Lately, there have been many articles in Google searches that are the same. They’re written by a type of artificial intelligence called ChatGPT.
Some of these articles are starting to disappear from search archives, and others don’t even get a chance to show up at the top of search results or bring in people to read them.
Does this mean ChatGPT is bad for SEO (Search Engine Optimization)?
In my next article, I’ll dive into this topic. Based on what I’ve learned from using it, I’ll talk about what parts of ChatGPT work well for SEO and which don’t.
Why is Chat GPT bad for SEO content generation?
ChatGPT isn’t doing great in making SEO content. It has lots of info and uses known tricks, but you must wonder: Can everyone use it? Is it unique? How about the writer’s skills? What extra value does it bring?
Nowadays, many sites use AI, like GPT, to crank thousands of articles daily.
If these articles follow usual SEO rules, like having the right keywords and lots of info from different sources, rewritten in a new way, you’re right. But even this has become automated.
Google’s latest updates made it more competent at spotting the difference between bad and good content. From what I’ve seen and heard, here’s what’s happening:
- Google checks out AI-written pages but doesn’t always add them to its list, especially for newer, less-known sites.
- Google might initially add new AI-written pages but then take them off its list, making the site lose its place over time.
- Sites that used AI extensively for their content in the past year have dropped in rankings. I’ll explain why in a part about Google’s latest changes for helpful content.
- As for my site, Yashura, I use ChatGPT to improve my content. I don’t have many articles, but my site’s doing well compared to others that pump out tons of AI articles without much use.
How to NOT Use ChatGPT for SEO
Here are some tips from my experience about what not to use ChatGPT for in SEO. This advice can help you avoid errors and save you time.
Keyword Research
Trying to find keywords with AI tools like ChatGPT is a big no-no.
It’s not just because its info might be old, but also because it can’t give you the details you need about keywords,
like how often they’re searched, if they’re becoming more or less popular, or if they’re seasonal and get lots of searches only at certain times.
However, you can use AI to develop ideas for topics in your specific area.
Writing Complete Page Content
Using AI to write a whole page of content is not a good idea if you want to do well in Google searches.
It’s not just about having mistakes or old info in the content (because there are tools that can update the info).
The main issue is that it doesn’t bring anything new to the search results. It’s just like rewording stuff, which anyone can do.
Writing a full article with AI tools doesn’t add anything special.
With Google’s new update (E-E-A-T), filling up the search with AI-written stuff that doesn’t offer anything extra won’t stand out.
This means that new kinds of expertise will become more important in Google’s search results.
Where AI CAN help with SEO
AI can be helpful for SEO stuff, helping you save time and make things easier.
Here are some ways ChatGPT can help you out with search engine optimization.
Find Topic ideas
You can find cool topic ideas for your website’s specific area easily. The more special topics you have about what you’re good at, the more Google thinks you’re an expert.
This is often called Topical authority. But be careful – if you make lots of low-quality stuff, even if there’s a lot of it, it might not help your site. Google might think your site isn’t helpful at all.
My Experience
I’ve got two ways to come up with topic ideas. One way is to ask ChatGPT for ideas.
Or, I can check out the competitors’ websites. I look for a thing called a sitemap on their sites.
Then, I use a tool called the Web Pilot plugin. It helps me pull out all the different topic ideas from those pages and sort them out.
Filter keywords
Sorting out keywords is essential, especially if you’ve got a bunch from a specific tool.
Some keywords mean the same thing, others repeat, and some are about selling stuff or giving information.
Also, you may find some with search numbers that don’t match what you want in your final list.
Before, you had to sort them by hand. But now, you can write a quick prompt, which does the sorting job for you in no time.
Search intent research
ChatGPT can be a big help when you’re working on keywords. It can sort them into different groups for you.
Plus, it can give you more info about what people are looking for when they search for your keywords.
Content workflow
A workflow process for your content is critical to making a good outline for your article.
It’s split into a few parts:
- planning what to write
- writing it
- checking and editing
- and finally putting it out there.
It can be tough if you’re good at something and want to write stuff that helps your readers.
A lot of what you know is just in your head from experience, and it’s hard to explain basic things, especially to people who are just starting.
AI can guide you through each step, remind you of important info that should be in your content, and do lots of other small but essential things.
Content optimization
Making your content better for search engines and people visiting your site is significant.
You want to get the best spot in search results, which means working with search engine algorithms.
Plus, your content needs to be great for people who read it. This gives them a good experience, and when they like and interact with your pages, it shows that your site is good.
This helps your site get a better reputation, more authority, and better rankings as time goes on.
Competitor analysis
You can analyze your competitors smartly and quickly using ChatGPT Plus. First, you turn on a tool like Web Pilot.
Then, you use an SEO tool to find out things about your competitors, like :
- how many people visit their sites
- what keywords they’re competing for
- how many other sites link to them
- how strong their authority is
- and how valuable their visitors are.
After you give this info, ChatGPT Plus can show you a graph that explains how the competition looks.
It shows what each competitor is good at, so you get a basic idea about everything in your niche before you dive in.
Analyze your SEO data
You can use AI to check how your website is doing with SEO easily.
You can see how things like the links coming to your site (backlinks), the stuff you post, and how many people visit are related. This can be done through your Google Search Console account or tools like SEMrush or Ahrefs.
To analyze Google Analytics data, for example, you look at lots of your site’s pages.
You check how many people visit them, how much they interact, how long they stay on the pages, and how often they do things like buy something or sign up.
Then, you might ask ChatGPT to list the pages that get the most visits or have good interaction but don’t make many sales or referrals.
This way, you can figure out what to fix to get more people to buy or sign up.
Or, you might want to find out which pages don’t get much attention or keep visitors for long.
You can link this with keywords info and look at stats for these pages to see if you can make the user experience better.
After all, a better user experience means your pages rank higher in search engines and get more people to buy or sign up.
The Future of SEO and AI
The future of SEO and AI started with Google’s latest update called ‘Google helpful content’. It’s about making search results more useful for people, as Google says.
The Helpful Content system is now totally different, changing how websites rank.
This is tough news for lots of SEO experts. If your site has pages that people don’t like or that give a bad experience, Google’s system will see this as a bad sign.
In Google’s next update, this could make your whole site rank lower.
Think about how many new pages get put up every day. Google has to check out trillions of pages each year – that’s a lot of work! So, Google says if your site has a bunch of useless stuff, it won’t do well.
Pro tip: Google says if you have lots of low-quality stuff on your site, getting rid of it can really help. Or, you can fix it up to make it better quality.
Conclusion
In this article, I’ve talked about whether ChatGPT is bad for SEO and shared the latest info on why it’s not great just to rewrite stuff using AI tools.
I also told you about the best ways to use AI in SEO and making content.
I’d like to know what you think about how SEO will change as AI gets better and better.
