Ecommerce Experts Reveal How AI Will Change SEO
Home > Blog > Ecommerce Experts Reveal How AI Will Change SEO
The expanded use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing many facets of our lives. From ChatGPT to OpenAI, this cutting edge technology continues to evolve and expand.
If you work in ecommerce marketing, you may be wondering “Can cutting edge AI tools really help me attain higher ROI, increased conversions, and better visibility?” You may be concerned about how your competitors could be using AI or how AI will change the online shopping landscape.
In response to all of these questions and concerns, Whitecap has hit the ground running and rounded up 22 expert opinions on what AI means for the future of ecommerce. Read on to learn about how to harness this powerful tool to improve your ad targeting, calculate dynamic pricing, enhance your keyword research and provide even more personalized customer experiences
Ecommerce Experts Answer: 'How do you see AI affecting search engine marketing (SEM) for ecommerce websites?'
Kurt Elster
Kurt Elster
“Search engine marketing has always revolved around providing the most relevant content for a search query. The benchmark for good content is constantly being elevated, and AI technology is leading this charge. Current AI tools can generate exceptional content, and embracing them leads to improved content quality. An arms race exists since other competitors have access to the same tools, and they are evolving quickly, making the pressure to produce good content even higher. Don't let fear prevent you from keeping up with the competition – the best approach is to explore the potential of these AI tools and make them an integral part of your content strategy.”
Luzie Wittl
Reload Media
Peformance Marketing Strategy Lead
“Yes, AI is really changing the Performance Marketing space of the future, making some of the previous day-to-day optimisations progressively redundant.
With the launch of new smart campaign types like "Performance Max" at the start of 2022, we have already seen AI make its first entry into the search engine marketing space last year. New tools such as Chat GPT are also making a big impact, and creating efficiencies in areas such as ad copy writing.
What does this mean for us? Now that everyone has access to the latest AI tools, we have to find new and innovative ways of differentiating our campaigns and strategies from other brands. Making your Shopping Feed stand out through feed optimisations, integrating your SEM strategy with your SEO strategy and being agile with creative is more important than ever.
The space is ever changing with AI, but we have to use these changes to our advantage — especially in agency land. We can now focus less on small, time-consuming daily bidding adjustments and instead allocate more time to big-picture strategy.”
Igor Nesmyanovich
Eradium
CEO
“AI is set to revolutionize search engine marketing (SEM) for ecommerce websites. Here are the top 5 ways that AI can affect in the SEM landscape.
Improved Ad Targeting:
AI can analyze vast amounts of data, including demographics, browsing behavior, and past purchases, to identify patterns and optimize ad targeting. This means that ecommerce marketers can expect better return on investment (ROI) by showing ads to the most relevant audience at the right time.
Dynamic Pricing:
AI can monitor competitor prices, demand trends, and customer behavior to automatically adjust product pricing in real-time. This enables ecommerce websites to stay competitive, increase sales, and improve customer satisfaction without manually tracking and updating prices.
Enhanced Keyword Research:
AI-driven keyword research tools can analyze and predict the performance of potential keywords based on historical data and current trends. Ecommerce marketers can use these insights to focus their SEM efforts on high-performing keywords, resulting in more effective campaigns and improved visibility.
Personalized Customer Experience:
AI can help create personalized experiences for users by analyzing their preferences and online behavior. Ecommerce websites can leverage this information to tailor search results, product recommendations, and even the website layout for individual users, leading to increased conversions and customer loyalty.
AI-Optimized Ad Creative:
With the help of AI, ecommerce marketers can automatically test and optimize ad creatives, including headlines, images, and descriptions. AI can identify the best-performing combinations and apply them to future campaigns, improving overall ad performance and reducing manual work.
In summary, AI is transforming search engine marketing for ecommerce websites by improving ad targeting, enabling dynamic pricing, enhancing keyword research, providing personalized customer experiences, and optimizing ad creatives. This can lead to higher ROI, better visibility, and increased conversions for ecommerce businesses.”
Aaron Anderson
Linkpitch.io
Founder & Lead Link Builder
“Many ecommerce brands struggle to have enough unique content on their product pages. A large part of this is due to the amount of effort required to manually write unique product descriptions for hundreds or thousands of products. I think that AI is going to massively reduce the amount of effort required for ecommerce brands to have unique content on these pages.
So, I assume that many of the content-related issues that have long-plagued ecommerce brands may be much less of an issue in the future. That also means that properly optimizing pages with content may be less of a differentiator than it has been in the past.
It’s hard to predict exactly what will happen in the future, but if I had to guess, any type of SEO optimizations that are content-heavy will have less impact in the future as the effort required to implement those changes goes down significantly with AI.”
Collin Belt
Belt Creative
Founder
“AI is changing, and in many ways enhancing the way we interact with tech, particularly when it comes to SEM and ecommerce. While change can be intimidating, here are just some of the areas where AI presents opportunities for ecommerce businesses to outperform their competition and stay ahead of the curve.
Voice & Visual Search
AI-powered visual search engines like Bing can analyze an image and provide highly relevant search results based on the visual features of the product. Ecommerce businesses can increase their odds of showing up by optimizing their product images for visual search, including adding descriptive alt text and metadata. As a bonus, this work helps improve site accessibility, making it possible for merchants to reach a wider audience.
Similarly, ecommerce businesses should optimize their websites for voice search to ensure that their products appear in voice search results from virtual assistants such as Alexa and Google Assistant.
Personalization
Ecommerce businesses can leverage AI to personalize and optimize the customer journey on their website, including their search results. By analyzing a user's browsing behavior, purchase history, and preferences, AI tools can help surface better product recommendations for users. This can increase the chances of a user finding what they are looking for, resulting in higher conversion rates and getting the most out of your PPC campaigns.”
Content Creation
Ecommerce businesses can leverage AI tools for content creation to generate high-quality, SEO-friendly content, such as product descriptions, alt text, blog posts, and category pages.
By using AI for content creation in tandem with a copywriter or editing team, ecommerce businesses can quickly create large amounts of content that is optimized for search engines, increasing their odds of ranking in organic search.”
Joe Dempsey
Liquify
Front End Developer
“We're already using AI to generate certain content faster, cheaper. In the short term it's a time/cost win for those using it at a generative level as a lot of businesses will be too slow to start thinking about that.
Ultimately AI will change the search landscape beyond what we know now and I believe a lot of our historical content investments will become redundant with a greater move towards centralized marketplaces/shopping experiences. Google will very quickly need to move beyond content quality signals.”
Dustin Dandy
FOMO agency
Co-Founder & Advisor
“Imagine a world where AI knows the user interacting with it. It's been learning from them over time, and has a surprisingly good grip on who that individual is, what they do, their interests, style, personality, etc. AI will be able to surface relevant content for each individual with precision.
No longer will content be able to speak to its audience generically, AI is going to force businesses to better understand the unique layers of their target audience. We already lived in a world of copycats, but now we live in a world of copycats who also have access to AI. I'd be surprised if AI didn't devalue this type of content. Originality and niche relevance has never been more valuable, look for your edge here.”
Darryl Stevens
DIGITECH Web Design, LLC
Founder
“AI is transforming search engine marketing for e-commerce websites in numerous ways. With AI-powered tools, online retailers can identify customer preferences and personalize search results, leading to increased engagement and conversion rates. AI can also optimize product descriptions, keywords, and metadata to improve search rankings and drive traffic to e-commerce websites. Additionally, AI can analyze user behavior and identify patterns to help retailers understand how customers interact with their websites and make data-driven decisions.
AI chatbots can also enhance customer service by automatically answering common queries and resolving issues in real time. Overall, AI is revolutionizing the e-commerce industry by enabling online retailers to deliver personalized experiences, improve efficiency, and drive growth.”
Sara Mannix
Mannix Marketing
Founder & Chief Executive Officer
“AI is a marketers superpower for being more efficient, allowing us to quickly research and summarize sentiment around products and services to allow us to write better copy, AI helps us write faster alternative ads for a/b testing and AI. AI powered chatbots will also help us service clients more efficiently.”
Tory Gray
Gray Dot Company
Founder
“A lot of eCommerce businesses will lean into AI like ChatGPT to accelerate output, especially as many look to tighten budgets because of the macro-economic outlook. That means SEOs and content managers are going to feel the push to rapidly scale content through AI-generated writing. If that quantity comes at the cost of quality, the end result is probably going to be a thin content issue. eCommerce sites that stay committed to quality, expert-written content stand to gain ground, especially with the evolution of E-E-A-T, which will likely evolve further in the coming years to weed out unchecked AI. The real question is going to be how to intelligently integrate AI into processes and strategies that still prioritize human oversight to fact-check, cite, optimize, and edit for great content.”
Kai Davis
Double Your Ecommerce
Marketing and Growth Consultant
“AI - like ChatGPT - will make it easier for merchants to create SEO-optimized content, like product or collection descriptions. That’s good because just a bit more of that optimized content can make a big difference for a store.
But that’s going to have knock-on effects on Ecommerce marketing. What is your differentiator if every store has SEO-optimized AI-written product and collection descriptions? I say your differentiator becomes your deep knowledge and understanding of your target market and best buyers.
- Who are they?
- What problems are they trying to solve?
- How do your products fit into that story?
If everyone can have SEO-optimized AI-powered content, you stand out by making your content different and remarkable. And you do that by investing in a deep understanding of your customers: through market research calls, surveys, and interviews.”
Ernest Bio Bogore
Nerdy Joe Inc.
Co-Founder & CEO
“I think sentiment analysis will be the biggest trend in the search engine marketing industry. Using AI, search engines like Google and Bing can quickly run machine learning programs that can gauge customer sentiment by analyzing reviews, social media posts, and other user-generated content.
It can then summarize the learnings and turn them into valuable insights into what customers like and dislike. This is great for searchers who can quickly satisfy their intent and for marketing who can use the insights to create even more customized content.”
Flynn Zaiger
Online Optimism
CEO
“It is crucial to recognize that AI remains in its early stages. AI solutions based on LLMs have only been around for a short while, with major consumer-facing AI models (such as ChatGPT) have yet to celebrate their first anniversary. Keeping this in mind is essential for devising a successful long-term strategy for your ecommerce site, particularly since there are so many unknowns about the future of AI. The AI technologies we employ today will undoubtedly evolve and become more sophisticated in the coming years. As a result, fundamental aspects that are currently vital, such as implementing proper schema to enable AI tools to recognize your site, may lose their significance. Instead, your focus should shift towards offering value to LLMs, akin to how early SEOs generated value by providing informative links and content that catered to search engines.
To create value for LLMs, continue offering unique content derived from human-generated ideas. While it may be tempting to harness AI for mass content production on your site, it's important to note that, from 2023 onwards, LLMs may face challenges in progressing if they rely predominantly on AI-generated content available online. As these models improve, they will likely prioritize training on human inputs. For long-term SEM strategies in an increasingly AI-driven world, maintaining a human-centric approach is, at present, the most effective strategy.”
Ross Beyeler
Trellis, Inc.
Chief Operating Officer
“Generative AI is going to make the long-tail, even longer. Now that content production is only a good prompt away, there is very little to hold marketers back from getting as niche as possible with their content. This could be particularly interesting when you combine niche audiences with niche content. A supplement company can now create landing pages targeting things like “Sustainable BCAA Alternatives for Vegans in New York City” - niche niche niche.”
Liam Quinn
Vervaunt
Technical Director
“Within the last 3-6 months we've already seen AI impacting ecommerce websites in fundamental ways; AI generated content has been brought into the Shopify platform to build out product descriptions, AI powered search will continue to personalize onsite search experience, AI chatbot functionality can offer a much richer customer service without any additional human effort. All of these things combine to provide a more personalized customer experience onsite.
I think the bigger impact from a marketing perspective is around Organic. We're obviously seeing a few beta versions of future search engine results, and these will be much more tailored to answering questions and really considering the context (of the search and the user) rather than listing everything relating to a search term.
This trend will continue across paid ads, where they will also become much more dynamic and personalized to the user. I can see AI utilized so that at scale we can be more specific around which brands and which product lines are more likely to convert for a user, what imagery & copy they'll react best to and tailoring [the ad] for them. Overall less ads being displayed, but a much higher conversion rate.”
Galen King
Lucid
Founder & Creative Director
“The challenges merchants have with content is that they lack the bandwidth and often the expertise to create high-quality copy consistently. While AI tools aren’t perfect, they do a remarkably good job of taking half-articulated thoughts and ideas and forming them into reasonably polished copy that is likely better than what a merchant had before—and certainly better than nothing! As merchants improve their skills at crafting appropriate prompts, we will see the quality of AI-generated copy improve, which is good for everyone—as ecommerce stores will be more engaging and intuitive and search engines will get rapidly better at helping consumers find what they are looking for.”
Michael Maher
Cartology
Chief Idea Officer
“People are reading less and less. Amazon has reported that consumers are making very quick purchase decisions. 28% purchase a product in 3 minutes or less and 50% purchase in 15 mins or less. That's lightning fast.
I see ecommerce websites using AI to generate copy more and more. It makes sense to provide stats to people in a well written way quickly when people aren't spending a ton of time reading the words. But don't forget that readability matters. We're utilizing it to write copy on Amazon PDPs but having a human go through and make final revisions. We aren't turning it completely over.
I think generating new ideas for content will be clutch but those that strictly rely upon it to write all content are going to suffer. As far as I know, Google punishes you for using generative AI copy so use with caution. Use it to help get your juices flowing and then make it your own.
Robots and AI can’t take over our most important jobs: strategy and creative thinking.”
Zak Hardage
Hardage + Hardage
Owner, Web Developer
“The fundamentals don't change. This is especially true as search results become more fluid and narrative and based on a constellation of settings. Your search results are the product of your site structure and content.
A well-built site (structured, accessible, fast-loading) and good content (clear, helpful, non-repetitive) are your basic tools. Refine them. Review your site critically -- navigate your site as a person who doesn't know anything about your business, as a person with poor eyesight, as someone who gets confused easily. Navigate your language the same way.
Cleverness and delight should be the *frosting* on a thoughtful, well-built webcake.”
David Simoes
David José
“As an AI aficionado and top Shopify expert in the industry, I can confidently say that AI is revolutionizing search engine marketing for ecommerce websites. With the help of AI-powered tools, ecommerce businesses can now personalize their search engine marketing efforts to reach their target audience more effectively.
One of the most significant impacts of AI on search engine marketing is its ability to analyze vast amounts of data quickly and accurately. AI algorithms can process customer data, including search queries, browsing history, and purchase behavior, to provide highly targeted and personalized recommendations. This, in turn, increases the chances of conversion and revenue for ecommerce businesses.
At the forefront of AI technology for ecommerce is the Chat GPT and Midjourney platforms. These tools allow businesses to generate speedy and relevant content, including product descriptions, FAQs, and chatbot responses. This enables ecommerce businesses to provide better customer service and improve the overall user experience.
Moreover, Chat GPT and Midjourney also enable businesses to gather valuable insights into customer behavior, preferences, and needs. This data can then be used to optimize search engine marketing campaigns and drive more conversions.
In conclusion, AI is set to transform the search engine marketing landscape for ecommerce businesses. With the help of advanced tools like Chat GPT and Midjourney, businesses can leverage the power of AI to improve their search engine rankings, drive more traffic to their websites, and ultimately increase revenue. As a leading AI and Shopify expert, I highly recommend ecommerce businesses to embrace AI technology and stay ahead of the competition.”
Josiah Hubbard
Helium
Solutions Engineer
“I see AI making search engine marketing a whole lot better for ecommerce merchants. We're no doubt going to see better search results, specific to the search term, as merchants adopt AI for SEO. Which I see as a win-win, for merchants (adding more relevant keywords, etc) and consumers (those finding what they need faster).
However, as more and more merchants start adopting AI for boosting their SEO and marketing, I would anticipate a plateau at some point in the long term. Still a huge benefit and win for merchants all around. You will just need to hack your SEO again if you stop seeing the upward trend.”
Ash Ome
MOTIF®
Founder
“I think AI has already started to significantly impact search engine marketing for e-commerce websites, and it's expected to continue to do so in the future. Here are a few ways AI is currently affecting search engine marketing for e-commerce:
Improved Search Algorithms:
AI algorithms can analyze vast amounts of data and help search engines understand user intent and search queries better. This allows search engines to provide more accurate search results and recommend relevant products to users.
Personalized Recommendations:
AI-powered recommendation engines can analyze customer data and behavior to recommend products that are more likely to appeal to individual customers. This can help e-commerce websites increase sales and improve customer satisfaction.
Automated Ad Campaigns:
AI-powered ad campaigns can automate the creation, targeting, and optimization of ads. This can save time and improve the performance of ad campaigns.
Voice Search Optimization:
With the increasing use of voice search, AI algorithms are becoming essential for optimizing e-commerce websites for voice search queries.
Chatbots:
AI-powered chatbots can provide customers with personalized support and assistance, improving their experience on the e-commerce website.
In summary, AI is already transforming the way e-commerce businesses approach search engine marketing. As AI technology continues to evolve, it will provide even more opportunities for businesses to optimize their online presence and drive sales. It’s nothing new. Marketers were already using AI for some projects, now it’s going to be accelerated.
In under 6 months, a fun AI project has caused a multi-trillion-dollar company to start disrupting the very product that made them a powerhouse.
People don't understand the pace we're moving at.
#ChatGPT was originally released as a fun demo. But since that launch, it's started to turn entire industries on their head.
Now Google has been spurred into action because Samsung is contemplating moving to Bing as the default search engine on all devices - a $3B annual contract.
Google is working on a 'new search engine' where the search experience is 'reimagined.' Also known as "Project Magi"
Reimagined is a pretty important word. Most people said Google would attempt to integrate AI features into the existing search experience to keep their Adwords cash machine running.
However, they've realized that ChatGPT has changed people's expectations around search.
People don't want to click, click, click; they want an assistant to give them a clear and concise answer where they can easily ask follow-up questions.
Ease of use always wins!
Today, Google aggregates information and mostly makes money selling ads around that information.
Tomorrow, Google can aggregate everything and make money on financial transactions through its platform. Like OpenAI, they can attempt to aggregate the aggregators.
Why use Booking, Kayak, or any of these intermediary sites when your assistant can find and buy what you need?
Not only that, but Google mentioned other avenues like coding, language learning (watch out DuoLingo), image generation, coding, writing, and more.
Google has realized they're not in a fight to win search; they're in a battle with OpenAI to be the natural language platform for the internet, and whoever wins that battle gets the keys to the future of the internet.
I think SEO is going to evolve a lot for good. SEO professionals now need to understand and learn how this kind of AI assisted Chat interface/search interface is going to work and how they can optimize contents for it.”
Apply These Expert Tips to Your AI Strategy:
Our community of experts were happy to share their top advice for ecommerce business owners coping with the rapid evolution of AI.
Here are some key takeaways for success in the age of AI:
Personalization: Search Engine AI algorithms will process customer data, including search queries, browsing history, and purchase behavior, to provide highly targeted and personalized recommendations for that customer. This will result in higher conversion rates. Get ready to launch PPC ad campaigns targeted very precisely for your ideal customers.
Fundamentals: Make sure your site structure is accessible and fast loading. Clear, helpful, and non repetitive content will be essential to standing out in a world full of AI generated content. As contributor Zak Hardage advised “Review your site critically -- navigate your site as a person who doesn't know anything about your business, as a person with poor eyesight, as someone who gets confused easily.”
Consider Your Niche: As contributor Dustin Dandy stated “AI is going to force businesses to better understand the unique layers of their target audience.” In a world full of copycats that have AI writing their product descriptions, originality and niche are going to be more valuable than ever. Ross Beyeler gave the excellent example that with search engines utilizing AI, searches will have narrower focuses than ever. A successful landing page for conversions in this market may be as specific as “Sustainable BCAA Alternatives for Vegans in New York City.”
Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness (EEAT): These four words are the key framework that Google uses to assess the quality of your website content. AI cannot establish these 4 traits. Human oversight to curate, optimize, edit, and fact check will be essential so that you do not over rely on AI and diminish your brand's EEAT. Making sure that you have trust and authority in the eyes of the customer will be absolutely critical in an age where AI can generate so much content.
If you would like a team of SEM and SEO experts to assist you in adapting your digital marketing strategies to the AI landscape, Whitecap SEO is here to help!