few weeks ago, OpenAI announced that SearchGPT would be launched as part of ChatGPT before the end of the year? Looks like the time has come with the release of ChatGPT Search. More details below!

–Thenuka

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What’s new in AI and content?

📉 Google will demote content that’s different from the rest of your site

Google has confirmed that its ranking systems demote content sections that are "independent or starkly different" from a site’s primary theme. Think content hosted within subdomains or subfolders that doesn’t align closely with your site’s focus. For instance, medical content published by Forbes Advisor and product reviews from CNN Underscored recently saw big drops in the search visibility. According to Google, this isn’t related to its "site reputation abuse" algorithm—it simply reflects efforts to prioritize content most aligned with a site’s brand and purpose. 

• What this means for SEO: Google basically confirmed that content out of sync with your core brand or topic is at risk of ranking dips. This shift emphasizes the importance of maintaining a cohesive content strategy across your brand. Don’t publish content just for the sake of having it or ranking for some tangential keywords—make sure it actually aligns with what the rest of your site is about.  

😯 Expect another Google algorithm update soon

At a recent Web Creator Summit, Google revealed that a new algorithm update is on the horizon. The summit, an invite-only event for content creators hit hard by the September 2023 Helpful Content Update, gave Google’s team members a chance to get feedback from publishers and also take some responsibility. (“Google probably needs to do better, there is nothing wrong with your sites,” one team member was quoted saying.) That said, Google emphasized that affected sites shouldn’t expect to recover with the upcoming algorithm update. To some creators’ disappointment, Google encouraged affected creators to diversify their strategies beyond search. 

• What this means for SEO: This one’s a bit of a head-scratcher. Since the Helpful Content Update had some unexpected casualties—sites with quality content—high-quality content alone may not guarantee immunity to algorithm updates. Google’s advice seems to be to explore other potential sources of traffic to hedge against its ranking volatility, especially as it continues to experiment with E-E-A-T criteria and AI.

💸 The future of search looks bright according to Alphabet’s recent earnings call

Looks like SEO is far from dead. Google’s parent company Alphabet boasted strong results in its recent Q3 2024 earnings call, particularly in AI-powered tools and search. Search generated $49.4 billion in revenue, up 12.3% year-over-year, and according to CEO Sundar Pichai, AI Overviews are seeing strong user engagement and satisfaction. Project Astra, coming soon in 2025, promises more AI-powered changes to the search experience—something to watch out for in the coming months. Dr. Marie Haynes sums up more takeaways from the call on her blog.

• What this means for SEO: Search remains the largest contributor to Alphabet’s revenue growth, suggesting that while user search behavior may have changed in recent years, AI threats like ChatGPT have done little to deter good old-fashioned Googling. With AI Overviews expected to reach more than 1 billion users/month, it’s important that marketers learn to better align content with user intent to improve their organic visibility. 

👋 Say hello to ChatGPT Search from OpenAI

OpenAI celebrated Halloween by launching ChatGPT Search, a search engine alternative embedded in ChatGPT and powered by its advanced GPT-4o model. This feature enables ChatGPT to deliver real-time data on news, sports scores, stock prices, and more—expanding beyond its previous knowledge cutoff between 2021 and 2023. Unlike traditional search engines, it uses a conversational format so users can ask follow-up questions and refine their search based on chat context. So far ChatGPT Search is available to Plus and Team users but will gradually roll out to enterprise, educational, and free users.

• What this means for SEO: Funny that the previous headline shows an optimistic outlook for Google Search—we’ll see if that holds true with the release of ChatGPT Search. As a Google challenger, ChatGPT’s AI-driven answers may reduce click-throughs to original sources. We’ll be keeping a close eye on its adoption in the coming months.

Expert Insights

🙋 Cindy Krum: “No other search engine has a component like a browser that’s as big as Chrome—so there’s no way a competitor can come in and threaten Google.”

Does Google use Chrome user engagement signals to determine rankings? That’s what Cindy Krum of MobileMoxie suggests in her interview with Dr. Marie Haynes on the Search News You Can Use podcast. She theorizes that Google has been leveraging users’ devices via Chrome since 2018 to render pages for indexing instead of Googlebot solely handling this. In other words, real user data—like time spent on pages and clicks—is collected through Chrome and then used to influence page rankings. If true, this could mean actual engagement data factors more into SEO than previously understood.

>> Listen to the episode

Playbooks & Guides

🌇 How Sunset scaled organic traffic from 0 to 27,000+ visitors/month

More than 90% of startups fail—a dismal statistic made worse for entrepreneurs by the complex shutdown process. Brendan Mahony founded Sunset in 2023 to guide founders through business closures and make these tough transitions smoother. However, as a fledgling startup itself, Sunset needed its own growth boost. That’s why it decided to partner with daydream to implement a programmatic SEO strategy. With our support, Sunset built its topical authority and grew its organic traffic to more than 27,000 monthly visitors in just six months. We break down its pSEO strategy in more detail in our latest playbook. 

>> Find out more