Money, obviously. But it’s deeper than that.
Google’s market share has broadly held firm in the wake of everything AI. By held firm, I mean its share price has gone through the roof, and its AI offering is growing ever stronger.
But I don’t think all is as rosy as it seems.
Google’s search product isn’t addictive – as much as they’re trying to change that. Nobody hangs out there except saddos like us. And audiences – particularly younger ones – have options.
They’re turning away from more traditional methods of information retrieval, and that’s a big problem. Even for Google.
Even the search engine giant isn’t immune.
Older audiences – those already ingrained in the system – are taking up a larger percentage of their audience. The younger ones have more exciting and addictive options, and best believe they’re using them to find stuff.
Across every engagement metric, 18-24-year-olds have deteriorated faster than 65+ users over the same period. Shorter visit duration, fewer pages per visit, and a worse bounce rate. And it’s declining more rapidly with younger audiences.
Evolution for Google and the wider web is a necessity.
Although interesting to note that the 18-24 year old audience share has only suffered a small decline according to Similarweb data. The real losses were in the 25-34 cohort.
TL;DR
- The publishing industry and Google have more in common than perhaps either of us cares to admit.
- The changes Google has made are a very deliberate effort to engage with – and retain – younger audiences. Audiences who behave differently.
- Engagement data on news websites (pages per visit, bounce rate, and time on site) declines with audience age. Exactly the same is true of Google.
- AI Mode is Google’s attempt to create a “sticky” product. One aimed at younger audiences.
What’s Changed?
Well, the obvious:
Just look at the SERP for almost any term, particularly middle-of-the-funnel comparison ones.
What people apparently want is not very publisher, or legacy-search-friendly. What they want is video.
Particularly the youth.
Right now, it’s feasible children spend almost four hours per day watching video on YouTube and TikTok. Four hours. That same group spends just four minutes on publisher websites.
The younger you are, the more time you spend watching, the less you spend reading. So the obvious counter (from a company that primarily organizes written content) is to saturate the market with video content.
Obviously, it’s very helpful if you own the market.
And this doesn’t just affect organic search. Adverts are more expensive to run because AIOs…
Source link
Disclaimer
We strive to uphold the highest ethical standards in all of our reporting and coverage. We blogs.grocliq.com want to be transparent with our readers about any potential conflicts of interest that may arise in our work. It’s possible that some of the investors we feature may have connections to other businesses, including competitors or companies we write about. However, we want to assure our readers that this will not have any impact on the integrity or impartiality of our reporting. We are committed to delivering accurate, unbiased news and information to our audience, and we will continue to uphold our ethics and principles in all of our work. Thank you for your trust and support.
Website Upgradation is going on for any glitch kindly connect at [email protected]
