February 2023 SEO Industry Updates
- Industry News
- By multiple authors
- 7 minutes read
Lots happened in the SEO industry in February 2023. Here are the most important updates flagged by the Conductor Customer Success team.
Despite the short month, Google rolled out lots of new features and updates in February 2023. Check out the latest news on Google’s AI Bard, the February 2023 Product Review Update, and new findings around Lighthouse 10. We’ll also provide you with handy tips for how to monitor these changes using our platform.
Google testing AI answers over organic results
By Omar Padilla
The what
Google is testing a new search design that will incorporate AI answers over organic results. On Monday, February 6th, users got to see AI Bard in action for the first time. Unfortunately, it made a factual error on its first demo, leading to a lot of chatter and questions surrounding the new Google offering. Google doesn’t have a timeline on its release yet, but it does seem Bing is out in front as they have announced that their integration with ChatGPT will be available to the public soon.
The why
On February 4th, Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, wrote an article on AI, highlighting that it is the most profound technology Google is currently working on. This statement doesn't come as a surprise, considering how important AI has become recently. Microsoft's recent unveiling of its integration with ChatGPT further emphasizes this point and boy did it impress! It is evident that Google is not trying to get left behind in the AI race.
However, Google's Bard AI, which made its debut recently, wasn't up to snuff and was very clearly second place to Microsoft and ChatGPT AI search integration. Despite this setback, it’s Google and I am confident they will catch up to its competitors in the AI arena. It will be interesting to see how this technology will impact search! Some current thoughts are that since AI results will be displayed above search results, this might impact longer-tailed keywords or questions.
For everyone
- Use Google Search Console to check your average keyword rank and monitor for any major drops. Also, take a look at impressions and CTR.
- Use Google Analytics to see if traffic has been impacted.
For Conductor customers
- Use Keywords within Conductor to keep an eye on keyword rankings and traffic.
- Sort by Change in Rank to find largest rank drops
- Asses to see if this keyword is being affected by AI search results being displayed above organic
- Sort by Change in Rank to find the largest rank increases
- Asses to see if this keyword has been positively impacted by AI search results
- Sort by Change in Rank to find largest rank drops
- Monitor your content in Page Groups to understand how certain content is performing.
Read more about this:
Google February 2023 product reviews update
By Carly Piekos
The what
Google announced the February 2023 Product Reviews Update, soon to be implemented on Google's products globally.
This update will take roughly two weeks to fully roll out across languages, and Google has revised its Product Reviews update guidance to reflect the new changes. Product Reviews System guidance explains, “Periodically, we improve how the product reviews system works. When we do this in a notable way, we share this as a “product reviews update” on our Google Search ranking updates page.”
The why
The new Google product reviews update will now have a title that more accurately conveys what the document is about, namely, giving users an understanding of Google's product reviews system.
Google intends for this update to give more clarity to customers by allowing them to make informed decisions regarding Google products before they buy them and is designed to weed out thin content summaries and favor reviews that are based on actual experience or research when it comes to Google search results.
For everyone
If your site has been affected by Google’s February 2023 Product Reviews Update, the best thing to do is to remain patient and hold off on making any drastic changes.
Google algorithm updates often result in ranking fluctuations, but they are rarely permanent. Wait until the update is over before considering taking any steps, like making content changes or retargeting campaigns, to remove its effect. Normally Google updates take anywhere from a few days to a week or two to complete their rolling process, so be sure to keep an eye out for any recuperative efforts that could help restore your rankings. If you are noticing priority keywords dropping in ranking, here’s a great 13-step guide on what to do.
For Conductor customers
- Create a Page Group with product pages that contain reviews.
- Add a custom annotation to pages that have product reviews so we can keep track of their performance.
- Monitor performance in Pages and Keywords .
- Monitor Google Search Console Data in Page Details.
Read more about this:
5 Ways AI is the future of SEO & 5 ways SEOs will still have job security
By Trey Hodges
The what
AI is here to stay, but this doesn't mean SEOs won't have work to do. There are different ways that AI can support the work of SEOs but there are also areas where AI or machine learning has a long way to go before replacing SEOs.
The why
Many SEOs have expressed both awe and concern about the rise of AI assistants like ChatGPT, but there are many core SEO functions that still require the work of search marketers to execute them.
Here are some areas where AI can assist SEOs are:
- Generating broad global keywords for content
- Creating schema markup and excel/regex formulas
- Producing title tags/meta descriptions
- Writing content
- Assisting with solving problems
Here are some areas where AI cannot assist SEOs:
- Generating specific keywords for content
- Be careful when generating schema/formulas and always double-check to make sure they are accurate
- The relevancy of these page titles and descriptions needs to be reviewed by humans
- Writing content that is accurate and not duplicated
For everyone
- Use ChatGPT to develop keyword lists for new content ideas.
- Create title tags/descriptions using ChatGPT but always double-check the relevancy of these.
For Conductor customers
- Check your ChatGPT keyword lists against Explorer keyword research to determine which inquiries resonate the most with the intended audience.
- Validate your ChatGPT recommended Titles and Meta Descriptions against the Content Guidance findings for your target keyword.
- Create a keyword group and a page group with these targeted keywords and published content to monitor rankings and performance
Read more about this:
Lighthouse 10 improves PageSpeed insights scores for 90% of pages
By Lauren Phillips
The what
Google Chrome recently announced a big change to their Lighthouse 10 scores. In the new Lighthouse 10, they have removed Time-To-Interactive (TTI).
Google is removing Time To Interactive because they feel there are other metrics such as Largest Contentful Paint, Speed Index, and Total Blocking Time that are better measurements of how fast or slow a page is loading.
The why
This change provides more accurate page speed user experience metrics. The change is to also encourage publishers and other webmasters to reduce the amount of Javascript they add to their sites. This release is scheduled for March 29th, 2023. During tests, a majority of webpages will see an improvement to their performance scores over 5 points.
For everyone
For pages with heavy Javascript, monitor these pages using Page Speed Insights or the Conductor for Chrome extension to help monitor how fast these pages are loading.
For Conductor customers
- Monitor performance in ContentKing to see if there is an improvement in your Core Web Vitals platform score.
- If Lighthouse Monitoring is enabled, create a segment of pages that had a slow Time-To-Interactive, to monitor how fast these pages are loading now.
- Create a Page Group in Conductor with these pages to monitor the organic traffic to see how they are performing.
Read more about this:
- https://www.searchenginejournal.com/lighthouse-10-tti-removal/479789/#close
- Core Web Vitals Readiness Report
