AI is transforming search engine marketing on multiple levels. Here we explore the potential of AI and how these tools improve SEO and SEA performance.
Everyone talks about "AI," but what’s often meant is generative artificial intelligence, or "GenAI" for short.
The term "generative" describes technology that can automatically generate text, images, videos, music, and more. It isn’t truly intelligent; instead, as a large language model, it assembles statistically probable combinations based on a vast language dataset.
If you haven't come across the term "GenAI" the name ChatGPT might be familiar. After OpenAI and Microsoft released this AI chatbot in November 2022, it reached 100 million users in just two months – fueling a surge in AI applications for both personal and professional use.
ChatGPT's success stems from its ease of use, versatility, and impressive textual and visual output. This popularity prompted new innovations and put pressure on Google, leading it to launch its own AI initiative based on the Gemini model, drawing inspiration from OpenAI and Microsoft’s approaches.
As a result, the number and capabilities of GenAI tools are growing rapidly. This trend has wide-ranging impacts on many industries, especially digital fields. As an agency offering SEO and SEA services, we see firsthand the potential that ChatGPT and similar tools bring to search engine marketing.
The impact and capabilities of GenAI are widely discussed, both positively and negatively. Concerns that AI could replace many jobs emerged early on. However, after countless hours of studying the tools and their results, we do not yet see this happening in our field of work. Human expertise is far from being replaceable here and should not be overlooked.
If you have high expectations, the reality is this: without careful curation and post-processing, most AI-produced content is mediocre at best and often contains errors (as seen in Google’s rather rough US launch of "SGE" or "AI Overviews").
However, it should be emphasized: AI has many useful applications in digital marketing. From our experience, GenAI tools are extremely good work assistants and productivity boosters in the initial phases of tasks – as long as their strengths and limitations are acknowledged.
A fascinating Harvard study, Navigating the Jagged Technological Frontier: Field Experimental Evidence of the Effects of AI on Knowledge Worker Productivity and Quality, also reached this conclusion:
„Our results show that this generation of LLMs are highly capable of causing significant increases in quality and productivity, or even completely automating some tasks, but the actual tasks that AI can do are surprising and not immediately obvious to individuals or even to producers of LLMs themselves.“
Harvard Business School | Working Paper 24-013
In short, the study revealed that those already proficient in their field can perform various tasks more effectively through proper use of GenAI tools. At the same time, the authors caution that anyone using these tools without relevant expertise may see their performance deteriorate.
Accordingly, one should remain both open-minded and informed about AI's capabilities – which we have strived to do from the outset. It quickly became clear: digital marketers must closely examine GenAI to stay current and to provide better services to customers and partners.
We believe that learning how to use AI tools effectively is now one of the top priorities in digital marketing. AI know-how will be essential for developing and implementing forward-thinking marketing strategies efficiently.
The disciplines of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and SEA (Search Engine Advertising) are examples of this because: AI is not just changing their world – it has already done so.
After intensive tool testing, clear AI favorites have emerged that are now used almost daily in our work, not only for SEO and SEA but across all teams in our agency.
As of May '24, the following AI tools are in use at Moccu:
Based on our practical experience, we can give you very specific insights below into where and how we now routinely use AI tools. We share scalable use cases based on the disciplines of SEO and SEA: AI is already accelerating tasks and improving results for our customers at Moccu.
GenAI chatbots are invaluable for researching topics and trends across various areas, especially with tools like Microsoft CoPilot, Google Gemini, or Perplexity.ai that have direct internet access, specify online sources, and enable verification (since April, this feature has been largely applied to ChatGPT as well).
These tools have also repeatedly proven effective for competitor analyses, a frequent part of our work. They offer a straightforward starting point by allowing us to ask the "AI counterpart" which brands are in direct competition with a specific customer in a particular area, for example.
We create extensive editorial content for our clients that successfully drives organic traffic. To generate a larger pool of relevant content ideas for our target audiences more efficiently, we now use AI chatbots as sparring partners whenever we explore a topic. This approach has already led to ideas we might have otherwise missed.
The tools also conveniently assist in creating basic content concepts on any topic, providing an excellent starting point for further development.
In search engine optimization specifically, AI tools are particularly helpful for generating FAQ lists and identifying overlooked keywords. Their unconventional suggestions often inspire fresh ideas in these areas.
Meta titles and descriptions, ALT texts, social sharing texts, and more – GenAI tools streamline these areas by enabling rapid text generation (e.g. "Create 10 headlines on topic XY") and helping us refine and condense our wording. Crafting these "micro-texts" is a routine part of SEO work for our clients, and with AI, this process has become more efficient and adaptable across nearly every language imaginable.
We not only create new content but also enhance our clients' existing pages where we identify ranking potential. AI simplifies and improves this optimization on multiple levels: with a simple prompt, we can check webpage texts for spelling, expand content, or adjust it for better alignment with the target audience. AI also assists our copywriters in creative tasks, such as strategically integrating product and service mentions or spotting stylistic issues like passive voice overuse. Additionally, the tools have become valuable translation aids, complementing DeepL by providing a strong basis for content localization in international projects.
Related use cases:
The previous paragraphs highlight a key point: SEOs constantly work with various forms of "content," and search engines have long evolved beyond displaying only classic HTML-based web pages in their SERPs.
For this reason, we employ a wide range of content formats in search engine optimization. Depending on search intention and SERP properties, we may recommend formats like a how-to article, encyclopedia entry, infographic, or checklist. We also consider secondary uses for content, such as repurposing sections for social media posts or standalone whitepapers (more on this in our article, Content Planning).
Why is this important? Because converting formats and reusing content has become significantly easier with AI tools. With multimodal GenAI tools, we can now use text-to-image and text-to-video functions, or turn key points into a comprehensive whitepaper concept. Converting a guide article into a social media post? AI serves as a powerful productivity booster for these tasks.
One of the most indispensable aids in tech SEO has quickly become GenAI tools, assisting with essential tasks like creating new schema markup, correcting errors, generating HREFLANG code (vital for international SEO), and detecting issues in HTML.
This support has streamlined our daily work; creating complex filters for SEO data analysis or building reporting dashboards has never been easier. ChatGPT and CoPilot, in particular, excel at generating formulas for Excel or Google Sheets and crafting regular expressions ("RegEx") tailored to our filtering needs.
When we first tested ChatGPT's "Advanced Data Analysis" feature in its beta phase, we were immediately impressed – and continue to be. This now-standard integration (soon available in Google's Gemini Advanced) allows us to analyze extensive datasets by simply uploading files.
Using targeted AI prompts, we can guide the data analysis to meet specific needs. So far, we've used it for clustering keywords by semantic relevance, swiftly converting performance data into insightful charts, and identifying patterns in large data exports – tasks that would otherwise require extensive manual effort. This capability makes us significantly more agile, especially for handling short-term customer inquiries.
In search engine optimization, we frequently work with multiple domains, subdomains, or website directories. Additionally, in digital commerce, we often manage numerous product detail pages that follow the same content template, leading to repetitive tasks – the perfect area for GenAI tools to shine.
Increasing access to these tools through APIs allows for automated batch processing, enabling task scalability. For instance, with Screaming Frog, we recently integrated ChatGPT via JavaScript, allowing us to create titles and descriptions during domain crawls (initial tests have been promising after some adjustments).
Beyond these tasks, other use cases include creating redirect maps for website relaunches, automating parameter adjustments on product pages, conducting sentiment analysis, processing extensive Search Console exports, and performing automated SERP analyses with a single command.
CustomGPTs are among the latest innovations from OpenAI. Essentially, a "CustomGPT" is a specialized "small LLM" that’s tailored with your own data.
Early on, we implemented custom GPTs trained on specific content to adopt a desired writing style, creating "writing style GPTs" that help standardize text drafts and align them with existing content.
Moccu also uses a CustomGPT to automatically summarize submitted lead forms, categorizing them as either "lead" or "spam." There are countless other potential applications – many of which we haven’t yet explored. Users can discover a wide variety of ready-made CustomGPTs in OpenAI's CustomGPT Store, where thousands await curious users. (It remains to be seen how Google’s upcoming clone "Gems," which promises similar functionality, will perform in this area.)
The major software suites from Microsoft and Google now come with AI features as standard (powered by their LLM-based systems, CoPilot and Gemini, respectively), though often for an additional charge. These features simplify tasks like working with formulas in tables or even render complicated formulas unnecessary.
Meanwhile, we've observed that our preferred SEO tools – Sistrix, SEMrush, and AHREFS – are also expanding their functionalities with AI. For example, all three have launched GenAI content generators. (As noted earlier, one of our favorite tools, Screaming Frog, now includes a native ChatGPT integration.)
First and foremost, nothing replaces the Google Ads Keyword Planner when it comes to reliable search volume data and keyword competitiveness predictions.
However, AI tools can occasionally provide fresh ideas during initial research on suitable ad keywords and competitive landscapes – similar to their role in SEO – that we might not have considered through conventional methods.
ChatGPT and similar tools can serve as inspiration for new keywords related to your services and topics, as long as you’re aware that all AI-generated keyword "data" should be verified and refined. Using this approach, we’ve successfully expanded our keyword sets with a few additional relevant terms on multiple occasions.
Just as meta titles and descriptions are essential in SEO, ad headlines, descriptions for RSAs, callouts, sitelinks, and product descriptions are crucial for SEA specialists.
AI tools provide valuable assistance in generating and refining these ideas. For example, with ChatGPT, CoPilot, and Gemini, we can now quickly develop the 10 headlines typically required for a Responsive Search Ad (RSA), significantly speeding up the process.
As discussed above, CustomGPTs offer a valuable use case in search engine advertising (and performance marketing in general): the quick creation of virtual proto-personas.
We can train a CustomGPT as a "lightweight" representative of a customer’s product target group by providing it with available target group data and assumptions. We can then consult this "PersonaGPT" on ad texts, PPC landing pages, or campaign types to obtain initial assessments and recommendations, helping us develop a more data-aligned approach early on.
Of course, this process does not replace real target group research; all AI-generated "proto-assumptions" must be critically evaluated and backed by further research. However, it serves as a useful preliminary step before conducting indispensable personal interviews to build qualitative personas.
With ChatGPT's advanced data analysis capabilities, we can sift through extensive data sets, allowing the bot to identify patterns that would otherwise take significant time to detect.
Our current SEA applications include scanning long lists of search terms to find keywords that lack target group relevance, spotting long-term demographic trends, and pinpointing optimal time windows for ad display. Additionally, this feature enables us to quickly translate these trends and data points into report-ready graphics.
While native Google Ads reports may suffice for small accounts, the larger the account volume and the longer the history, the more valuable AI assistance becomes in analyzing and visualizing this data.
High-quality, contract- and platform-compliant product images are essential for SEA campaigns, especially for display and shopping ads. GenAI tools like Adobe Firefly now make it much easier to edit and optimize product shots, even when the original image is less than ideal.
Tasks such as cropping products, applying neutral backgrounds, enhancing contrast and lighting, and removing unwanted elements (e.g. text or distracting artifacts) are simplified with Adobe Creative Suite's GenAI-enhanced features, freeing our designers to focus on more complex work.
But that’s not all: Google, a leader in SEA, is already offering native GenAI image creation tools directly within Google Ads, currently available in the USA. These tools allow even non-designers (like SEAs!) to generate, edit, and adapt images by replacing backgrounds, adjusting colors, or enhancing contrast and brightness.
Microsoft has launched a similar GenAI initiative within its ad platform with its CoPilot assistant. It's clear that major providers are committed to integrating GenAI-based features into their ad platforms to further streamline these workflows.
As our use cases show, AI has brought significant changes to SEO and SEA strategies.
However, like all GenAI users, we also encounter unresolved copyright issues inherent to LLM architecture and are conscious of various risks. Among these is the risk of unintentionally distributing duplicate content, particularly with directly copied texts and unedited images. Additionally, GenAI systems are known for occasional errors and "hallucinations."
This means that AI implementation requires careful oversight: the more tasks we entrust to artificial "intelligence," the more vulnerable our work becomes to fundamental errors. For instance, SEA projects could drift into undesirable directions without proper checks, moving away from defined goals and values.
While AI tools offer a tremendous opportunity to streamline workflows, we emphasize the essential role of human oversight and intentional strategic planning.
At Moccu, we remain committed to this approach because, ultimately, what matters most to us is quality and innovation – both of which, at least for now, are areas where GenAI typically falls short in its initial output, regardless of "prompt engineering" efforts.
The advancements in generative artificial intelligence are already reshaping the landscape of search engine optimization and search engine advertising in multiple ways. This evolution brings both opportunities and challenges, impacting the daily practice of these disciplines – and our work.
As digital marketing experts, it’s up to us at Moccu to stay closely attuned to these developments, continuously adapting our methods and strategies to thrive in this shifting environment.
Today, adaptability and a commitment to innovation are essential – not only to keep us competitive but, more importantly, to ensure our clients remain competitive.
Ultimately, we view this transformation as an opportunity. In SEO and SEA, combining advanced AI applications opens doors to more customized and efficient marketing strategies.
However, we shouldn’t place all our work in AI’s hands. Despite automation, fine-tuning content, interpreting data, and adhering to a cohesive strategy are tasks that require human expertise – no SEO or SEA professional should fully relinquish control.
Yet, the integration of AI into workflows undeniably creates new opportunities to boost efficiency, relevance, and personalization, resulting in improved user experiences, higher conversion rates, and increased sales.
Through the examples in Search Engine Advertising and Search Engine Optimization, we hope to illustrate that GenAI is vital for developing and implementing forward-thinking marketing strategies. It’s evident that both disciplines must continue evolving to respond to AI’s influence and harness its potential fully.
The term "AI-powered SEO" refers to the use of "artificial intelligence" (AI) and machine learning to improve search engine optimization.
The discipline of SEO serves to improve the visibility of a website in the organic search results of search engines such as Google - the promise of AI support lies in performing the associated tasks more efficiently and precisely, leading to faster achievement of the set goals.
We see two main lines of development:
On the one hand, AI-based possibilities are changing SEO practice by helping AI tools to perform analyses faster, simplify technical optimizations or automate repetitive tasks.
On the other hand, the overall development around GenAI is changing the framework conditions in the search engines for which we perform SEO. All major platforms, especially Google and Bing, are now in a race to be the best AI-enhanced search engine, which is resulting in some far-reaching changes to the ranking rules.
We SEO service providers therefore have two major tasks: On the one hand, to integrate the rapidly increasing possibilities of AI into our work - on the other hand, to closely follow the development of "AI search engines" and to continue to advance our clients with "AI-approved" SEO in the future.
No, SEO is by no means dead, on the contrary. Thanks to AI, search engine optimization feels more alive and relevant to us than ever.
As we show in this article, the integration of AI into SEO has already led to our processes and practices evolving.
At the same time, the current rapid development in the field of AI-enhanced online search motivates us to think about SEO differently than we traditionally have - even more user- and customer-oriented, even more versatile and multidisciplinary.
In addition, we are looking even more intensively than before beyond the Google SEO horizon and expanding our optimization knowledge to other channels (such as "Amazon SEO").
Thank you for your message! We will get in touch with you as quickly as possible!
