The (Continued) Rise of Zero-Click Searches

[This transcript has been edited for clarity]

Jacob: 

Jeff, welcome to season 2, episode something or other of the Human Friend Digital Podcast.

Jeff: 

Hey Jacob, today’s topic is zero-click-search, which came up in a call with one of our clients the other day, and I was like, I don’t know what that is. So, Jacob, what is it and why does it matter?

Jacob: 

Yes, and it’s becoming more important. So, the short of it is, if you search for something, and the information that appears is satisfactory, and you don’t need to click into anything else, that’s a zero-click search.

Jeff: 

Like the little box that shows up at the top of Google?

Jacob: 

It’s a perfect example. And Google is doing it even more with that Gemini summations at the top, where people are—you know, when they first rolled it out, they were saying, “put rocks in your pizza” kind of stuff.

Jeff: 

I remember that.

Jacob: 

That’s really funny. They’ve gotten a lot better and have rolled it out to more places in the public, but essentially, yeah, that’s the example that is leading people to ask, what do I do more of now?

Because Google has been dabbling with these information panels, knowledge panels, over time. It started with local search, where you would learn all about a local business—the reviews, a link to their website, where they’re located—all before actually going to the business owner’s website. That was the original zero-click, in my opinion, and then they kept adding more and more cool things.

So there’s—like, if you search a person’s name, they’ll have a little Wikipedia knowledge panel.

Jeff: 

You know, like a little summary of their age, their whatever.

Jacob: 

And they have a variety of these. They have FAQ styles. They have image gallery styles. They have knowledge panels that are focused on—like if you searched for a movie. But that’s basically it.

So why is it important? It’s basically you, as a business owner or a website owner, depending on what you’re giving people, you’re going to get fewer people to your website. That’s kind of the big metric that pretty much everyone judges their website by.

Jeff: 

Okay, but it’s going to be more important for people trying to sell from their website. Like, if it’s an informational website, does that matter very much?

Jacob: 

Oh, it matters. You got it backwards. If your website is primarily informational, Google is going to scrape that or ChatGPT is going to scrape that in their own little search world. They’re going to learn from it. They’re going to regurgitate it. They might cite your source. And then, yeah, you won’t get any click at all. 

So the more informational you are, the more you’ll be affected. But the more commercial or transactional you are, Google can’t make the last decision for you. So, those kinds of sites won’t be as affected as heavily.

Jeff: 

So how is website traffic going to change with zero-click search?

Jacob: 

What we’re going to see is probably a change in the landing pages where people are coming into your site. Your informational-based blog posts—you’re probably going to get less traffic from that because people are going to get the answer from there, if you give good information and Google scrapes that, it kind of makes that blog post a little questionable in terms of usefulness.

But if it’s on a commercial-focused landing page—like, “I want to buy Dropbox today,” and I want to see some information about purchasing Dropbox for my business—zero-click search really isn’t going to help anybody with that. So, I feel like you’re going to see some of your blog traffic go down, and some of your commercial page traffic stay about the same and grow as it has been growing over time as more people search for that kind of stuff.

Jeff: 

And so, piggybacking off of that, what can businesses do to optimize for zero-click search? Maybe downplay blog sections, make more landing pages for commercial or…?

Jacob: 

Yeah, SEMrush is a really good help for this as you’re trying to figure out what kind of content to do. If you don’t have SEMrush, you can just do it manually.

SEMrush—or whatever keyword phrase you want to use for position tracking—will have this thing called SERP features (Search Engine Results Page Features). That includes featured snippets, knowledge panels, and other elements. It categorizes them and gives you little icons for each type that appears on that page. That then acts as a checklist.

So if there’s an FAQ, your page would be good if it had some FAQ-style questions. If there are images on there, it would be good to make sure that maybe there’s a gallery of photos associated on your webpage. If there’s a video in there already, maybe you should have a video on your page, etc.

The more you can mimic what’s already on the search results for a given keyword phrase, the better.

Jeff: 

Yeah, so let me make sure I’m understanding. Let’s say—give me a keyword example.

Jacob: 

Digital marketing Cincinnati.

Jeff: 

Okay. Digital marketing Cincinnati. Let’s say that’s your keyword. One section on SEMrush is the SERP section, and it will tell you, “These are the snippets that will show up if you search that,” and it can be FAQs or whatever.

Jacob: 

Mm-hmm. Essentially, they’ll give you a list of icons, and then if you hover over them, it’ll be a quick little list. They’ll have one for local businesses, one for…

Jeff: 

If you’re trying to drive traffic to your site, should you try to not show up for that keyword? Because wouldn’t Google just be taking that all from your site and putting it on the search results page?

Jacob: 

You’re absolutely right. But what will happen is, even though there will be those zero-click searchers, there will also be those people that do want to learn more. So even though you’re going to get less traffic, the people that are really engaged and want to learn more…

Like, I just did it. I Googled “digital marketing Cincinnati,” and I see local businesses show up. I see normal businesses, and then I see a “People also ask” section, which has things like, “How much should you pay for digital marketing?” “How much does a digital marketing specialist make in Cincinnati?” “What are seven types of digital marketing?” etc.

What I would do is make sure that I have a Google Maps listing, which I do. I would make sure that we have some FAQ sections or content that would answer those kinds of questions on our site– and there are a couple on here that we do cover in our website– and that would be important for you to use. 

Because if someone clicks on that “People also ask” section, and then I see “3digital.com” show up, and if I click on that, it will take me to their page, which has a lot more information about one of these FAQs

Jeff: 

So it can be a little like an amuse-bouche for your website.

Jacob:

Yes. A little taste, and then you can try out the rest.

But yes, that’s essentially what you have to do, what I would recommend people do  is Google the terms that you want to show up for, use that to help guide content on your page. Know that you won’t get as many people clicking on your site as you try to reach these things but for those you show up for…

Jeff:

Yeah, they will be better quality clicks. 

Jacob:

Yeah, better quality clicks. They’re more motivated. And which is really what you want, is you just want people that are motivated to get your service. However, we are picking on a commercial service.

So if I did something that was more informational-based, maybe like sports or something about…

Jeff:

Like news or…

Jacob: 

News or cooking. That might be really, really difficult to show up in those categories. Or something very educational, like a PBS Kids page, and you want to teach kids about sharks. And you have a weird question about sharks, like, “What are dermal denticles?”

Jeff: 

Gosh, your kids are such nerds, in the best possible way. But I know that is a question that Violet has asked you in the past couple of days.

Jacob: 

That’s true. They were talking about it this morning. And so, here I am—I just did a test of it. This is why it’s going to hurt, because the Smithsonian Ocean website is the first knowledge-website after the AI overview, which then tells me everything about the function, the structure, the diversity, and the fossil records of dermal denticles.

Now I don’t have to go there anymore. So people that were relying on website traffic to drive ads or videos on their own website, they’re going to see less.

Jeff: 

Gotcha. Gotcha.

Jacob: 

It’s a big difference between commercial and informational.

Jeff: 

Okay. So, just summarizing here, because my last question was going to be: Is it a threat or an opportunity? And the answer is both.

Jacob: 

Yes.

Jeff: 

Commercial websites can try to play the SERP game to get more people to their site. But informational sites are really going to lose out.

Jacob: 

Yeah, it’s kind of odd because I feel like the informational people are the ones who have given these knowledge panels all the information, and Google has just gone ahead and said, “Thanks.”

Jeff: 

Yeah, exactly. But here’s nothing in return.

Jacob: 

Yeah. So they get the short end of the stick.

Commercial-wise, what you’re doing SEO-wise for your business right now is probably not going to change that much. Because if you were doing good SEO now, or want to do good SEO in the future, you’re going to be making quality content. To a certain degree, it’s a little unnerving because it’s another thing thrown in the game, but in certain industries, you’re not going to see much of an effect. Until Google starts helping you shop. Which they probably will do in the next three to five years.

Jeff: 

They’ve tried, but it has never caught on.

Jacob: 

Yeah, they probably will have some sort of AI-powered business shopping assistant. That’s when commercial businesses are going to be very scared. Because now you have to not only rank well in search for people who don’t want to use that tool, but for the people who do use that tool, you have to be…

I have heard somebody ask me—and I don’t know if it’s a real phrase yet in the industry—AIO, Artificial Intelligence Optimization.

Jeff: 

I bet it is, but we haven’t come across it yet.

Jacob: 

No, no one’s asked me about it yet. Because when you do research into it, most of these tools use search engines like Google to get that information anyway. So if you show up well in search, you show up well on the robots as well.

Jeff: 

Right. Because right now, if you go to ChatGPT and search something, it’s just pulling it from Google.

Jacob: 

Yes. They have a database in their brain, but if you turn on that little web search, it will search Google. And they do use that same kind of result setup, so it’ll be a little different, but it’s…

Jeff: 

In the future, you’re saying you could just go to an AI bot directly, and it… 

What do you mean? What would this look like, do you think?

Jacob: 

Oh, sure, we can get into that. I think it would basically quiz you on the things that you want. There is something analogous already in society, and that’s a car broker. What they do is they help buyers search for cars, negotiate, and buy the right car. Just got that off of an AI summary. Can’t help myself.

Jeff: 

Or like, a realtor helps you buy a house. Or if you go to a hotel, a concierge will help you find whatever in the city. So, AI could take that role for the internet.

Jacob: 

Yeah, I would imagine so. Essentially, what it will do is ask you, like if you’re going to buy a car—do you want a sedan? Do you want a Volkswagen? Do you want a Porsche? What can you afford? What can’t you afford? What are the top three things that you want?

You’d probably have an interview with the AI bot, and then the AI bot will spend, I don’t know, however long it takes an AI bot to do it, and then it will come back with results that meet your criteria.

Jeff: 

Gotcha.

Jacob: 

So when that day comes, which I’m just going to throw out my hat and say three to five years, we’ll have an AI concierge. They’ll probably call it the concierge service, and you can—it’ll be a flexible AI bot.

Like, “What do I want to do this weekend?” And it will be like, “Here are some plans for your family.”

Jeff: 

Yeah, that would be really cool. But yeah, sites would have to optimize for showing up in those bots’ questionnaire answers.

Jacob: 

Yeah. And so, to a certain degree, they’re going to have to rely on systems that are already in place. So you might not have to change too much.

But one thing I do see is that you have an opportunity now with changes with robots. You can opt in to letting your website be crawled by AI robots or opt out. If you don’t say anything, you’re technically opted in. So doing nothing means you’re opted in.

Jeff: 

Well, it depends on what it is. But for stuff like that, it should always be—the good thing for society would be if that default was opt out.

Jacob: 

Yes.

Jeff: 

You know, the default for “Do you want us to contribute to your 401k?” The default should be opt in. But it’s opt out, and it’s one of those things where it should be the other way around.

Jacob: 

No. They want you to find the problem before they solve the problem.

Jeff:

Yeah, they could solve it at the start.

Jacob: 

Yeah, there’s a lot of things like that where…

Jeff: 

Taxes are like that in America. They know how much money we made—just take the tax. Don’t do refunds. Don’t do anything. You know what we owe.

Jacob: 

That’s a whole other conversation, Jeff. 

But I agree with you. It’s complicated, but that’s probably how this is going to be too. You’re going to have to jump through loops to opt out or in. So right now, doing nothing means that your website can be crawled by a bot. But you can go to your robots.txt and do that.

I have a feeling in the future, a concierge might require you to have an index put in place, and then you go submit your website to the ChatGPT concierge service. But that’s maybe three to five years down the line.

Okay, final thoughts. If you are a B2B business, don’t lose your head. Most of what you’re doing now is going to keep helping you. If you want to take it on yourself without an SEO [tool] involved, simply Google the search terms you want to show up for, and they will give you the content pieces you need. You will see on the page things like, “Oh, there’s a local listing, there’s an FAQ, there’s images, there’s video.” Just do that yourself, and then you’ll know which content you need to make for your website to stay competitive in that mix for quality content.

If you have been tracking your analytics, give your blog a break. Don’t assume your blog is terrible now and not working anymore. It might be working, but it might be working in the zero-click space where you’re not going to see those results

.

Jeff:

Okay, cool. This is episode two. We have kind of had a stutter-start with the podcast at the beginning of this year, but hopefully, we will be back on the two-week schedule going forward.

Jacob:

You know, running a small business isn’t easy all the time. Also, this is episode three, I believe, for the year.

Jeff:

No, it’s episode two.

Jacob:

No, we’ve done two already this year, Jeff.

Jeff:

Well, I can’t keep track. Anyway, this is episode 3…

Jacob:

That’s funny. Well, come back next time, and I swear we’ll be wearing pants.

Jeff:

We know what we’re doing.

Jacob:

We know what we’re doing.

Jeff:

Hopefully, see you guys in two weeks.

Jacob:

Alright, bye.