Whether or not we like it, artificial intelligence (AI) is here to stay. How will AI impact SEO? There are benefits and disadvantages to AI-generated content and understanding AI can put you ahead in the SEO game — or set you back. This article will explain what AI-generated content is, discuss how it is used in SEO content creation and present its potential impacts on your SEO performance.
What Exactly Is AI-Generated Content?
AI- or computed-generated content is produced by software such as ChatGPT that utilizes natural language processing (NLP) and machine learning algorithms to replicate human thinking and generate writing that is similar to natural human language. Free and easy-to-use, AI tools can create all types of content — from social media posts and product descriptions to newsletters and entire articles. They can also brainstorm ideas that we can use to write our own content.
Google and AI-Generated Content
You may hope to save time and resources by using an AI tool to improve your SEO rankings. AI-generated content produced solely to raise search rankings via keyword placement can result in copy that sounds spammy, i.e., it may have the right keywords but make little sense to the user. Remember, Google prefers high-quality, relevant and reliable content.
Obviously, AI-created content developed only for search engines goes against Google’s guidance. If the content makes sense and is helpful to readers, however, then Google says AI-generated content is not an issue.
The Pros of Using AI to Generate SEO Content
- AI can assist you by providing ideas for main topics and related subtopics.
- AI can provide you with a list of commonly asked questions related to the topic you are writing for.
- AI can generate multiple outline structure options to help guide your writing.
- AI can help you quickly research information on the topic you are writing for.
- AI can be used as a thesaurus to give you different options to make your content more interesting.
The Cons of Using AI to Generate SEO Content
- Automatically generated content is not unique or original and is unable to provide new perspectives. This is because AI creates content by searching the internet for data and ideas that already exist.
- By using content straight from the AI tool, you may unwittingly be plagiarizing others’ ideas and/or text.
- AI tools can generate duplicate or rehashed content, which can negatively affect your search engine rankings.
- AI cannot create personalized content that expresses human feelings or emotions. AI content can sound not only spammy, but also robotic and more neutral than a topic demands.
- Because AI uses content posted on the internet and this content is not always accurate, the result can include errors and misinformation, which may damage your reputation.
- The content may present information about a topic without providing in-depth knowledge, resulting in content that Google considers to be low quality.
Conclusion
Should you use AI to generate SEO content, or should you avoid it completely? The answer will depend on your unique business, content goals and SEO risk tolerance. AI is a helpful technology that can benefit the content creation process for your business. While AI tools can assist in many ways, there are still many unknowns/risks with copying the exact content that is generated by an AI tool into your website pages.