How can your B2B business stay on top of the ever-evolving search landscape?
As AI platforms like ChatGPT continue to influence how we search, it’s more critical than ever to stay ahead of the curve. In this post, we’ll explore 5 key trends shaping the future of search and 4 immediate actions you can take right now to help your business be more easily found on both Google and AI-driven platforms.
For two decades, Google has been the dominant search engine, with little competition from Bing, Yahoo or DuckDuckGo. Based on third-party data, Google still controls about 90% of the market share for search in all English-speaking countries.
However, now more than ever, Google has their back against the wall and is finally at serious risk of losing market share to other evolving platforms. Why?
What many people might not know is that Google has been using AI in their organic algorithm for years. During Google’s testimony before Congress in 2020, an executive revealed that Google’s index contains over 400 billion pages and documents — a number that has likely grown significantly since then.
Nearly 5.9 million searches happen every minute, totaling 8.5 billion searches per day. Of those searches, Google claims that about 15% of those searches are for things that no one has ever typed into Google before. To address this, they’ve leveraged AI to process billions of pages and distill them down into only a handful of results that might be most relevant and informative to the user. User behavior and how they engage with these search results feed back into Google's AI models, continuously refining search quality.
However, what’s happening next is the real trend to watch. When OpenAI launched ChatGPT in 2023, it ignited an AI arms race, pushing major companies like Google to roll out AI features that were half-baked. One of those rushed releases was the launch of Google’s AI chatbot platform Bard, which was designed to compete against ChatGPT. However, Bard struggled to gain traction, and in February 2024 Google rebranded the product — renaming it Gemini. Despite heavy promotion, adoption rates remain low.
Meanwhile, in May 2023, Google rolled out generative AI features within the search results. Through Google Search Labs, Godfrey was an early tester of these features, experimenting with them before they were available to everyone. From our testing, we’ve experienced that the information surfaced in AI Overviews is often just repetitive snippets pulled from other website pages, with sources cited beneath — essentially duplicating information already present lower on the page.
And unfortunately, sometimes the information that is provided is just plain wrong — like how long it takes to cook filet mignon on the grill. Whether you like it rare or well done, that’s easy — it’s simply 2-3 minutes per side!
Many wish Google search could just go back to the way it was before all of the noise. That’s unlikely to fully change, but after constantly hearing this feedback, Google added a “Web” filter in May 2024, allowing users to filter down to only text-based webpage links — without ads. It’s tucked away in the navigation under the “More” drop-down, but once clicked and enabled, that will allow you to see search results like they were years ago — and ensure you’re cooking steaks to your personal perfection.
These developments will continue to transform how users experience search, and companies must pay close attention to how AI-driven results will continue to evolve.
In February 2023, Microsoft signed a multiyear billion-dollar contract to embed ChatGPT’s functionality into Bing’s search results. This is significant because Microsoft ships new desktop computers and laptops with Microsoft Edge as the default internet browser and Bing is set as the default search engine. Unlike its predecessor, Edge hasn’t faced as many performance issues, so many users don’t bother changing the default browser or search engine.
As a result, Bing has slowly started to regain market share on desktop again, growing from 8.6% to 12% of all desktop users worldwide. This resurgence, combined with the integration of ChatGPT’s advanced conversational capabilities, positions Bing as a real contender in the search engine landscape — especially as users seek more AI-enhanced experiences.
OpenAI also just launched ChatGPT search. They claim that ChatGPT search will provide a new way to search, as “getting answers on the web can take a lot of effort, often requiring multiple attempts to get relevant results.” By enhancing the conversational capabilities of their existing models with real-time information from the web, they claim this will help finding what you’re looking for be faster and easier. Time will tell if ChatGPT, through Bing or ChatGPT search, can become a true competitor — and possibly even a replacement for Google.
But as of now, despite the explosion of artificial intelligence, data shows that AI is not disrupting search in a way that impacts Google’s dominance — at least, not yet. Rand Fishkin from SparkToro recently shared details from a large-scale study just conducted by Sonata Insights and Datos. Their research shows that desktop users aren’t leaving Google in favor of ChatGPT or other AI platforms; if anything, they’re using both platforms together.
The study, which analyzed anonymous clickstream data from millions of users, found that Google is still used 11 times more frequently than ChatGPT by the same cohort of users. The graph below illustrates this trend, showing that, while AI is growing, Google remains the preferred tool for most users:
Source: Datos
Additionally, the percentage of traditional search engine users who also use AI platforms has only grown by 2 percentage points in the past year — with only 16% of the data cohort using one of the AI platforms in the study (ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini and Copilot).
Most notably, AI platform users haven’t stopped leveraging traditional search engines, with 99% of those users still relying on Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo.
Source: Datos
While AI continues to grow, many marketers believe search patterns have already shifted, when in reality this shift hasn’t happened yet. The data shows that users are supplementing their search habits with AI rather than replacing traditional search engines. For businesses, traditional search optimization remains as critical as ever, while keeping an eye on AI tools will provide a competitive edge.
In May 2024, Reddit and OpenAI announced they signed a formal partnership to allow Reddit content to be used as training data for OpenAI’s large language models. Additionally, Open AI would become a Reddit advertising partner.
This is important for several reasons:
What others are saying about your company on Reddit could be leveraged as part of the data that fuels AI-generated responses, like those from ChatGPT.
While neither company has elaborated on what OpenAI becoming an official advertising partner means, it could signal that ChatGPT may start showing ads within their platform — potentially leveraging Reddit’s ad platform to serve up ads to users that don’t have paid accounts. This move could divert ad revenue away from Google, whose primary revenue stream comes from Google Ads. Google will likely fight hard to retain its position as a dominant player in digital advertising.
Historically, Reddit has not been a typical B2B marketing channel, but this partnership may create new opportunities for B2B marketers to rethink their approach and tap into this growing space.
As Reddit and OpenAI continue to evolve their partnership, it’s crucial for businesses to monitor these developments closely. The shifting advertising landscape and the growing influence of AI-driven content could provide both new opportunities and competitive threats.
Here are 4 ways you can take immediate action to help ensure the best information about your business is being surfaced in both traditional search engines and AI platforms like ChatGPT.
While there are hundreds of signals that Google and other search engines use to determine search results, it ultimately boils down to the value of information on your website and what others are saying about you online.
While there may be other factors at play, like how often questions are asked about your brand, AI platforms like ChatGPT will utilize these same principles. It’s critically important that the content available on your website adds value and incorporates relevant keywords that people might search for when looking for information about your company.
There are a few ways to do this:
You can use this information to find content gaps and where there are opportunities to improve your website and your online reputation.
What others are saying about your company on third-party websites is just as important as it was a decade ago. The SEO tools refer to this as Domain Authority, and here are a few ways to help improve that:
Increasing the quality and quantity of your backlinks can significantly help increase your website rankings on Google and better position your brand for evolving AI platforms.
Social platforms, including Reddit, can shape perceptions of your brand, which may now be influencing AI responses. Leveraging social listening tools can help you stay on top of public sentiment:
If Google and other search engines can't properly crawl, index and rank your website, then you likely will not see any value with ChatGPT or other AI platforms either. OpenAI scraped the web and is leveraging that data, just as Google does.
Not only is it important to include keywords on relevant pages and ensure there’s enough valuable content, but there are many technical factors behind the scenes that can make a big impact. Here are just a few ways to improve the overall technical health of your website:
Google has long been the dominant force in search, but the landscape is shifting rapidly. For the first time in their 20-year history, Google faces the possibility of being dethroned. Now more than ever, it’s crucial to ensure your website is fully optimized for search engines and that your online presence is continually evolving to keep pace with these changes.
There are many components and complexities in ranking well in search engines, and that’s where Godfrey can help. Contact us today to find out how we can enhance your search visibility and ensure your brand is well-positioned for the future of search.