How AI Search Is Transforming the Importance of Search Intent in SEO
Written by :
John Kilhefner
Posted on :
04.07.2023
Tags :
Organic Growth | Audience Development | Search Engine Optimization
How you can understand your users’ search intent in 2023
- The world of digital media and search engine optimization (SEO) is changing due to artificial intelligence (AI) optimization or AIO.
- AI prompts provide conversational data, and as more people use AI to search, SEOs and marketers will get a more complete picture of what their users want.
- Understanding intent is an important ranking factor because users are less likely to bounce from an article that meets their needs.
If you’re new to the world of digital media and search engine optimization (SEO), let me be the first to say… I’m sorry.
Because, right now, content creators, writers and editors, publishers, and basically the rest of the world, are all talking about one thing: artificial intelligence (AI). And they’re all coming to one conclusion – that this is the end of traditional search as we know it. Guess what? They’re not entirely off base.
Search is changing, but it’s not going anywhere (and I’ll expound on why in a special in-depth piece soon). Because of AI optimization (or “AIO,” as I’ve dubbed it), SEOs will have more data than they know what to do with. But the one datapoint you should be more interested in than ever is… search intent.
What Is Search Intent
There are 8.5 billion searches on Google each day, and there’s intent behind every one. Search intent tells you what these users want. For publishers and marketers, search intent is extremely valuable. It gives them critical data on their users. With this data, a writer can tailor their message to the user. Though, with billions of searches happening daily, how could you know the intent behind the ones that matter to you?
AI search is giving SEOs unprecedented insight into the intent of complex queries. To illustrate, consider a user searching for the pros and cons of AI in digital media…
Here’s what that looks like in Google Search with the query, “what are the pros and cons of AI on digital media?”
And here’s what that looks like in Bing AI with the prompt, “I’m studying the impact of artificial intelligence on the digital media industry. Can you tell me the pros and cons of AI?”
In the Google search, the user only tells us they’re looking for pros and cons of AI. But with AI search, we get more context about why they’re searching (“I’m studying the impact of artificial intelligence on the digital media industry.”) Compared to search queries, AI prompts provide conversational data. As more people use AI to search, SEOs and marketers will get a more complete picture of what their users want.
“Hey Google, search ‘search intent’”
I’ve spent the past decade working for publishers who emphasized simple queries (think: “best tech companies” or “holiday gift guide”). And very few managers ask their content team to focus on intent.
Most middle managers are chasing keyword volume, and that’s had a profoundly negative effect on the quality of online content. The rise of complex prompts via AI search will change that paradigm for the better.
But even before AI went mainstream, Google has been interested in natural language. It uses this to glean intent from users and rank publisher content.
Google uses several factors (latent semantic indexing is one theory, but it’s controversial) to detect which stories are written with the reader’s intent in mind, and which stories are written with keywords in mind.
I shouldn’t have to tell you which Google prefers (it’s the former). Why is intent an important ranking factor? Because users are less likely to bounce from an article that meets their needs.
The more you understand intent, the more capable you are at writing content that attracts high-value users to your brand. With more granularity and specificity in your content strategy, you’ll bring in a broader audience, meet their needs, and rank higher for your chosen terms.
The More You Know!
So you’ve got your fine-tooth comb out and are ready to get granular… But what exactly do you look for? Two things: simple and complex queries.
Behind each “simple query,” the search itself can tell you about the intent of the keyword.
Behind each complex query, the search yields many forms of intent that tell you about the user.
Users who make complex queries tend to be of a higher value than those who make simple queries. This is because simple-query users have little-to-no desire to go beyond the search engine results page (SERP).
A simple query looks for a very specific answer, like “Dow Jones Industrial Average,” where the intent is simply to find the current price of the Dow index.
While complex queries fall into four categories of user intent:
Informational — Learn
Search leads to every and anything about the topic
Intent is to answer a question or learn more about a topic.
Navigational — Go
User wants to find a specific website.
Intent is to go directly to the website.
Commercial — Browse
User is looking to research products before buying.
Intent is to eventually buy a product but is in the compare/contrast stage.
Transactional — Buy
User is looking to buy and thus usually leads toward a conversion.
Intent is to obtain something, i.e. signing up for a newsletter, buying a subscription, downloading a product.
Apart from navigational queries, there are two main characteristics of searches. There are “directed” searches and “undirected” searches.
For directed searches, the user asks a very specific question, such as “how to open a SoFi brokerage account?” This is an opportunity for evergreen content like “How to Sign Up for a SoFi Brokerage Account: A Step-by-Step Guide.”
For undirected searches, the user employs a “tell me anything” approach. The user’s needs are broad and layered, so you could create a content package containing several articles on different angles of a single topic.
Multiple intent types can coexist within a single query. For instance, a user might search for “best laptops under $1000” with commercial, informational and transactional intent. Fortunately, directed and undirected characteristics aren’t the only tell-tale signs of what your users want.
The Bottom Line on Search Intent
User behavior can also indicate intent (and help you identify a PQL). For instance, if your users click on a specific product or spend a lot of time reading about that product, it’s likely they have commercial or transactional intent.
But searcher intent can vary based on context…
Someone searching for “best pizza restaurants” on a Friday night is likely to have transactional intent. But a user searching for the same query on a Monday morning is more likely to have informational intent.
By now you should have a grasp on how to identify intent. But if you want to grow your blog traffic… there are many more SEO tactics to learn.
Search is a constantly evolving practice (as evidenced by ChatGPT and Bing AI search). Which means it’s a full-time job just to keep up with new developments.
Luckily, that’s all we do! And between us, we have decades of experience in search engine optimization, content strategy and creation, and web development.
Give us a holler!
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
John Kilhefner is a writer, editor and digital native focused on creating content within the attention economy. He is the co-founder and managing partner of DC creative agency Skellator, serving as the director of content. He is also a senior managing editor at InvestorPlace Media and a freelance writer with bylines in The Hill, Entrepreneur, Yahoo Finance, MSN Money, Kiplinger, Benzinga, Rent., Spiceworks and many more. Check out his portfolio on Muckrack.
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