Cautions for Search Engine Optimization(SEO) using ChatGPT

Writing blog contents using ChatGPT. ChatGPT for SEO. Real-world performance comparison AI vs Human.
Apr 25, 2023
Cautions for Search Engine Optimization(SEO) using ChatGPT

Writing blog contents using ChatGPT

In recent years, Artificial Intelligence(AI) technology has advanced rapidly, and large language models like ChatGPT, developed by OpenAI, have become popular. This makes it easier to write contents created by AI.
There are many related videos on YouTube. However, Google is not expected to like blogs created automatically using ChatGPT. Also, it will be quite difficult to create a business blog contents using only AI.
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After using ChatGPT for more than 3 hours every day for about 2 weeks, We found that we need to have clear and well-defined "prompts" to use it effectively.
Clear and well-defined prompts are necessary for effective use of ChatGPT. Prompts help to determine the user's intent and provide appropriate answers. Therefore, the simpler the question, the simpler the answer, while more complex questions require more detailed prompts.
We all know that good questions get good answers. For example, if you ask a friend, "Is it raining?", the listener might respond, "When are you talking about?". However, if you asked, "Is it raining in the Bay Area this afternoon?" you might get a better answer, "Uh, they say it's been raining since 2:00 p.m. today".
Therefore, it is a good idea to use well-defined prompts to ensure efficient usage. Many people blog without understanding the prompts, which can lead to poor performance.

Google's stance on AI-generating posts

According to an official announcement on Twitter on January 12, Google's Search Relation team advised posting good quality content. The Search Relation team is responsible for communicating updates and changes to Google's search algorithm and providing information on how to improve your website's search rankings and visibility.
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Google's search quality rating guidelines have been significantly updated with the addition of a new E (Experience) to the E-A-T scale. Google is adding Experience above Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. Google said trust is the most important of the four factors here.
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"We've said, pretty clearly, content written primarily for search engines rather than humans is the issue" said Danny Sullivan, SEO manager at Google.
However, Google is not against AI-generated content and text. It doesn't say it's against all automatically generated content, including AI-generated content. Instead, the team clarified what should be avoided and what will be penalized.

Google's response

Google has always taken a strong stance against content generated by machines or automated writing, as evidenced by its spam policy for Google Web Search. If you put the output of ChatGPT or any other AI on your site, you will probably be penalized or blocked by Google.
 
Google has a strict policy against content generated by machines or automated writers in order to prevent spam content. Therefore, if you are tempted to use ChatGPT or any other AI technology to generate content haphazardly to boost your SEO, this is not in line with Google's policies and will most likely be blocked.
 
In April 2022, Google's Search Advocate, John Mueller, spoke out about Google's opposition to AI content. It created a huge spike in articles about Google penalizing content made up of AI text and content.
 
However, time has passed since this interview and he has changed his tune.
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I don't know if AI is the right approach to making titles & descriptions, but if you're running out of ideas, and especially if you see pages showing up in search for the wrong terms, it seems like a good way to get inspiration, or to try new things out. I would strongly discourage blindly following it though: you know your audience much better than any tool. Have you considered adding a short survey for your visitors? "Which title do you think fits best for this page: A / B?" (Source)
 
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What we can take away from this is that it doesn't matter if it was written by a human or AI. The most important factor is β€œThe Quality of the Contents”.

How can Google detect AI content?

Theoretically, Google can detect text generated by ChatGPT. It's Google, so we can think they'd catch it.
Google wants to provide its users with the best possible search results. As it continues to work on improving how it does this, it will try to catch AI-generated posts.
By focusing on high-quality, human-generated content, Google can provide a better experience for its users and maintain the credibility of its search engine.

AI Detection Tools

Naturally, there are shielding tools out there to counter this. In addition, ChatGPT is launching its own AI filtering service.
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This way, it determines whether a post is written by an AI or a human. For some topics, the AI is prolific, while for others, the majority of articles are written by humans, leading to a higher originality score.

Real-world performance comparison AI vs Human

On AuthorityHacker, a blogger named Gael Brenton published the results of an experiment called "Does Increasing AI Percentage Correlate with Declining Google Traffic?" He ran the experiment using data from a company called Cnet.
Of course, it's hard to say whether his results are accurate. His premises are a bit lacking. Still, it's an interesting experiment.
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Looking at the flat line, Gael says that Google doesn't appear to be reducing organic traffic if it's partially using AI.
He says that keyword selection and other traditional SEO factors are far more important than the use of AI.
As another experiment, Gael also uses the Ahrefs tool to analyze author performance on the bankrate.com company blog.
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He goes to the #1 author, James royal, and the #6 author, Brian Baker, who write 402 pages and get more than 1.5 million traffic per month. He analyzes their articles and compares them to the traffic generated by AI content written in a month.
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It turns out that not all of them wrote the same articles with the same content. The difference in traffic was striking, even though the articles were about different things.
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James Royal (Human writer #1) and Brian Baker (Human writer #2) outperformed the AI by 776% and 735% respectively.
As these results show, it's still difficult to generate quality content using text generative AI alone. However, Chat GPT and other AI writing tools can provide insights and information that can be used to create high-quality, engaging content.

The future of blog content

AI writing tools can be used to generate articles and other forms of content quickly and efficiently. What's more, AI can be highly efficient because it can work around the clock and doesn't need a break.
However, despite the advantages of AI-powered content creation tools, there are a few key reasons why they are unlikely to completely replace human-written content.
For one, these systems can only work within the parameters they've been trained on and can't yet match human creativity and nuance. People can also think critically and bring a unique perspective to the writing process that AI systems cannot.
Additionally, while AI systems can analyze data and statistics, they do not yet understand the context and cultural significance of that data. This is an important aspect of content creation that only humans can currently understand and communicate effectively.
In conclusion, AI tools like ChatGPT can be incredibly useful and efficient for content creation, but they are not yet advanced enough to fully replace humans. Humans bring creativity, nuance, critical thinking, and cultural understanding to the writing process that AI systems simply can't match. Ultimately, AI tools and human content writers will continue to work together and complement each other to create high-quality, engaging content.
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