Interest in Google Generative Search Soars with AI Boom

Google Labs traffic topped 17 million visits in May after access to the search experiment began, compared with less than 13,000 in previous months. In September, it drew 10.6 million visits

Search engine optimization professionals and others with a keen interest in the future of search are flocking to labs.google.com to turn on the Search Generative Experience (SGE). SGE is Google’s prototype of how the same kind of generative AI tech that powers ChatGPT and Google’s own Bard (bard.google.com) might be incorporated directly into search results.

Microsoft has already incorporated OpenAI’s GPT-4, the latest generation of the technology behind ChatGPT, into its Bing search engine, and other generative AI startups like Perplexity (perplexity.ai) also position the technology as a new kind of search and knowledge discovery experience.

SGE is Google’s competitive response. It’s not a separate product at a different subdomain, like Bard, which makes it harder to track how much traffic and usage it’s getting. However, we can see how the arrival of SGE as the main attraction at the Google Labs website has lit its traffic on fire.

Although Google offers other beta products, including AI tools for developers and graphic artists, through the same portal, SGE is the one with the potential to upend the established order of search engine optimization and search engine marketing.

Here’s what a sample search for “what is the best email marketing tool” brings up in today’s standard Google search experience …

… with two ads displayed, followed by a little bit of AI-generated summarization (which Google has been experimenting with for years), followed by a listing of the top-ranked website for that search.

With SGE, you still get ads at the top of the page, but even the top-ranked web page doesn’t appear until after a block of content created by Google’s generative AI tech that writes you a short essay on the answer to your question and provides the opportunity to ask follow up questions.

So it’s no wonder that anyone with a business or professional business in attracting search traffic to websites would be interested in getting a preview of how their world is about to change.

Previously, the name of the game in organic search was getting ranked #1 in Google search. Now, it may mutate into persuading the AI engine to mention your content in its summary. If the SGE design makes it into production, even the #1 organic search result will be way down at the bottom of the page – down where users don’t often bother to scroll.

Good to know you will still be able to buy your way to the top of the search results page, however.

Note: Google appears to be transitioning to using labs.google, rather than labs.google.com, as the primary address for Google Labs. However, the majority of the traffic is still recorded in our platform as associated with labs.google.com.

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