Hello there, Digital Darlings,
With the start of spring comes new beginnings, innovations, and revelations. Does the milder weather have you feeling a bit lighter? Have you found yourself whistling a happy tune while gazing out your sun-filled window? I love that for you. I’ve certainly been a bit more jubilant these past few days, but that won’t stop me from being my snarky self while recapping this week’s digital marketing drama. Let’s get into it.
Google has a new Head of Search, and she’s super into AI.
Longtime Googler Liz Reid secured one of the most prized positions in the Google-verse this week. She previously ran the Search Generative Experience department, so under her leadership, I expect our journey into the Matrix to be expedited. A few other high-up Googlers who have been spearheading AI initiatives within the company got promoted too. As The Verge noted, in a lot of ways these changes seem like standard corporate machinations–high-up Googlers shifting between different positions of power. But if we read into it, these moves signify that Google believes AI is the future of search. Which is valid! That said, Google has been annoying me lately, especially after…
Google asked us to be patient while their core update upends our SEO world.
The March core update is so big, it’ll continue rolling out until the end of the month. Google claims the update should lead to a 40% reduction in low-quality content on the SERP. Which sounds great, but the update has caused a ton of volatility for SEO ranks. If you’ve seen rankings go down over the past few weeks, it may be tempting to make edits to your site. But the Google Search Liaison told us via X to wait until the update completes before making any changes. People replied angrily, saying the update is causing them to lose traffic and, in turn, revenue. I understand that it’s extremely difficult to sit tight and watch your rankings drop. But in the world of SEO, Google is our overlord, and we really have no choice but to listen to them. Now for a little paid search news…
We can now import Google PMAX campaigns to Microsoft Advertising.
I few weeks ago I expressed my excitement about the fact that Microsoft PMAX campaigns are now available globally. And now you can import Google PMAX campaigns to Microsoft seamlessly. Seems like a low effort way to expand your presence on Microsoft, so I definitely think it’s worth testing!
Now, let’s chat about The Fediverse…
Meta showed off Threads’ Fediverse integration for the first time.
If you’ve never heard of the fediverse, I’ll let this quote from The Verge explain it:
“The fediverse is as if you took X, TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook and made them all interoperable so you could post anything from anywhere, and all your followers would be guaranteed to see it. And if you wanted to leave one platform for another, you could bring all your content, all your followers, all your everything with you.”
The social media web is expanding. Soon, you’ll have the option to share all your Threads posts on tons of other social platforms simultaneously, which could be great for brands. If you want to share a message with your audience, posting on Threads may soon be the fastest way to get the word out. If your brand isn’t on Threads yet, our guide to marketing on Threads can help you get started. But honestly, is it just me or has Meta made a real-life WUPHF? In other Meta news...
Instagram ads with promo codes are now available globally.
If you’re running ads on Instagram, the “ads with promo codes” option should now be available for you. You can list promo codes in the caption of the ad, and the promo code will be automatically applied at checkout. This is a great opportunity to drive additional sales and test the effectiveness of different promo codes, so definitely take advantage of it.
And now for your regularly scheduled AI news…
Nvidia’s president said that artificial general intelligence is 5 years away.
Artificial general intelligence (AGI) is often referred to as “human-level AI”... oh no. Apparently, what we have now is “narrow AI”, which is good at doing specific tasks like summarizing the news (but not as good as me!) or building a website. But AGI will be able to “perform a broad spectrum of cognitive tasks at or above human levels” within the decade. I’m scared!! And in other AI news…
OpenAI’s chatbot store is full of spam.
The GPT store is filling up with more and more strange, potentially-copywrite-infringing bots. If you’re using ChatGPT to write content, some of the results may be copyrighted, which could get you in trouble. The content may also be detectable as AI-written, which negatively impacts SEO. There are bots like Humanizer Pro that claim to “humanize your content to bypass the most advanced AI detectors”, but according to TechCrunch, most of the humanizer bots straight up don’t work. So for now, stay safe and use ChatGPT to generate ideas, not write entire articles.
Well, that’s all for this week, Darlings. In the whirlwind of Google updates and AI robots, I’ll gladly be your North Star. May your Friday be easy, and your weekend peaceful. Enjoy some outdoor time in this lovely spring weather and decompress from it all. We’ll chat again next week.
You know you love me.
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