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COVER STORY
on a medical question. To get the answer, Dempsey bypassed Google and instead used ChatGPT, the chatbot started by OpenAI in late 2022. ChatGPT didn’t just spit out links for Dempsey to sift through—it also engaged him in a dialogue, improving the quality of the information he received. “It even suggested angles I hadn’t
considered, enhancing my understanding of the topic,” Dempsey says. “This experience underscores the transformative potential of AI search for us as consumers and as marketers. It’s a stark reminder that we need to think like our audience. AI doesn’t just answer our questions; it often knows what we need before we fully articulate it. That’s the future we’re stepping into, where AI shapes the search landscape by being interactive, intuitive, and insightful.” That’s because AI-powered search engines know not just what we are looking for, but also why we are looking for it and even the context behind our searches. They can even use our past search behavior to predict what information will be most helpful to us moving forward. In this way, AI’s impact on search tools is refining how these platforms understand and anticipate customer behavior and preferences. Dempsey uses the example of a customer who frequently searches for eco-friendly products. An AI-powered search tool could learn from this and prioritize content that highlights sustainability in that person’s queries. “Even if a user doesn’t search for ‘eco- friendly floor-cleaning products’ and simply enters ‘best floor-cleaning products,’ because of their past behavior looking for sustainable products, eco-friendly products could be prioritized in search results for them,” he says. “As marketers, understanding this shift enables us to create content that resonates more deeply with our audience’s values and interests, improving our visibility in search results and enhancing user engagement. In essence, AI is bridging the gap between the vast amount of content available online and the specific needs of individual users, making
it essential for marketers to leverage these insights to craft more effective, user-centric campaigns and content.”
THINKING LIKE A MARKETER To varying degrees, all of us have been told how AI will change our lives by taking away our jobs or creating robots that will rule the world. AI in the context of organic search and SEO is slightly less dramatic. It’s a suite of tools and capabilities that can change the game, but not always in the manner you might expect. When it comes to creating content, many companies have used AI to quickly produce generic content from generic prompts, but Dempsey says that prioritizing quantity over quality—or word count over the value being delivered in the content—is a mistake. A lesson to heed: generic content created by AI without a customized touch won’t perform well from an SEO standpoint. “This approach reminds me of the content
marketing boom, where the volume of content became the focus, leading to a deluge of generic, low-quality, unoriginal content online,” Dempsey explains. “When Google caught on, they refined their algorithm to prioritize quality, well-researched content, leveraging criteria like experience, expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness (EEAT).” Make no mistake: AI is now very good
at creating content that sounds like it was created by a human. A 2023 study published in the journal Research Methods in Applied Linguistics asked 72 linguistics experts to differentiate between AI-generated content and human writing; the group could only
identify AI-created content 39 percent of the time. So, is your job in jeopardy if you are feeding your family by creating content (such as copy) designed to perform well in organic search and bringing ROI to the brand you work for? Dempsey says not exactly. The difference, at least for now, is that AI lacks that unique human touch—the ability to incorporate personal stories, anecdotes, trust factors, and appropriate third-party links that resonate with readers and meet Google’s criteria for ranking content and, therefore, deliver long-term SEO results. “Renowned entrepreneur Neil Patel and his team did a five-month study that showed that human-generated content significantly outperformed AI-generated content on the same topic, and the primary difference was the lack of EEAT factors in AI content,” Dempsey says. “This speaks to the ongoing need for real human copywriters and editors and why they should embrace the use of AI. It’s a tool, but to be truly effective for search, it requires a thoughtful human to polish it.” The same holds true for choosing SEO
keywords to help your organic search results. While AI can suggest keywords, Dempsey believes it does not replace the insights from SEO tools that provide real-time data crucial for decision-making. He sees AI as a tool, not a replacement for the nuanced work of SEO professionals. “It’s our job to blend AI’s efficiency with the
irreplaceable human elements of creativity and strategic insight to create content that not only ranks, but also resonates with users,” he says. At Bright Tribe, Dempsey and his team use AI to help brainstorm ideas and outlines, evaluate authority sites, and see what competitors are up to—even in the drafting of content. When it comes to brainstorming, Dempsey says that AI delivers a never-ending well of ideas that he and his team would never dream up on their own. The content that is created from that process, however, does not deliver great SEO results unless it’s fine-tuned to the brand’s unique voice, value proposition, and specific insights. The “really cool part” of
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