OpenAI just launched ChatGPT, and all tech enthusiasts have been going crazy about its capabilities. If you haven't tried it already, you absolutely should go and sign up right now because it's absolutely free to use at the moment. In this article, we are going to show you how ChatGPT is going to impact SEO and also how ChatGPT compares to Google and why in many ways it's actually better than Google. So, we are super excited to show this to you and all kinds of awesome examples. So, let's dive right in.
What Is ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is simply an AI language model for dialogue. This basically just means that you can ask this AI any questions or feed in any commands and it will give you a response or an answer. The AI can create fully edited SEO articles, write programming scripts, act as a chatbot and so much more. What the team at OpenAI has basically done is, crawled the internet and crawled all kinds of information to be able to have this large database where they can basically provide responses to all kinds of questions.
So after learning about ChatGPT, the team at Partnerkin decided to put this thing to the ultimate test in many ways and we are going to show you from an SEO perspective how this could change the game for us as far as what we do. And ultimately, this could really be a problem for Google. It is definitely a real competitor and a real opportunity for Google to either try to replicate or if they don't replicate, then something like this could easily put them out of business in many ways. So, it is really really something that you have to pay attention to. This is really no joke and we are going to prove this to you with examples.
How ChatGPT Works
The way that ChatGPT works is you just go into its dashboard you’ll see a text bar at the bottom of the page where you can enter any query and then it will give you an answer. It's that simple.
And it's much more than that though. It's not like Google where we go in here and we just type a query in and then we get a list of results and then that's it. What's different about this is we can type a query in and then we can follow up on that query. We’ll show you in a second what that looks like to get more specific but for now, let's just start with a few examples.
Informational Queries
Let's start with something as simple as "What is inflation?" We type that into ChatGPT, and it gives us a good answer.
This is exactly what it is and seems accurate. One thing that is a little difficult with this is because this information that we get, we have to assume that it's true because it doesn't cite any sources, it doesn't say where it got this information from.
So, we just have to assume that the AI is correct, which is definitely not the case, right? It's not always going to be correct. But, it's actually the same case with Google when we look at Google. We're assuming that all of these results are accurate, right? We're just taking this at face value that this is all accurate information because it should be coming from qualified sources in some ways. But, we know that's not always true because Google's not always accurate.
So, both of these tools have accuracy issues, but when we think about these informational queries, this is under the assumption that we're actually going to believe the information that's given to us by the AI.
However, the experience on ChatGPT is way better than that you get on Google because when we ask the question "What is inflation?" on Google, first we get hit with three ads. I don't want to click on ads. I'm not interested in the ad about what is inflation, I just want to know what it is.
We do have the panel on the right-hand side of the Google screen that does kind of explain it, but really all this is is just scraped information from a bunch of web pages. Google is not actually answering this question. Now with ChatGPT, it's giving us a direct answer, and we can even follow up on that question to get more specific information.
Conversational Queries
Another advantage of ChatGPT is its ability to handle conversational queries. Let's say we want to know "What are the best SEO practices for e-commerce websites?". We can ask this question to ChatGPT, and it will give us a detailed answer, and we can even follow up with more specific questions like "Can you give me examples of successful e-commerce websites?" ChatGPT will be able to provide that as well. This type of back-and-forth interaction is something that Google can't really provide.
Comparison Queries
Another example is a comparison query. Let's say we want to compare "ChatGPT vs Google." We type that into ChatGPT and it gives us a good comparison of the two, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each. This is something that Google can't really do, as it just gives us a list of web pages with the information we're looking for. With ChatGPT, we're getting a more direct answer and a more comprehensive understanding of the topic.
Transactional Queries
Next here, we want to look at transactional queries and this is an area where ChatGPT just does not do well. So let's try this query, "Please review the Sony A90J OLED TV."
It was having some problems or errors, and too many requests. Like we were hitting it up a little too hard. But then we'll go back up here and do it again on a separate window and it couldn’t give a review of a specific product. But it can give you a general idea of what that product is about and give you some features or benefits of it. But it's not going to do this super well at this point.
So with transactional queries, ChatGPT is not there yet. It's nowhere near where it needs to be. And in fact, I don't know how they would even do that because most reviews are very subjective in nature. They're usually someone giving their opinion about this particular product.
Even though they'll try to do objective analysis, it's always going to be subjective because we're using our eyes in this example to look at two different TVs. So, you could say "Oh well, with my eyes, it's deeper or this," but it's still subjective because humans are subjective. So, the bottom of the funnel keywords is where ChatGPT is still finding difficulty in handling.
Another way to prove that ChatGPT is not good at transactional queries is by looking at this example:
When we search for "Best TVs" on Google, we get a list of results with different TV models and reviews. But with ChatGPT, it's not able to give us a specific list of the best TVs, but it can give us a general idea of what makes a TV good and the features that we should look for when buying one. This is something that ChatGPT needs to improve on in order to compete with Google in the transactional queries space.
Advantages of ChatGPT over Google
One of the biggest advantages of using ChatGPT for SEO research is the ability to get quick answers without having to do a bunch of research. The AI can provide a quick answer, but if you want to go deeper into a topic, you can force the AI to give you even deeper information.
This is one of the main reasons why Google's approach is flawed. People know Google's algorithm and know how to manipulate it by providing an ungodly amount of information about any topic, usually more than what's even necessary. This is done to juice content and make it more fluffy to satisfy Google's algorithms.
The problem with this approach is that all of these publishers go way overboard and can't just practice brevity. They can't give you a succinct answer to a question. The AI can and with the AI you can get that short answer that you need. If you want to go deeper, you can follow that up. This is especially useful for informational queries where you just need a quick answer without all the fluff.
In addition, ChatGPT shines when it comes to questions for kids, where it can give a whole list of questions that are appropriate for kids to ask. This is another great example of why this tool works so well relative to Google. With Google, you might have to go through multiple web pages to get the answers you need, but with ChatGPT, you can get as many answers as you need in one place.
ChatGPT provides a more direct and comprehensive way of getting answers to questions, and has the added benefit of being able to handle conversational queries. It's a valuable tool for SEOs to have in their arsenal, and Google will have to step up its game if it wants to compete with ChatGPT.
The conversational nature of ChatGPT really shines as it allows you to follow up on your initial query and dig deeper into the topic without having to start over with new keywords or modifiers. It understands the context of the conversation and can provide more specific and detailed information. This is a major advantage over Google, which can only provide a list of results based on your initial query. With ChatGPT, you can continue the conversation and get the information you need in a more natural and efficient way.
Limitations of ChatGPT
It's important to note that ChatGPT is not perfect and still has limitations, especially when it comes to transactional and bottom-of-the-funnel queries. It may not be able to provide specific product recommendations or reviews, but it can still give you a general idea of what to look for and what to expect.
Our Verdict
ChatGPT goes further beyond being a search tool with a capability that is now starting to blow a lot of people’s minds. It is the capability to process and respond to action queries. If you give it an action query, it can actually produce something of real value for you. Something Google can't do.
ChatGPT can compose a song for you and basically be your free songwriter, it can write for you an entire book if you give it a topic, and the biggest of all is that it can generate computer code in all the popular programming languages.
People are now using ChatGPT to create different computer software programs like chrome extensions, web applications, and also mobile applications. The code it generates is almost 95% accurate, you’ve only got to make some slight adjustments to suit it for your project.
Some experts are worried that the tool might wipe out some jobs like copywriters, and programmers because it does most of the complex work for the company:
Others are appreciating how it helps to improve company productivity and the speed of implementation of some office tasks:
Overall, it's a must-have tool for anyone who needs to get things done quickly and efficiently and it's a game changer for those who are looking for quick and accurate answers to their questions. We are impressed with the capabilities of this tool and we are excited to see how it can help us in our future projects.
Conclusion
As we've seen in these examples, ChatGPT has the potential to change the game for SEO. It's a more direct and comprehensive way of getting answers to our questions and has the added benefit of being able to handle conversational queries. While it's not without its accuracy issues, it's still a valuable tool for SEOs to have in their arsenal. Google will have to step up its game if it wants to compete with ChatGPT. And as always, it's important to verify the information provided by any AI, including ChatGPT.
