Google just released their guide for how to rank in Google's AI features. I wanna talk about what we can take away from it. Specifically, it's what Google's telling us not to do that I think is most insightful.
The guide is called Optimizing Your Website for Generative AI Features in Google Search.
The guide starts the same way all of Google's SEO guidance starts. Just write for humans. Just write really good, helpful content that humans like, and that's all you have to do.
And while there is some true there, it implies that their systems are able to read content and understand if it's helpful. And that's not true at all.
In fact, I didn't find any of the guidance on what you should be doing helpful at all. However, there's some very interesting information you can glean from what they said not to do.
First of all, they say don't make a bunch of different variations of the same content based on how people or AI searches. In other words, don't just create the same guy targeting a different use case or demographic. And why can't you do this?
Well, according to Google, it's because this is seen as manipulating generative search results, and it can lead to a scaled content abuse penalty.
Oh wait. If this isn't effective, how is it manipulating search results? And why would Google need to penalize you?
Well, that's pretty simple actually. It's because it's incredibly effective.
Now you can of course overdo this. I don't recommend creating hundreds of similar articles. I also don't recommend creating multiple pages that are targeting synonymous terms or have the same information.
But if you can share unique information on each article, targeting 12 different demographics with 12 variations is very effective and doesn't put you at risk of a penalty.
They also tell you you shouldn't be trying to get inauthentic mentions of your brand. In other words, you shouldn't be spamming mentions and recommendations for your brand all across the internet. And the reason, according to Google, is they're already very good at detecting spam, and they can just ignore these pages you're building mentions on.
And that's partly true. Google does ignore most spamy pages. We only build recommendations on pages that are already being cited by Google.
You don't have to guess if a page is spammy or being ignored by Google. They'll tell you.
But Google also did something very valuable in this guide. They cleared up a lot of Geo myths. You don't need an LMS TXT file.
You don't need a markdown version of your pages. You don't need to worry about chunking your content and adding structured data. Doesn't help you rank in AI features.
But if you're looking for a guide that actually has helpful information on how to be cited in AI, I would recommend Microsoft's guide.
