<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Google ranking factors survey" decoding="async" fetchpriority="high" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>Search intent ranks highest, backlinks remain influential, and original research outperforms scaled AI content in perceived ranking impact.

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Google ranking factors survey" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/google-ranking-factors-survey-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Backlinks ranked as Google&#8217;s second most important ranking factor in a new survey of 131 SEO professionals conducted by Zyppy. Relevance ranked first, and content quality ranked third.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Backlinks ranked No. 2.</strong> Although Google&#8217;s Gary Illyes has <a href="https://searchengineland.com/links-google-search-ranking-factor-gary-illyes-432422">said links are not among Google&#8217;s top three ranking signals</a>, 54.8% of respondents selected backlinks as one of the three most important factors. Only relevance ranked higher at 57.1%.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Links from trusted, topically relevant domains and pages with real visitors received some of the highest ratings among backlink-related factors.</li>



<li>Spammy backlinks ranked among the strongest negative signals.</li>



<li>Cyrus Shepard wrote in the report that &#8220;the rumor of the death of backlinks has been greatly exaggerated.&#8221;</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Search intent ranked first.</strong> Search intent match received the highest rating of any individual ranking factor.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Many respondents said success depends on satisfying the searcher&#8217;s underlying goal, not just matching keywords.</li>



<li>Several also pointed to information gain as an important factor when multiple pages satisfy the same search intent.</li>



<li>Meta descriptions ranked near the bottom. Most respondents said they have little or no direct effect on rankings.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Original research ranked highly.</strong> Content quality ranked third overall. Within that category, original research and first-party data received some of the highest ratings.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Respondents viewed AI-generated content more favorably when it received substantial human review and added unique value. </li>



<li>AI-generated content published at scale with little added value received negative ratings.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Brand and user signals.</strong> Branded search volume, online reputation, and user satisfaction received some of the highest ratings in their categories. Among user signals, satisfaction and task completion ranked highest. Quickly returning to Google&#8217;s search results received a negative rating.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Technical SEO remained foundational.</strong> Respondents gave consistently positive ratings to technical SEO factors. They generally described crawling, indexing, and overall site health as foundational requirements. Internal linking also received high ratings.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>About the data.</strong> <a href="https://signal.zyppy.com/p/google-ranking-factors-expert-survey" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Zyppy&#8217;s 2026 Google Ranking Factors Expert Survey</a> collected 13,665 ratings across 103 potential ranking factors. Respondents rated each factor on a seven-point scale and identified what they believed were Google&#8217;s three most important ranking signals. Zyppy said it updated this year&#8217;s survey to reflect AI search, Google&#8217;s API leak, testimony from Google&#8217;s antitrust trial, and recent algorithm updates.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Why we care.</strong> The survey offers an interesting snapshot of what 131 SEO professionals believe Google&#8217;s ranking systems value most in 2026. That said, nothing in the survey was too surprising — expect more confirmation than revelation. Search intent, backlinks, and content quality have long mattered for ranking well on Google.</p>


Backlinks ranked as Google’s second most important ranking factor in a new survey of 131 SEO professionals conducted by Zyppy. Relevance ranked first, and content quality ranked third.
Backlinks ranked No. 2. Although Google’s Gary Illyes has said links are not among Google’s top three ranking signals, 54.8% of respondents selected backlinks as one of the three most important factors. Only relevance ranked higher at 57.1%.
Links from trusted, topically relevant domains and pages with real visitors received some of the highest ratings among backlink-related factors.
Spammy backlinks ranked among the strongest negative signals.
Cyrus Shepard wrote in the report that “the rumor of the death of backlinks has been greatly exaggerated.”
Search intent ranked first. Search intent match received the highest rating of any individual ranking factor.
Many respondents said success depends on satisfying the searcher’s underlying goal, not just matching keywords.
Several also pointed to information gain as an important factor when multiple pages satisfy the same search intent.
Meta descriptions ranked near the bottom. Most respondents said they have little or no direct effect on rankings.
Original research ranked highly. Content quality ranked third overall. Within that category, original research and first-party data received some of the highest ratings.
Respondents viewed AI-generated content more favorably when it received substantial human review and added unique value. 
AI-generated content published at scale with little added value received negative ratings.
Brand and user signals. Branded search volume, online reputation, and user satisfaction received some of the highest ratings in their categories. Among user signals, satisfaction and task completion ranked highest. Quickly returning to Google’s search results received a negative rating.
Technical SEO remained foundational. Respondents gave consistently positive ratings to technical SEO factors. They generally described crawling, indexing, and overall site health as foundational requirements. Internal linking also received high ratings.
About the data. Zyppy’s 2026 Google Ranking Factors Expert Survey collected 13,665 ratings across 103 potential ranking factors. Respondents rated each factor on a seven-point scale and identified what they believed were Google’s three most important ranking signals. Zyppy said it updated this year’s survey to reflect AI search, Google’s API leak, testimony from Google’s antitrust trial, and recent algorithm updates.
Why we care. The survey offers an interesting snapshot of what 131 SEO professionals believe Google’s ranking systems value most in 2026. That said, nothing in the survey was too surprising — expect more confirmation than revelation. Search intent, backlinks, and content quality have long mattered for ranking well on Google.

Search intent ranks highest, backlinks remain influential, and original research outperforms scaled AI content in perceived ranking impact.

Google’s top ranking factors, according to 131 SEO professionals

<div><img width="2048" height="1145" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-scaled.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-scaled.png 2048w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-768x429.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-1536x858.png 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 2048px) 100vw, 2048px" /></div>Reva Minkoff explored Google’s target bidding changes and why lessons from a decade ago could help PPC marketers adapt.

<div><img width="2048" height="1145" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-scaled.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-scaled.png 2048w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-768x429.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-18.16.53-1536x858.png 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 2048px) 100vw, 2048px" /></div>
<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/embed/oUvYmIqYJDA?feature=oembed" rel="noopener noreferrer">Watch this video on YouTube</a>
</div></figure>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Reva Minkoff, Founder and President of Digital4Startups Inc., led our latest SMX Now webinar, examining Google’s changes to target bidding — and why paid search marketers shouldn’t panic.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Drawing on nearly two decades of PPC experience, Minkoff argued that while the update represents a meaningful shift in how advertisers should manage Target CPA and Target ROAS, the industry has effectively been here before. Google’s target bidding strategies operated in a remarkably similar way around a decade ago.</p>



<h2 id="h-what-changed-with-target-bidding" class="wp-block-heading">What changed with target bidding?</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Previously, target bid strategies could function more like efficiency safeguards. If a campaign could outperform its Target CPA or Target ROAS, Google could continue delivering that better performance.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That meant a campaign with a $10 Target CPA might consistently generate conversions for $5.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Under the new approach, the target is more literally a <strong>performance target</strong>. If Target CPA is set at $10, Google will seek conversions around that CPA rather than necessarily trying to beat it.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The upside is greater predictability. Advertisers may find it easier to forecast what happens when budgets increase because Google is attempting to maintain performance around a defined efficiency level.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The downside is that campaigns which historically outperformed their targets may see that advantage shrink.</p>



<h2 id="h-we-ve-seen-this-before" class="wp-block-heading">We’ve seen this before</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The important context is that Target CPA originally behaved much like this.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Around 2015 and 2016, Google described Target CPA as a strategy designed to set bids so that the average cost per conversion would equal the advertiser’s chosen target. Some conversions could cost more and others less, but the system aimed for the target on average.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A decade later, much of that logic has returned.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The advertising ecosystem surrounding it may look dramatically different — with Performance Max, AI Max, Demand Gen and other technologies emerging since then — but advertisers have experience managing this kind of bidding environment.</p>



<h2 id="h-start-by-deciding-whether-you-want-volume-or-efficiency" class="wp-block-heading">Start by deciding whether you want volume or efficiency</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Minkoff’s first recommendation is to establish what the campaign is actually supposed to accomplish.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If the priority is generating as much conversion volume as possible from a fixed budget, Maximize Conversions or Maximize Conversion Value may make more sense.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Target CPA and Target ROAS become more appropriate when <strong>efficiency is the constraint</strong>.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">For example, a business might be prepared to spend aggressively as long as leads remain below a $50 CPA. An ecommerce advertiser might be willing to scale provided ROAS remains above an acceptable threshold.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The distinction matters because applying a target to a campaign whose real objective is maximum volume can unnecessarily restrict delivery.</p>



<h2 id="h-make-your-target-reflect-reality" class="wp-block-heading">Make your target reflect reality</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Once efficiency is established as the objective, advertisers need to choose an appropriate starting target.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Rather than picking an arbitrary number, Minkoff recommends starting reasonably close to actual performance. If a campaign is currently generating conversions at a $30 CPA, for example, that provides a logical reference point for the initial Target CPA.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">From there, the target becomes a lever for improving efficiency.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">For completely new campaigns without enough historical information, advertisers don&#8217;t necessarily need to invent a target. Starting with a maximize strategy can provide the data needed to establish an appropriate target later.</p>



<h2 id="h-gradually-push-targets-toward-better-performance" class="wp-block-heading">Gradually push targets toward better performance</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">One of the most useful lessons from the earlier Target CPA era is that advertisers can progressively test the limits of Google&#8217;s bidding system.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If actual CPA is consistently meeting or beating the target, particularly when a campaign is limited by budget, Minkoff recommends considering a gradual reduction in the Target CPA.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That could mean reducing it by around 10% to 20%, allowing the campaign to run for one or two conversion cycles and then evaluating the results. If performance remains healthy, advertisers can repeat the process.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Minkoff has seen the approach produce significant results before. One transportation industry client achieved a 75% reduction in CPA over two weeks as its target was progressively lowered from $10 to $7.50 and then $5.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A B2B financial services client followed a similar pattern. As Google continued delivering actual CPAs around the target, the team lowered that target further and continued improving efficiency.</p>



<h2 id="h-don-t-change-targets-too-quickly" class="wp-block-heading">Don’t change targets too quickly</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Progressive adjustment does not mean constantly tinkering with campaigns.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Advertisers need enough data to establish whether the bidding system is genuinely meeting its target. Depending on campaign volume and conversion-cycle length, that evaluation might happen weekly, biweekly or monthly.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Changing targets before conversions have had enough time to mature risks making decisions using incomplete performance data.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The better approach is to allow the campaign to settle, compare actual CPA or ROAS with the target and then decide whether another adjustment is justified.</p>



<h2 id="h-when-target-bidding-stops-working-move-down-the-bidding-ladder" class="wp-block-heading">When target bidding stops working, move down the bidding ladder</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Advertisers also aren&#8217;t locked into a single bidding strategy.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If Target CPA or Target ROAS stops producing conversions, Minkoff recommends first checking the fundamentals, including conversion tracking, landing pages and search queries.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If those appear healthy, removing the target and moving to Maximize Conversions can help determine whether the target itself is restricting the algorithm.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If Maximize Conversions still cannot generate sufficient activity, Maximize Clicks can be used to build traffic and data before working back toward conversion-focused bidding.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The broader principle is that advertisers can move up and down the bidding hierarchy as campaign conditions change.</p>



<h2 id="h-your-bidding-is-only-as-good-as-your-conversion-data" class="wp-block-heading">Your bidding is only as good as your conversion data</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">None of these strategies will work particularly well if Google is optimizing toward the wrong signals.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That makes conversion tracking — and especially conversion quality — fundamental.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A store visit, for example, isn&#8217;t necessarily equivalent to a purchase. Likewise, a cheap lead isn&#8217;t valuable if it turns out to be spam or has virtually no chance of becoming a customer.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If poor-quality leads are reported to Google as successful conversions, the bidding system can rationally pursue more of them. From the algorithm&#8217;s perspective, it is doing what it was instructed to do.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Advertisers therefore need to ensure primary conversions represent genuine business outcomes and, particularly for lead generation, feed meaningful quality signals back into the system.</p>



<h2 id="h-separate-campaigns-when-their-economics-are-different" class="wp-block-heading">Separate campaigns when their economics are different</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Target bidding also makes campaign structure more important.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Brand and non-brand traffic, for example, frequently have different economics. Brand conversions are typically cheaper, while non-brand activity can be more competitive.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Combining them can make it harder to establish an appropriate efficiency target for each type of traffic.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Minkoff applies similar thinking to new customer acquisition campaigns. When new customers have different lifetime values or justify a different acquisition cost, separating those campaigns makes it easier to assign targets and report on performance according to their specific purpose.</p>



<h2 id="h-watch-more-than-cpa-and-roas" class="wp-block-heading">Watch more than CPA and ROAS</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">CPA and ROAS remain central, but advertisers should monitor the surrounding signals as targets change.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Search impression share and search impression share lost to budget can reveal whether campaigns are being constrained. Impression volume is also worth monitoring because aggressive efficiency targets may cause Google to reduce delivery when it doesn&#8217;t believe the target can be achieved.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">CPCs could rise as well if Google enters more expensive auctions in pursuit of conversions around the specified target.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Whether those changes are problematic depends on the campaign&#8217;s objective. A decline in volume may be acceptable when maintaining a strict CPA is the priority. It is far less desirable when maximum conversion volume is the real goal.</p>



<h2 id="h-the-target-bidding-apocalypse-is-really-a-strategy-reset" class="wp-block-heading">The target bidding “apocalypse” is really a strategy reset</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google’s target bidding change requires advertisers to become more deliberate about the relationship between campaign goals, bidding strategies and performance targets.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The playbook Minkoff outlined is relatively simple: determine whether volume or efficiency matters most, choose the bidding strategy that reflects that goal, establish a realistic target and adjust it progressively as performance data comes in.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Most importantly, this isn&#8217;t an entirely new challenge for PPC marketers.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The technology surrounding paid search may have changed dramatically over the past decade, but the fundamental job remains familiar: give the bidding system the right objective, provide it with high-quality conversion data and keep testing how far performance can improve.</p>


Watch this video on YouTube




Reva Minkoff, Founder and President of Digital4Startups Inc., led our latest SMX Now webinar, examining Google’s changes to target bidding — and why paid search marketers shouldn’t panic.
Drawing on nearly two decades of PPC experience, Minkoff argued that while the update represents a meaningful shift in how advertisers should manage Target CPA and Target ROAS, the industry has effectively been here before. Google’s target bidding strategies operated in a remarkably similar way around a decade ago.
What changed with target bidding?
Previously, target bid strategies could function more like efficiency safeguards. If a campaign could outperform its Target CPA or Target ROAS, Google could continue delivering that better performance.
That meant a campaign with a $10 Target CPA might consistently generate conversions for $5.
Under the new approach, the target is more literally a performance target. If Target CPA is set at $10, Google will seek conversions around that CPA rather than necessarily trying to beat it.
The upside is greater predictability. Advertisers may find it easier to forecast what happens when budgets increase because Google is attempting to maintain performance around a defined efficiency level.
The downside is that campaigns which historically outperformed their targets may see that advantage shrink.
We’ve seen this before
The important context is that Target CPA originally behaved much like this.
Around 2015 and 2016, Google described Target CPA as a strategy designed to set bids so that the average cost per conversion would equal the advertiser’s chosen target. Some conversions could cost more and others less, but the system aimed for the target on average.
A decade later, much of that logic has returned.
The advertising ecosystem surrounding it may look dramatically different — with Performance Max, AI Max, Demand Gen and other technologies emerging since then — but advertisers have experience managing this kind of bidding environment.
Start by deciding whether you want volume or efficiency
Minkoff’s first recommendation is to establish what the campaign is actually supposed to accomplish.
If the priority is generating as much conversion volume as possible from a fixed budget, Maximize Conversions or Maximize Conversion Value may make more sense.
Target CPA and Target ROAS become more appropriate when efficiency is the constraint.
For example, a business might be prepared to spend aggressively as long as leads remain below a $50 CPA. An ecommerce advertiser might be willing to scale provided ROAS remains above an acceptable threshold.
The distinction matters because applying a target to a campaign whose real objective is maximum volume can unnecessarily restrict delivery.
Make your target reflect reality
Once efficiency is established as the objective, advertisers need to choose an appropriate starting target.
Rather than picking an arbitrary number, Minkoff recommends starting reasonably close to actual performance. If a campaign is currently generating conversions at a $30 CPA, for example, that provides a logical reference point for the initial Target CPA.
From there, the target becomes a lever for improving efficiency.
For completely new campaigns without enough historical information, advertisers don’t necessarily need to invent a target. Starting with a maximize strategy can provide the data needed to establish an appropriate target later.
Gradually push targets toward better performance
One of the most useful lessons from the earlier Target CPA era is that advertisers can progressively test the limits of Google’s bidding system.
If actual CPA is consistently meeting or beating the target, particularly when a campaign is limited by budget, Minkoff recommends considering a gradual reduction in the Target CPA.
That could mean reducing it by around 10% to 20%, allowing the campaign to run for one or two conversion cycles and then evaluating the results. If performance remains healthy, advertisers can repeat the process.
Minkoff has seen the approach produce significant results before. One transportation industry client achieved a 75% reduction in CPA over two weeks as its target was progressively lowered from $10 to $7.50 and then $5.
A B2B financial services client followed a similar pattern. As Google continued delivering actual CPAs around the target, the team lowered that target further and continued improving efficiency.
Don’t change targets too quickly
Progressive adjustment does not mean constantly tinkering with campaigns.
Advertisers need enough data to establish whether the bidding system is genuinely meeting its target. Depending on campaign volume and conversion-cycle length, that evaluation might happen weekly, biweekly or monthly.
Changing targets before conversions have had enough time to mature risks making decisions using incomplete performance data.
The better approach is to allow the campaign to settle, compare actual CPA or ROAS with the target and then decide whether another adjustment is justified.
When target bidding stops working, move down the bidding ladder
Advertisers also aren’t locked into a single bidding strategy.
If Target CPA or Target ROAS stops producing conversions, Minkoff recommends first checking the fundamentals, including conversion tracking, landing pages and search queries.
If those appear healthy, removing the target and moving to Maximize Conversions can help determine whether the target itself is restricting the algorithm.
If Maximize Conversions still cannot generate sufficient activity, Maximize Clicks can be used to build traffic and data before working back toward conversion-focused bidding.
The broader principle is that advertisers can move up and down the bidding hierarchy as campaign conditions change.
Your bidding is only as good as your conversion data
None of these strategies will work particularly well if Google is optimizing toward the wrong signals.
That makes conversion tracking — and especially conversion quality — fundamental.
A store visit, for example, isn’t necessarily equivalent to a purchase. Likewise, a cheap lead isn’t valuable if it turns out to be spam or has virtually no chance of becoming a customer.
If poor-quality leads are reported to Google as successful conversions, the bidding system can rationally pursue more of them. From the algorithm’s perspective, it is doing what it was instructed to do.
Advertisers therefore need to ensure primary conversions represent genuine business outcomes and, particularly for lead generation, feed meaningful quality signals back into the system.
Separate campaigns when their economics are different
Target bidding also makes campaign structure more important.
Brand and non-brand traffic, for example, frequently have different economics. Brand conversions are typically cheaper, while non-brand activity can be more competitive.
Combining them can make it harder to establish an appropriate efficiency target for each type of traffic.
Minkoff applies similar thinking to new customer acquisition campaigns. When new customers have different lifetime values or justify a different acquisition cost, separating those campaigns makes it easier to assign targets and report on performance according to their specific purpose.
Watch more than CPA and ROAS
CPA and ROAS remain central, but advertisers should monitor the surrounding signals as targets change.
Search impression share and search impression share lost to budget can reveal whether campaigns are being constrained. Impression volume is also worth monitoring because aggressive efficiency targets may cause Google to reduce delivery when it doesn’t believe the target can be achieved.
CPCs could rise as well if Google enters more expensive auctions in pursuit of conversions around the specified target.
Whether those changes are problematic depends on the campaign’s objective. A decline in volume may be acceptable when maintaining a strict CPA is the priority. It is far less desirable when maximum conversion volume is the real goal.
The target bidding “apocalypse” is really a strategy reset
Google’s target bidding change requires advertisers to become more deliberate about the relationship between campaign goals, bidding strategies and performance targets.
The playbook Minkoff outlined is relatively simple: determine whether volume or efficiency matters most, choose the bidding strategy that reflects that goal, establish a realistic target and adjust it progressively as performance data comes in.
Most importantly, this isn’t an entirely new challenge for PPC marketers.
The technology surrounding paid search may have changed dramatically over the past decade, but the fundamental job remains familiar: give the bidding system the right objective, provide it with high-quality conversion data and keep testing how far performance can improve.

Reva Minkoff explored Google’s target bidding changes and why lessons from a decade ago could help PPC marketers adapt.

Google’s target bidding shake-up: Why PPC marketers have been here before

<div><img width="1672" height="941" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location.png 1672w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1672px) 100vw, 1672px" /></div>Google updated its Location asset requirements with clearer language and troubleshooting guidance

<div><img width="1672" height="941" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location.png 1672w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Location-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1672px) 100vw, 1672px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google updated its Location asset requirements in September, revising terminology, improving readability and adding troubleshooting guidance for advertisers.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Why we care.</strong> Advertisers using location assets now have clearer guidance for understanding and troubleshooting requirements, but Google says there is no change to policy enforcement.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>The details</strong>. Location assets let advertisers supplement their ads with information about a specific business location, including its address, phone number, opening hours and ratings.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">They remain subject to Google&#8217;s standard advertising policies as well as its specific Location asset requirements.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Zoom in</strong>. Google Business Profile is commonly used to supply the business information needed for location assets in Google Ads.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Business information and location images are managed directly through the advertiser&#8217;s Google Business Profile rather than within Google Ads.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google also notes that Business Profile is only available in supported countries and regions.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Yes, but</strong>. Despite updating the requirements twice this year, Google says the changes are about <strong>clarity rather than enforcement</strong>.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Advertisers aren&#8217;t facing a new Location asset policy or a change in how Google applies the existing rules.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Bottom line</strong>. <a href="https://support.google.com/adspolicy/answer/18155586?hl=en">Google&#8217;s latest updates</a> give advertisers clearer instructions for setting up and troubleshooting Location assets without changing the underlying policy enforcement.</p>


Google updated its Location asset requirements in September, revising terminology, improving readability and adding troubleshooting guidance for advertisers.
Why we care. Advertisers using location assets now have clearer guidance for understanding and troubleshooting requirements, but Google says there is no change to policy enforcement.
The details. Location assets let advertisers supplement their ads with information about a specific business location, including its address, phone number, opening hours and ratings.
They remain subject to Google’s standard advertising policies as well as its specific Location asset requirements.
Zoom in. Google Business Profile is commonly used to supply the business information needed for location assets in Google Ads.
Business information and location images are managed directly through the advertiser’s Google Business Profile rather than within Google Ads.
Google also notes that Business Profile is only available in supported countries and regions.
Yes, but. Despite updating the requirements twice this year, Google says the changes are about clarity rather than enforcement.
Advertisers aren’t facing a new Location asset policy or a change in how Google applies the existing rules.
Bottom line. Google’s latest updates give advertisers clearer instructions for setting up and troubleshooting Location assets without changing the underlying policy enforcement.

Google updated its Location asset requirements with clearer language and troubleshooting guidance

Google updates Location asset requirements without changing enforcement

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Jessica Bowman Search Engine Land 20 for 20" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>AI weighs reviews, operations and reputation — not just content. Bowman says future visibility depends on the whole business.

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Jessica Bowman Search Engine Land 20 for 20" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/jessica-bowman-search-engine-land-20-for-20-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<figure class="wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio"><div class="wp-block-embed__wrapper">
<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Tm6n0VX9EHw?feature=oembed" rel="noopener noreferrer">Watch this video on YouTube</a>
</div></figure>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Jessica Bowman has spent more than 20 years figuring out how to make SEO work inside large organizations.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Now she thinks AI is turning visibility into a challenge that SEO – and even marketing – can’t solve alone:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“The SEO team is not going to be the ones that can take it to the finish line in every case. In fact, I think marketing and search PR type of activities are going to hit a glass ceiling, and then it’s going to be the rest of the organization that determines the future of revenue.”</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-from-ux-to-one-of-the-first-enterprise-seos" class="wp-block-heading">From UX to one of the first enterprise SEOs</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman didn’t set out to build a career in SEO.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">She was working at Enterprise Rent-A-Car in user experience and project coordination when her role was eliminated. While looking for another position inside the company, a product manager gave her an assignment: Figure out this thing called search engine marketing.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman researched it and returned with her first SEO audit.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A week later, management asked whether she thought SEO could be a full-time job.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Her answer: “Yes, there’s five years of work in there.”</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">They gave her the job.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">At conferences, Bowman would ask other search marketers how they handled developers and other internal teams. Most couldn’t help because they worked with smaller businesses.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">So Bowman learned through trial and error how to get SEO implemented across a large organization – a problem that would eventually become the focus of her career.</p>



<h2 id="h-the-danger-of-winning-the-short-game" class="wp-block-heading">The danger of winning the short game</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Early SEO could be surprisingly simple.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman summarized the prevailing formula as optimized content plus links plus crawlability equals high rankings.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Some companies generated a large number of thin pages targeting individual keywords. The strategy worked — until Google became better at evaluating quality.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman remembers being brought into companies where revenue was dropping, and employees were being laid off because the business had relied heavily on those strategies.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Their financials, she said, were built on &#8220;what was not a good, solid strategy&#8221;:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“It was just a working revenue-generating strategy for a season of time. We played the short game and in some cases lost the long game.”</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Her own approach was to put on what she called her “Google engineer hat.”</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“If I were a Google engineer, how would I code it? And that was how I always designed the strategy going forward.”</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-ai-is-becoming-a-buyer-adviser" class="wp-block-heading">AI is becoming a buyer adviser</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman sees two broad types of AI responses: retrieval and advice.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The first retrieves and communicates what the AI knows. The second involves the system making judgments, determining fit and recommending products or brands.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“In essence, they are the world’s most sophisticated buyer advisor,” Bowman said.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Those recommendations can incorporate information from well beyond a company’s marketing.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman has seen AI systems use customer complaints, software release notes, earnings calls, vendor case studies, and employee reviews when discussing companies and products.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">She described one retailer she struggled to get ChatGPT to recommend. When Bowman eventually asked ChatGPT directly about the company, she said it discouraged her from shopping there.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman said ChatGPT pointed to complaints about product quality, inconsistent materials, returns, and refunds.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“That’s not something marketing can solve. That is completely operational.”</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Her advice to companies:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“You need to look at operations as a growth opportunity.”</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-get-comfortable-with-zero-click-success" class="wp-block-heading">Get comfortable with zero-click success</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The change also affects how SEO teams measure success.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">One of Bowman’s clients put it this way: “We have to be comfortable with zero click.”</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“This is not about the revenue and the clicks. This is about: Are we visible when people ask? Are we mentioned? How are we described?” Bowman said.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman recently compared how AI described one client with its competitors. The client was described positively, but competitors received stronger language about where and why they excelled.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“We need to know where are we winning in narratives, where are we not winning in narratives, where is there positive sentiment, negative sentiment, where are our competitors just sounding better than us,” Bowman said.</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-how-ai-forms-opinions-about-brands" class="wp-block-heading">How AI forms opinions about brands</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Figuring out what shapes those narratives won’t always be straightforward.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“It’s not that I’ve identified patterns. It’s they’re identifying patterns,” Bowman said.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Those patterns come from what AI systems encounter in the public record, she said. In some niche B2B markets, Bowman has seen AI draw conclusions despite there being relatively few comments about a company or product.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The responses can also change from user to user – and during the same conversation.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A brand recommended at the beginning may disappear as the AI system learns more about what a buyer needs.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman experienced this herself while shopping for a HEPA vacuum. ChatGPT didn’t recommend the model with the strongest reported suction because it knew from previous conversations that she had dealt with an illness associated with fatigue. It determined the heavier vacuum might not be the best fit.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“It shows how it’s really considering your context. The context it knows about you, not just what you asked for. You are training a true buyer advisor when we think of LLMs.”</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman expects those recommendations to have significant consequences for brands.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“Revenue will completely recalibrate based on what AI is saying,” she said.</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-the-next-rung-for-seo-leaders" class="wp-block-heading">The next rung for SEO leaders</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman believes SEO leaders should prepare organizations for a future in which their teams won’t control every factor influencing AI visibility.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">She also wouldn’t be surprised to see more SEO teams move outside marketing as their work becomes increasingly dependent on operations.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman sees an opportunity for SEO leaders who are good at working across departments.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“There’s finally a next rung on the career ladder,” Bowman said.</li>
</ul>



<h2 id="h-search-is-exciting-again" class="wp-block-heading">Search is exciting again</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bowman has lived through more than two decades of changes in search.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">She remembers the early days of the industry as a smaller community where some of the best insights came from talking with other SEOs at conferences about what was working.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">People were “hungry for the hunt,” she said – trying to figure out what worked and what would come next.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Now she feels that excitement returning.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“I’m excited again. This is thrilling. I think this is the biggest new thing we’ve seen.”</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Her advice for SEO leaders approaching AI visibility is to stop assuming the new discipline will work like the old one.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>“Instead, just look at it for what it is.”</li>
</ul>


Watch this video on YouTube








Jessica Bowman has spent more than 20 years figuring out how to make SEO work inside large organizations.
Now she thinks AI is turning visibility into a challenge that SEO – and even marketing – can’t solve alone:
“The SEO team is not going to be the ones that can take it to the finish line in every case. In fact, I think marketing and search PR type of activities are going to hit a glass ceiling, and then it’s going to be the rest of the organization that determines the future of revenue.”
From UX to one of the first enterprise SEOs
Bowman didn’t set out to build a career in SEO.
She was working at Enterprise Rent-A-Car in user experience and project coordination when her role was eliminated. While looking for another position inside the company, a product manager gave her an assignment: Figure out this thing called search engine marketing.
Bowman researched it and returned with her first SEO audit.
A week later, management asked whether she thought SEO could be a full-time job.
Her answer: “Yes, there’s five years of work in there.”
They gave her the job.
At conferences, Bowman would ask other search marketers how they handled developers and other internal teams. Most couldn’t help because they worked with smaller businesses.
So Bowman learned through trial and error how to get SEO implemented across a large organization – a problem that would eventually become the focus of her career.
The danger of winning the short game
Early SEO could be surprisingly simple.
Bowman summarized the prevailing formula as optimized content plus links plus crawlability equals high rankings.
Some companies generated a large number of thin pages targeting individual keywords. The strategy worked — until Google became better at evaluating quality.
Bowman remembers being brought into companies where revenue was dropping, and employees were being laid off because the business had relied heavily on those strategies.
Their financials, she said, were built on “what was not a good, solid strategy”:
“It was just a working revenue-generating strategy for a season of time. We played the short game and in some cases lost the long game.”
Her own approach was to put on what she called her “Google engineer hat.”
“If I were a Google engineer, how would I code it? And that was how I always designed the strategy going forward.”
AI is becoming a buyer adviser
Bowman sees two broad types of AI responses: retrieval and advice.
The first retrieves and communicates what the AI knows. The second involves the system making judgments, determining fit and recommending products or brands.
“In essence, they are the world’s most sophisticated buyer advisor,” Bowman said.
Those recommendations can incorporate information from well beyond a company’s marketing.
Bowman has seen AI systems use customer complaints, software release notes, earnings calls, vendor case studies, and employee reviews when discussing companies and products.
She described one retailer she struggled to get ChatGPT to recommend. When Bowman eventually asked ChatGPT directly about the company, she said it discouraged her from shopping there.
Bowman said ChatGPT pointed to complaints about product quality, inconsistent materials, returns, and refunds.
“That’s not something marketing can solve. That is completely operational.”
Her advice to companies:
“You need to look at operations as a growth opportunity.”
Get comfortable with zero-click success
The change also affects how SEO teams measure success.
One of Bowman’s clients put it this way: “We have to be comfortable with zero click.”
“This is not about the revenue and the clicks. This is about: Are we visible when people ask? Are we mentioned? How are we described?” Bowman said.
Bowman recently compared how AI described one client with its competitors. The client was described positively, but competitors received stronger language about where and why they excelled.
“We need to know where are we winning in narratives, where are we not winning in narratives, where is there positive sentiment, negative sentiment, where are our competitors just sounding better than us,” Bowman said.
How AI forms opinions about brands
Figuring out what shapes those narratives won’t always be straightforward.
“It’s not that I’ve identified patterns. It’s they’re identifying patterns,” Bowman said.
Those patterns come from what AI systems encounter in the public record, she said. In some niche B2B markets, Bowman has seen AI draw conclusions despite there being relatively few comments about a company or product.
The responses can also change from user to user – and during the same conversation.
A brand recommended at the beginning may disappear as the AI system learns more about what a buyer needs.
Bowman experienced this herself while shopping for a HEPA vacuum. ChatGPT didn’t recommend the model with the strongest reported suction because it knew from previous conversations that she had dealt with an illness associated with fatigue. It determined the heavier vacuum might not be the best fit.
“It shows how it’s really considering your context. The context it knows about you, not just what you asked for. You are training a true buyer advisor when we think of LLMs.”
Bowman expects those recommendations to have significant consequences for brands.
“Revenue will completely recalibrate based on what AI is saying,” she said.
The next rung for SEO leaders
Bowman believes SEO leaders should prepare organizations for a future in which their teams won’t control every factor influencing AI visibility.
She also wouldn’t be surprised to see more SEO teams move outside marketing as their work becomes increasingly dependent on operations.
Bowman sees an opportunity for SEO leaders who are good at working across departments.
“There’s finally a next rung on the career ladder,” Bowman said.
Search is exciting again
Bowman has lived through more than two decades of changes in search.
She remembers the early days of the industry as a smaller community where some of the best insights came from talking with other SEOs at conferences about what was working.
People were “hungry for the hunt,” she said – trying to figure out what worked and what would come next.
Now she feels that excitement returning.
“I’m excited again. This is thrilling. I think this is the biggest new thing we’ve seen.”
Her advice for SEO leaders approaching AI visibility is to stop assuming the new discipline will work like the old one.
“Instead, just look at it for what it is.”

AI weighs reviews, operations and reputation — not just content. Bowman says future visibility depends on the whole business.

Jessica Bowman: SEO can’t win AI visibility alone

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="4 risks hiding in your branded search results" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>Your branded search results can change in ways that affect visibility and perception. Learn what to monitor and how to spot emerging risks.

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="4 risks hiding in your branded search results" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/4-risks-hiding-in-your-branded-search-results-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Consider the role that branded search results play in consumer decisions. Say a consumer types “company X + name of newest product” into their search bar. The results that display first will generally be those directly related to the company the consumer is searching for.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The benefits of a typical branded search are numerous. They provide visibility for your brand, and they educate customers and build consumer sentiment. And this search type may lead to higher conversion rates.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">But various risks are also hiding in branded search results. You must pay attention to the stability, composition, and potential drawbacks of these results. Let’s walk through each of the four risks associated with <a href="https://searchengineland.com/branded-search-seo-452676">branded search results</a>.</p>



<h2 id="h-risk-1-you-may-rely-too-heavily-on-a-few-positive-results" class="wp-block-heading">Risk 1: You may rely too heavily on a few positive results</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The first page of Google search results is no longer as simple to influence as it used to be. Many of the results that now appear on the first page are just as likely to be third-party results as owned or influenced assets.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">As a result, you might end up relying too much on a small number of positive search results. This makes your brand vulnerable, as you don’t want these results to appear inauthentic.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The key is to have a range of positive, highly authoritative assets directly linked to your brand. You want these assets to come from sources that potential customers will immediately trust and that will maintain visibility over the years.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/ai-search-reputation-risk-473361">Why AI search is your new reputation risk and what to do about it</a></em></strong>


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<h2 id="h-risk-2-negative-results-are-more-prominent-than-ever-before" class="wp-block-heading">Risk 2: Negative results are more prominent than ever before</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">With the rise of Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT searches, negative search results are vaulting to the top in AI-powered surfaces.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">This is just as true with branded search results as it is with regular searches. One unfavorable Reddit thread can negatively impact your branded results. A questionable review on YouTube from an influencer or an outlandish blog post can do the same.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">For this reason, it’s critical to monitor the placement of these results. For example, is negative content rising from the second page of search results to the first? Are those Reddit threads increasing in popularity and visibility?</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In addition to monitoring traditional search, you should track AI search. And if you notice that negative results associated with your brand are rising, it might be time to get an <a href="https://searchengineland.com/online-reputation-management-top-10-hurdles-and-how-to-overcome-them-440354">online reputation management</a> (ORM) specialist involved.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/ai-search-old-negative-content-new-life-482117">How AI search gives old negative content new life</a></em></strong>



<h2 id="h-risk-3-search-features-can-bring-unwanted-consequences" class="wp-block-heading">Risk 3: Search features can bring unwanted consequences</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">There are many other <a href="https://searchengineland.com/library/search-features">search engine features</a> that you often neglect. For instance, have you been paying attention to the image results, People Also Ask, autocomplete, and news results features? Or how about features like Google Discover, Google Trends, and Top Stories?</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">These features can be hard to access and harder to assess. But they can reveal just as much information about a brand as Google’s top organic listings. So, go beyond simply analyzing AI Overview results and the blue links on page one.</p>



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<hr class="wp-block-separator has-text-color has-cyan-bluish-gray-color has-css-opacity has-cyan-bluish-gray-background-color has-background"/>



<h2 id="h-risk-4-your-positive-results-aren-t-diverse-enough" class="wp-block-heading">Risk 4: Your positive results aren’t diverse enough</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">It’s not enough to duplicate owned content or place brand mentions on third-party websites. Instead, you need to <a href="https://searchengineland.com/seo-priorities-2027-453418">build your reputation</a> with trusted media organizations and third-party outlets.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In other words, you need to diversify. Seek out opportunities to earn mentions of your brand and products or services on third-party properties and trusted websites. Think Wikipedia and trusted media organizations like Reuters and the Associated Press.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Having varied and trusted mentions of your brand reduces the dependence you’d otherwise have on any single ranking asset.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/earn-brand-mentions-drive-llm-seo-visibility-466728">How to earn brand mentions that drive LLM and SEO visibility</a></em></strong>



<h2 id="h-how-to-conduct-a-branded-search-risk-audit" class="wp-block-heading">How to conduct a branded search risk audit</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">To identify and address potential issues facing your brand, conduct a branded search risk audit. The steps are simple:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>Identify branded queries: </strong>What are your customers searching for in relation to your brand? Answer these questions first to improve your brand’s position in traditional and AI search results.</li>



<li><strong>Record initial results: </strong>What does page one of Google search results look like? Record third-party results and search features.</li>



<li><strong>Categorize your results: </strong>Once you’ve recorded all your branded search results, move on to analyzing them. Sort them into categories based on whether they’re positive, negative, neutral, owned, or third-party.</li>



<li><strong>Track themes and movement: </strong>New themes related to your brand can surface at any time. Track movement related to branded searches, whether positive or negative.</li>



<li><strong>Prioritize vulnerability: </strong>Prioritize potential weak spots. Focus on vulnerabilities related to visibility, authority, ranking, and potential conversion impact.</li>
</ul>


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<h2 id="h-view-branded-search-results-as-an-early-warning" class="wp-block-heading">View branded search results as an early warning</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In online reputation management, being proactive reigns supreme. Regular branded SERP monitoring is essential for identifying early warning signs.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">But monitoring isn’t the only way you can be proactive with your branded search results. Your mission should be to build an authoritative, diverse, and trusted search presence. This way, your company will be more resilient if reputation issues arise.</p>

Consider the role that branded search results play in consumer decisions. Say a consumer types “company X + name of newest product” into their search bar. The results that display first will generally be those directly related to the company the consumer is searching for.
The benefits of a typical branded search are numerous. They provide visibility for your brand, and they educate customers and build consumer sentiment. And this search type may lead to higher conversion rates.
But various risks are also hiding in branded search results. You must pay attention to the stability, composition, and potential drawbacks of these results. Let’s walk through each of the four risks associated with branded search results.
Risk 1: You may rely too heavily on a few positive results
The first page of Google search results is no longer as simple to influence as it used to be. Many of the results that now appear on the first page are just as likely to be third-party results as owned or influenced assets.
As a result, you might end up relying too much on a small number of positive search results. This makes your brand vulnerable, as you don’t want these results to appear inauthentic.
The key is to have a range of positive, highly authoritative assets directly linked to your brand. You want these assets to come from sources that potential customers will immediately trust and that will maintain visibility over the years.
Dig deeper: Why AI search is your new reputation risk and what to do about it



  
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Risk 2: Negative results are more prominent than ever before
With the rise of Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT searches, negative search results are vaulting to the top in AI-powered surfaces.
This is just as true with branded search results as it is with regular searches. One unfavorable Reddit thread can negatively impact your branded results. A questionable review on YouTube from an influencer or an outlandish blog post can do the same.
For this reason, it’s critical to monitor the placement of these results. For example, is negative content rising from the second page of search results to the first? Are those Reddit threads increasing in popularity and visibility?
In addition to monitoring traditional search, you should track AI search. And if you notice that negative results associated with your brand are rising, it might be time to get an online reputation management (ORM) specialist involved.
Dig deeper: How AI search gives old negative content new life



Risk 3: Search features can bring unwanted consequences
There are many other search engine features that you often neglect. For instance, have you been paying attention to the image results, People Also Ask, autocomplete, and news results features? Or how about features like Google Discover, Google Trends, and Top Stories?
These features can be hard to access and harder to assess. But they can reveal just as much information about a brand as Google’s top organic listings. So, go beyond simply analyzing AI Overview results and the blue links on page one.
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Risk 4: Your positive results aren’t diverse enough
It’s not enough to duplicate owned content or place brand mentions on third-party websites. Instead, you need to build your reputation with trusted media organizations and third-party outlets.
In other words, you need to diversify. Seek out opportunities to earn mentions of your brand and products or services on third-party properties and trusted websites. Think Wikipedia and trusted media organizations like Reuters and the Associated Press.
Having varied and trusted mentions of your brand reduces the dependence you’d otherwise have on any single ranking asset.
Dig deeper: How to earn brand mentions that drive LLM and SEO visibility



How to conduct a branded search risk audit
To identify and address potential issues facing your brand, conduct a branded search risk audit. The steps are simple:
Identify branded queries: What are your customers searching for in relation to your brand? Answer these questions first to improve your brand’s position in traditional and AI search results.
Record initial results: What does page one of Google search results look like? Record third-party results and search features.
Categorize your results: Once you’ve recorded all your branded search results, move on to analyzing them. Sort them into categories based on whether they’re positive, negative, neutral, owned, or third-party.
Track themes and movement: New themes related to your brand can surface at any time. Track movement related to branded searches, whether positive or negative.
Prioritize vulnerability: Prioritize potential weak spots. Focus on vulnerabilities related to visibility, authority, ranking, and potential conversion impact.
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View branded search results as an early warning
In online reputation management, being proactive reigns supreme. Regular branded SERP monitoring is essential for identifying early warning signs.
But monitoring isn’t the only way you can be proactive with your branded search results. Your mission should be to build an authoritative, diverse, and trusted search presence. This way, your company will be more resilient if reputation issues arise.

Your branded search results can change in ways that affect visibility and perception. Learn what to monitor and how to spot emerging risks.

4 risks hiding in your branded search results

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="When Google spam updates put your revenue at risk" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>Rushed fixes can make recovery harder after a Google spam update or manual action. Here’s what to investigate, address, and avoid.

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="When Google spam updates put your revenue at risk" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/When-Google-spam-updates-put-your-revenue-at-risk-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google’s <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-august-2026-spam-update-ranking-impact-485980">August 2026 spam update</a> has caused considerable confusion across the industry. Google has <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-august-2026-spam-update-done-rolling-out-485471">confirmed that the update is complete</a>, but a number of publishers have seen their search visibility drop considerably, including sites that had been performing well in Google Search for years.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The timing was unfortunate. The update came during the summer vacation period, when many businesses were running with reduced teams and fewer people available to investigate. Fortunately, affected retailers in particular still have a window to address the problem before Q4 sales get underway.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">At the same time, Google is issuing a wave of manual spam actions, commonly referred to as Google penalties. Far fewer sites are affected by manual actions than by the latest spam update, but a significant number of publishers appear to be affected by both. That means some websites are dealing with two serious problems at once.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In either case, the consequences for an online business can be serious. When organic search is a major source of converting traffic, losing visibility can quickly become a cash flow problem. Staying calm and taking the right steps can make all the difference.</p>



<h2 id="h-what-the-august-spam-update-means-for-affected-sites" class="wp-block-heading">What the August spam update means for affected sites</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Significant ranking drops that correlate with the release of a Google update can reasonably be attributed to poor or inconsistent signals. In the case of the August 2026 spam update, however, content quality appears to be a primary issue.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">There’s been considerable speculation that the update specifically targets websites that use AI to produce content. Google doesn’t specifically target content based on how it was produced. Aggregated, spun, and generated content existed long before the arrival of LLMs. What matters is the quality of the content Google can crawl and index.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">For websites affected by the update, the issue is likely insufficient human oversight to maintain a minimum standard of content quality. Without proper oversight, the quality of published content is likely to decline over time.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: </em></strong><a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-august-2026-spam-update-ranking-impact-485980"><strong><em>Google’s August 2026 spam update hit rankings harder than normal</em></strong></a>


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<h2 id="h-what-to-investigate-after-a-ranking-drop" class="wp-block-heading">What to investigate after a ranking drop</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Crawl the affected website and analyze its server log data. <a href="https://searchengineland.com/server-logs-reveal-what-seo-tools-miss-479650">Server logs</a> can reveal things that <a href="https://searchengineland.com/guide/what-is-seo">SEO</a> tools don’t, such as sections of the website that bots frequently visited shortly before a significant ranking change. Commercial crawlers such as Lumar and JetOctopus can be useful for this type of investigation.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Have an independent third party conduct the investigation instead of the in-house team. There’s an obvious conflict of interest when the team responsible for the website’s development and daily operations is tasked with determining what went wrong.&nbsp;</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The objective should be to bring the website’s technical signals into alignment while maintaining strict content quality standards and full compliance with Google’s Search Essentials policies. In some cases, recovery may require changes to the business model itself. A model can work successfully for years and still conflict with Google’s policies. Mixing editorial and paid content is one example.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Once you’ve made the necessary changes in the production system, Google’s crawl frequency determines how quickly it notices and takes those changes into account. This can still take months. That’s why prevention and contingency planning are both more cost-effective and strongly recommended.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: </em></strong><a href="https://searchengineland.com/guide/de-risk-and-futre-proof-seo-for-google-changes"><strong><em>How to de-risk your SEO strategy when Google keeps changing the model behind your rankings</em></strong></a>



<h2 id="h-when-google-takes-manual-action" class="wp-block-heading">When Google takes manual action</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The impact of a manual spam action is far more daunting. It’s a targeted action that typically is confirmed through <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-search-console-seo-guide-443942">Google Search Console</a>. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">While manual actions are often applied at a granular level, for example, to a subdomain or directory, leaving even a partial penalty unresolved can increasingly affect rankings across the entire website. A manual spam action can’t be left to linger.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Prolonged poor rankings, whether caused by a manual action or poor quality signals, can have a lasting, damaging effect on visibility, even after the issue is resolved. Rankings aren’t guaranteed. If one website is no longer ranking because of its signals, another will take its place. Leaving a ranking problem unattended, even when it’s initially limited to one section of a website, is the worst possible approach.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Affected publishers shouldn’t apply for reconsideration before fully addressing the specific issue Google highlighted. Hasty actions, such as deleting content wholesale or applying for reconsideration prematurely, can lead to rejection. Each consecutive rejection can make the subsequent effort more difficult and costly.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Previously, resolving the issue identified in Google Search Console was sufficient. That, however, is no longer the case. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">To have a penalty lifted today, the website must be fully compliant with Google’s Spam Policies. The website needs a full compliance audit, which can require substantial effort.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">At the same time, the risk of prolonging a Google penalty and the cost of continued ranking declines usually far outweigh the expense of comprehensively addressing the underlying problem. Experience shows that the investigation and remediation should be handled by a third party that isn’t emotionally invested in the website affected by the penalty.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: </em></strong><a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-penalties-prevention-recovery-480253"><strong><em>Google penalties: Why prevention is cheaper than recovery</em></strong></a>



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<h2 id="h-reducing-the-business-risk-of-google-penalties" class="wp-block-heading">Reducing the business risk of Google penalties</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Even after all the necessary steps have been taken, getting a manual spam action lifted can take months. Google doesn’t guarantee a turnaround time for reconsideration requests.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A conservative, preventive approach is far less costly than remediation. Staying compliant with Google’s policies, conducting regular defensive audits, and maintaining a solid due diligence process can help identify issues before they result in a penalty.&nbsp;</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Contingency planning is equally important, particularly when known issues, such as existing advertiser agreements, can’t be fully addressed. No business should rely entirely on a single revenue-generating source.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Relying on Google Search for 50% or more of your sales creates significant business risk. A diversified traffic acquisition strategy can reduce dependence on Google and help mitigate that exposure. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Bing Search is one option, while building a recognizable brand can increase direct traffic and reduce reliance on Google. Larger publishers may also consider developing multiple distinct and independent brands as part of a broader diversification strategy.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The best way to manage this risk is to prevent a penalty from occurring in the first place.</p>

Google’s August 2026 spam update has caused considerable confusion across the industry. Google has confirmed that the update is complete, but a number of publishers have seen their search visibility drop considerably, including sites that had been performing well in Google Search for years.
The timing was unfortunate. The update came during the summer vacation period, when many businesses were running with reduced teams and fewer people available to investigate. Fortunately, affected retailers in particular still have a window to address the problem before Q4 sales get underway.
At the same time, Google is issuing a wave of manual spam actions, commonly referred to as Google penalties. Far fewer sites are affected by manual actions than by the latest spam update, but a significant number of publishers appear to be affected by both. That means some websites are dealing with two serious problems at once.
In either case, the consequences for an online business can be serious. When organic search is a major source of converting traffic, losing visibility can quickly become a cash flow problem. Staying calm and taking the right steps can make all the difference.
What the August spam update means for affected sites
Significant ranking drops that correlate with the release of a Google update can reasonably be attributed to poor or inconsistent signals. In the case of the August 2026 spam update, however, content quality appears to be a primary issue.
There’s been considerable speculation that the update specifically targets websites that use AI to produce content. Google doesn’t specifically target content based on how it was produced. Aggregated, spun, and generated content existed long before the arrival of LLMs. What matters is the quality of the content Google can crawl and index.
For websites affected by the update, the issue is likely insufficient human oversight to maintain a minimum standard of content quality. Without proper oversight, the quality of published content is likely to decline over time.
Dig deeper: Google’s August 2026 spam update hit rankings harder than normal



  
customers find first.
      
Start your free trial
    
What to investigate after a ranking drop
Crawl the affected website and analyze its server log data. Server logs can reveal things that SEO tools don’t, such as sections of the website that bots frequently visited shortly before a significant ranking change. Commercial crawlers such as Lumar and JetOctopus can be useful for this type of investigation.
Have an independent third party conduct the investigation instead of the in-house team. There’s an obvious conflict of interest when the team responsible for the website’s development and daily operations is tasked with determining what went wrong. 
The objective should be to bring the website’s technical signals into alignment while maintaining strict content quality standards and full compliance with Google’s Search Essentials policies. In some cases, recovery may require changes to the business model itself. A model can work successfully for years and still conflict with Google’s policies. Mixing editorial and paid content is one example.
Once you’ve made the necessary changes in the production system, Google’s crawl frequency determines how quickly it notices and takes those changes into account. This can still take months. That’s why prevention and contingency planning are both more cost-effective and strongly recommended.
Dig deeper: How to de-risk your SEO strategy when Google keeps changing the model behind your rankings



When Google takes manual action
The impact of a manual spam action is far more daunting. It’s a targeted action that typically is confirmed through Google Search Console. 
While manual actions are often applied at a granular level, for example, to a subdomain or directory, leaving even a partial penalty unresolved can increasingly affect rankings across the entire website. A manual spam action can’t be left to linger.
Prolonged poor rankings, whether caused by a manual action or poor quality signals, can have a lasting, damaging effect on visibility, even after the issue is resolved. Rankings aren’t guaranteed. If one website is no longer ranking because of its signals, another will take its place. Leaving a ranking problem unattended, even when it’s initially limited to one section of a website, is the worst possible approach.
Affected publishers shouldn’t apply for reconsideration before fully addressing the specific issue Google highlighted. Hasty actions, such as deleting content wholesale or applying for reconsideration prematurely, can lead to rejection. Each consecutive rejection can make the subsequent effort more difficult and costly.
Previously, resolving the issue identified in Google Search Console was sufficient. That, however, is no longer the case. 
To have a penalty lifted today, the website must be fully compliant with Google’s Spam Policies. The website needs a full compliance audit, which can require substantial effort.
At the same time, the risk of prolonging a Google penalty and the cost of continued ranking declines usually far outweigh the expense of comprehensively addressing the underlying problem. Experience shows that the investigation and remediation should be handled by a third party that isn’t emotionally invested in the website affected by the penalty.
Dig deeper: Google penalties: Why prevention is cheaper than recovery




	
	
Get the newsletter search marketers rely on.
 
				
				
			
See terms.
		
Reducing the business risk of Google penalties
Even after all the necessary steps have been taken, getting a manual spam action lifted can take months. Google doesn’t guarantee a turnaround time for reconsideration requests.
A conservative, preventive approach is far less costly than remediation. Staying compliant with Google’s policies, conducting regular defensive audits, and maintaining a solid due diligence process can help identify issues before they result in a penalty. 
Contingency planning is equally important, particularly when known issues, such as existing advertiser agreements, can’t be fully addressed. No business should rely entirely on a single revenue-generating source.
Relying on Google Search for 50% or more of your sales creates significant business risk. A diversified traffic acquisition strategy can reduce dependence on Google and help mitigate that exposure. 
Bing Search is one option, while building a recognizable brand can increase direct traffic and reduce reliance on Google. Larger publishers may also consider developing multiple distinct and independent brands as part of a broader diversification strategy.
The best way to manage this risk is to prevent a penalty from occurring in the first place.

Rushed fixes can make recovery harder after a Google spam update or manual action. Here’s what to investigate, address, and avoid.

Caught by Google’s spam update? Don’t make recovery harder

<div><img width="1920" height="1079" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation-.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Manual vs. automated Google Ads campaigns: How to allocate your budget" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation-.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--1536x863.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>Balance scale and control by matching automation to conversion volume, account maturity, and performance needs.

<div><img width="1920" height="1079" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation-.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Manual vs. automated Google Ads campaigns: How to allocate your budget" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation-.png 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--1536x863.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Manual-vs.-automated-Google-Ads-campaigns-A-framework-for-budget-allocation--1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google Ads&#8217; push to automate as many campaigns as possible isn’t news to anyone with recent paid search experience. Yet, at least as of this writing, advertisers still have options to set up manual campaigns when it makes sense for the business.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Rather than get wistful about the good old days of helpful account reps and Alpha Beta campaigns that helped preserve elite performance from your top keywords, I’ll talk about how and when we use manual and automated campaigns today.</p>



<h2 id="h-manual-vs-automated-campaign-benefits" class="wp-block-heading">Manual vs. automated campaign benefits</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In broad strokes, manual campaigns give you more control over costs, keyword-level bids, and bid adjustments by time of day, day of the week, device, or location.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Automated campaigns, meanwhile, offer scale (Google finds likely-to-convert users outside of targeting parameters or specified keywords), time savings, and real-time optimizations and adjustments based on auction and user behavior. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">These adjustments are made automatically according to real-time auction signals, some of which aren’t visible or available in manual campaigns. Advertisers can also set optimizations in automated campaigns based on key business-level goals like specific conversion actions, target CPAs, and ROAS goals.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Automated setups also save advertisers time by eliminating manual campaign setup and optimization. With that time, they can focus more on bigger-picture strategy and higher-level optimizations like ad copy and landing page tests, positioning updates around product value and promotions, and customer and competitor research.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/in-google-ads-automation-everything-is-a-signal-in-2026-468218">In Google Ads automation, everything is a signal in 2026</a></em></strong>


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<h2 id="h-recommended-use-cases-for-manual-vs-automated-campaigns" class="wp-block-heading">Recommended use cases for manual vs. automated campaigns</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The use case for automated campaigns is pretty simple: Any campaign big and mature enough to have provided learnings and racked up enough conversion volume to teach the algorithm to self-optimize is a likely candidate for automation.&nbsp;</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That’s not to say those will always outperform manual campaigns, but given the right guardrails (more on that below), they’re usually close enough to justify the time savings and added scale they provide.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That said, there are several scenarios in which I use (and would strongly recommend you consider using) the manual option. These include:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Accounts with limited budgets where focusing spend on the most efficient areas is key and can provide adequate learnings for optimization.</li>



<li>Brand-new accounts or niche accounts with low volume and scant conversion data that need initial learning and insights.</li>



<li>Accounts that have proven to need more control over performance where conversions are a challenge or issue:
<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Large delays or latency that limit the ability for real-time learning and optimization.</li>



<li>Duplicated campaigns that are inaccurate and overattributing, causing learnings and optimization to be skewed.</li>



<li>Campaigns where conversion tracking is glitchy or nonexistent.</li>



<li>Low-volume campaigns with fewer than 30 conversions per month (not enough volume for the algorithm to optimize effectively).</li>
</ul>
</li>



<li>Branded campaigns (Search or Shopping) with very broad, expensive keywords.</li>



<li>Brand-new product or service launches where there are no initial learnings.</li>



<li>Competitor campaigns for which you want your brand to show up — but value controlling cost over a focus on driving conversions.</li>



<li>Any campaign where you want to control which keywords show more often and/or how much you spend on each keyword.</li>



<li>Standard Shopping campaigns in which you want to prioritize specific products over others based on priority, inventory, and internal data.</li>



<li>Display campaigns if you’re targeting multiple different audience segments in the same campaign and want control over how each spends.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The length of that list is a little misleading. In our accounts, most of the volume is now in automated campaigns, though there are clearly scenarios where maintaining control is the right call.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/ppc-budgeting-adjust-scale-optimize-data-452493">PPC budgeting: When to adjust, scale, and optimize with data</a></em></strong>



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<h2 id="h-how-to-shift-budget-in-accounts-mixing-manual-and-automated-campaigns" class="wp-block-heading">How to shift budget in accounts mixing manual and automated campaigns</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Is your business prioritizing scale and time efficiency, learnings and control, or a mix of both? That’s the question to start with.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If the answer is “both,” identify campaigns with sufficient conversion data and learnings and lean into scale through automation. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If performance is strong enough, give these campaigns the majority of the budget while keeping control over a smaller proportion of manual campaigns, including (as the list above mentions) new campaigns or campaigns with limited data and conversion volume, while they ramp up and give you insights along the way.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Note that in most instances, you’re going to benefit from shifting budget from manual to automated campaigns rather than the other way around. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">When your manual campaigns start to take off and drive enough conversion volume to teach the algorithm how to be more effective, consider shifting those to an automated bid strategy. But don’t just flip the switch. Start by building an experiment to test the move before fully moving to automated campaigns.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">There are scenarios where manual campaigns will outperform automated ones, especially early in the algorithm’s learning phase. But I have two cautionary notes here.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Don’t toggle back and forth before the algorithm truly has a chance to get up to speed. You need to be prepared for a performance dip in the early stages.</li>



<li>Before you jump to any conclusions about the business impact of automated campaigns, make absolutely sure you’ve put the proper guardrails in place: 
<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Enhanced conversions.</li>



<li>Offline conversion tracking using first-party data.</li>



<li>Product exclusions so Google doesn’t rack up a bunch of conversions on shoelaces when you’re trying to sell high-end sneakers.</li>
</ul>
</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">If those aren’t in place, poor ROAS in automated campaigns could be rectified with more rigorous data integration.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><em>Dig deeper: <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-ads-automation-governance-competitive-advantage-483297">Google Ads automation makes governance a competitive advantage</a></em></strong>



<h2 id="h-keep-control-where-it-matters" class="wp-block-heading">Keep control where it matters</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Before we’re all fully in a world of AI Overview ads, <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-ai-max-checklist-467929">AI Max</a>, and <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-performance-max-431821">PMax</a> campaigns with no manual options, use the controls you have when it makes sense for your advertising and business conditions.&nbsp;</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google can push scale and the benefits of its algorithms all it wants (and it will), but you’re best positioned to know when your account will benefit from having your hands on the wheel and when it’s time to let Google step on the gas.</p>

Google Ads’ push to automate as many campaigns as possible isn’t news to anyone with recent paid search experience. Yet, at least as of this writing, advertisers still have options to set up manual campaigns when it makes sense for the business.
Rather than get wistful about the good old days of helpful account reps and Alpha Beta campaigns that helped preserve elite performance from your top keywords, I’ll talk about how and when we use manual and automated campaigns today.
Manual vs. automated campaign benefits
In broad strokes, manual campaigns give you more control over costs, keyword-level bids, and bid adjustments by time of day, day of the week, device, or location.
Automated campaigns, meanwhile, offer scale (Google finds likely-to-convert users outside of targeting parameters or specified keywords), time savings, and real-time optimizations and adjustments based on auction and user behavior. 
These adjustments are made automatically according to real-time auction signals, some of which aren’t visible or available in manual campaigns. Advertisers can also set optimizations in automated campaigns based on key business-level goals like specific conversion actions, target CPAs, and ROAS goals.
Automated setups also save advertisers time by eliminating manual campaign setup and optimization. With that time, they can focus more on bigger-picture strategy and higher-level optimizations like ad copy and landing page tests, positioning updates around product value and promotions, and customer and competitor research.
Dig deeper: In Google Ads automation, everything is a signal in 2026



  
your competitors win.
      
Analyze your competitors
    
Recommended use cases for manual vs. automated campaigns
The use case for automated campaigns is pretty simple: Any campaign big and mature enough to have provided learnings and racked up enough conversion volume to teach the algorithm to self-optimize is a likely candidate for automation. 
That’s not to say those will always outperform manual campaigns, but given the right guardrails (more on that below), they’re usually close enough to justify the time savings and added scale they provide.
That said, there are several scenarios in which I use (and would strongly recommend you consider using) the manual option. These include:
Accounts with limited budgets where focusing spend on the most efficient areas is key and can provide adequate learnings for optimization.
Brand-new accounts or niche accounts with low volume and scant conversion data that need initial learning and insights.
Accounts that have proven to need more control over performance where conversions are a challenge or issue:

Large delays or latency that limit the ability for real-time learning and optimization.
Duplicated campaigns that are inaccurate and overattributing, causing learnings and optimization to be skewed.
Campaigns where conversion tracking is glitchy or nonexistent.
Low-volume campaigns with fewer than 30 conversions per month (not enough volume for the algorithm to optimize effectively).
Branded campaigns (Search or Shopping) with very broad, expensive keywords.
Brand-new product or service launches where there are no initial learnings.
Competitor campaigns for which you want your brand to show up — but value controlling cost over a focus on driving conversions.
Any campaign where you want to control which keywords show more often and/or how much you spend on each keyword.
Standard Shopping campaigns in which you want to prioritize specific products over others based on priority, inventory, and internal data.
Display campaigns if you’re targeting multiple different audience segments in the same campaign and want control over how each spends.
The length of that list is a little misleading. In our accounts, most of the volume is now in automated campaigns, though there are clearly scenarios where maintaining control is the right call.
Dig deeper: PPC budgeting: When to adjust, scale, and optimize with data




	
	
Get the newsletter search marketers rely on.
 
				
				
			
See terms.
		
How to shift budget in accounts mixing manual and automated campaigns
Is your business prioritizing scale and time efficiency, learnings and control, or a mix of both? That’s the question to start with.
If the answer is “both,” identify campaigns with sufficient conversion data and learnings and lean into scale through automation. 
If performance is strong enough, give these campaigns the majority of the budget while keeping control over a smaller proportion of manual campaigns, including (as the list above mentions) new campaigns or campaigns with limited data and conversion volume, while they ramp up and give you insights along the way.
Note that in most instances, you’re going to benefit from shifting budget from manual to automated campaigns rather than the other way around. 
When your manual campaigns start to take off and drive enough conversion volume to teach the algorithm how to be more effective, consider shifting those to an automated bid strategy. But don’t just flip the switch. Start by building an experiment to test the move before fully moving to automated campaigns.
There are scenarios where manual campaigns will outperform automated ones, especially early in the algorithm’s learning phase. But I have two cautionary notes here.
Don’t toggle back and forth before the algorithm truly has a chance to get up to speed. You need to be prepared for a performance dip in the early stages.
Before you jump to any conclusions about the business impact of automated campaigns, make absolutely sure you’ve put the proper guardrails in place: 

Enhanced conversions.
Offline conversion tracking using first-party data.
Product exclusions so Google doesn’t rack up a bunch of conversions on shoelaces when you’re trying to sell high-end sneakers.
If those aren’t in place, poor ROAS in automated campaigns could be rectified with more rigorous data integration.
Dig deeper: Google Ads automation makes governance a competitive advantage



Keep control where it matters
Before we’re all fully in a world of AI Overview ads, AI Max, and PMax campaigns with no manual options, use the controls you have when it makes sense for your advertising and business conditions. 
Google can push scale and the benefits of its algorithms all it wants (and it will), but you’re best positioned to know when your account will benefit from having your hands on the wheel and when it’s time to let Google step on the gas.

Balance scale and control by matching automation to conversion volume, account maturity, and performance needs.

Manual vs. automated Google Ads campaigns: How to allocate your budget

<div><img width="1919" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="The AI hours nobody on your marketing team is counting - featured-image" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image.png 1919w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1919px) 100vw, 1919px" /></div>AI adoption can turn marketers into unpaid (ineffective) software teams, while the real work absorbs the opportunity cost.


<div><img width="1919" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="The AI hours nobody on your marketing team is counting - featured-image" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image.png 1919w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/The-AI-hours-nobody-on-your-marketing-team-is-counting-featured-image-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1919px) 100vw, 1919px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Your marketing team has never spent more hours working in, on, and with AI. I (Kevin) think every marketer, especially every SEO, has this backlog of tools or shortcuts that they always wanted to build, unrestricted by engineering. But in the process, we end up building things that we could often pay (little money) for.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">I’m pro AI use (that’s pretty clear if you’ve been reading for some time), and I’ve seen the positive impact of vibe coding and AI automation. But efficiency isn&#8217;t automatic. It comes from asking “when,” “what,” and “why.”</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><img decoding="async" width="2048" height="1982" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_metr-scaled.png" alt="AI made experienced developers 19% slower" class="wp-image-487361" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_metr-scaled.png 2048w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_metr-768x743.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_metr-1536x1486.png 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 2048px) 100vw, 2048px" /></figure>
</div>


<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In late 2025, <a href="https://metr.org/blog/2025-07-10-early-2025-ai-experienced-os-dev-study/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">METR ran 16 experienced developers through 246 real tasks</a>, half with AI tools and half without.&nbsp;</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The developers expected AI to make them 24% faster. It made them 19% slower. Even after seeing their completion times, they still believed AI had made them about 20% faster.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That gap is the AI productivity paradox. AI can make work feel faster while moving effort into prompting, waiting, checking, correcting, and maintaining the system. (The METR study above has since rerun the study in 2026 with <a href="https://metr.org/blog/2026-02-24-uplift-update/#wider-adoption-of-ai-has-made-it-more-difficult-to-measure-task-level-productivity" target="_blank" rel="noopener">higher productivity but admittedly skewed results</a>.)</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Marketing teams are especially exposed because they’re building their own workflows. Every hour spent maintaining an internal tool is an hour not spent publishing, earning mentions, or strengthening the brand that search engines and AI systems recommend.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">This new “homebrew AI work” doesn’t have the visibility of “real work,” so it’s often unaccounted for and the true cost is unanticipated. It&#8217;s &#8220;meta” work: working on how to get work done.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That cost is paid from somewhere, and organic visibility work often pays the bill.</p>



<p><a href="https://www.growth-memo.com/embed?transparent=1" rel="noopener noreferrer">View embedded content</a>



<h2 id="h-ai-removed-moved-the-work" class="wp-block-heading">AI <s>removed</s> moved the work</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><a href="https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/state-of-ai-report" target="_blank" rel="noopener">HubSpot reports 91% of marketing leaders</a> say their teams use AI, and 66% say their company builds its own internal AI tools for marketing. Many of those projects don’t appear in your team’s marketing plan or project management tool.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Simply asking your marketing team whether internal AI tools are saving them time won’t actually tell you whether or not it&#8217;s doing so. Just like the 2025 METR study, they will say yes, they will mean it, <strong>and they’ll probably be wrong.</strong>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Growth marketers and organic search strategists are among the earliest adopters of AI tooling and workflows, because:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Understanding the technology is now a part of earning visibility inside it.</li>



<li>LLMs are literally built on language, which is central to organic search and marketing overall.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The time it takes to learn, pressure test, and examine the technology is now a job requirement. It&#8217;s also <strong>real</strong> new work stacked on top of the old work, and the old work didn’t shrink.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">This past year I have watched internal teams build custom AI workflows and tools, on top of the ones they already pay vendors for.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Building your own in-house AI tools is addition, not necessarily efficiency.</strong> While it feels like instant productivity, with a rush of extra dopamine on the side, it also requires ongoing maintenance. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">AI doesn’t delete work, but instead removes work from<em> </em><strong>doing the task</strong> to building, learning, and maintaining the thing that does the task. That time investment shows up on no dashboard, and the bill for those hours? Often paid for by the work that has a longer lead time before it hits a strong ROI (like earning more organic AI mentions).</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Your team isn’t an outlier when it comes to these hurdles, and the frustration surfaces when stakeholders ask why the AI tooling hasn’t paid off yet in scaled content production.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The AI work itself is a new production line item.</p>



<h2 id="h-one-person-s-shortcut-becomes-someone-else-s-time-suck" class="wp-block-heading">One person’s shortcut becomes someone else’s time suck</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Your growth and organic search team’s new work is paid for out of the old work. The hours often come out of <a href="https://www.growth-memo.com/p/multiply-your-brand-authority" target="_blank" rel="noopener">content production, digital PR, community and UGC presence, and third-party review campaigns</a>.&nbsp;</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><img decoding="async" width="1638" height="2048" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/output-does-not-equal-productivity-scaled.png" alt="output-does-not-equal-productivity" class="wp-image-487362" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/output-does-not-equal-productivity-scaled.png 1638w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/output-does-not-equal-productivity-768x960.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/output-does-not-equal-productivity-1229x1536.png 1229w" sizes="(max-width: 1638px) 100vw, 1638px" /></figure>
</div>


<p class="wp-block-paragraph">BetterUp Labs and Stanford surveyed 1,150 full-time U.S. workers about what they call <a href="https://hbr.org/2025/09/ai-generated-workslop-is-destroying-productivity" target="_blank" rel="noopener">workslop: AI output that looks “finished”</a> and isn’t.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>41% got workslop in the previous month. Each time, it took an average of 1 hour and 56 minutes to sort out. At a 10,000-person company that runs past $9 million a year.</li>



<li>The sender saved 20 minutes. Someone else spent two hours sifting through what was sent. On a dashboard that counts output, the sender looks great, like they saved time. The time savings were eaten elsewhere.</li>
</ul>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-full is-resized"><img decoding="async" width="2048" height="1858" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_upwork-scaled.png" alt="Where the AI time actually goes" class="wp-image-487363" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_upwork-scaled.png 2048w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_upwork-768x697.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/gm_upwork-1536x1394.png 1536w" sizes="(max-width: 2048px) 100vw, 2048px" /></figure>
</div>


<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><a href="https://itbrief.news/story/ai-productivity-paradox-as-rework-erodes-time-gains" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Workday&#8217;s study puts a number on the rework</a>: for every 10 hours AI saves, companies hand back about 4 in fixing and rewriting weak output. An <a href="https://www.upwork.com/research/ai-enhanced-work-models" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Upwork survey of 2,500 leaders and workers</a> reported the itemized version: Among employees who use AI and say it added to their workload, 39% point to time spent checking and fixing AI output, 23% to learning the tools, and 21% to just being handed more work.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">When marketing attention gets pulled, the work with a slower ROI or murkier attribution is what gives to the meta work of homebrew AI or wading through workslop. The unsexy, unglamorous work that multiplies brand authority is often the production flexible enough to steal time from, because it’s a longer-term play for customers. Things like:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Publishing enough depth on a topic that you become the obvious source.</li>



<li>Earning mentions on the sites AI answers actually pull from.</li>



<li>Showing up in the Reddit and YouTube threads your buyers read.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">None of that work produces a quickly visible result or an easily attributable lead, sometimes for weeks or months after the work is initiated. (Even though some of the tasks can be automated with AI.)</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That opportunity cost may be one reason teams resist adopting custom AI workflows.</p>



<h2 id="h-every-ai-workflow-becomes-software-to-manage" class="wp-block-heading">Every AI workflow becomes software to manage</h2>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">A workflow works on the day you finish it. All the time spent in meetings, AI engineering, and team (i.e., user) interviews counts as work even before the usable workflow is in place. </p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Then, on the first day your team uses it, it immediately starts to degrade.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Then the model version changes, or someone surfaces an issue or hurdle that appeared when using it. The tool it plugs into ships an update, and the thing stops working on a Tuesday, and it throws a wrench in the rest of the week.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">From a practical perspective, every single workflow your team builds creates a small permanent job to maintain. Those jobs accumulate over time.&nbsp;</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li><strong>What your executives think is happening:</strong> You’re using AI to build more efficient workflows and save time and money.</li>



<li><strong>What your individual contributors think is happening:</strong> AI doesn’t work right. Every output they receive needs deep revision, or a workflow or project doc needs regular updating and tweaking to solve.&nbsp;</li>



<li><strong>What your strategists think is happening:</strong> Tons of time spent on workflows, not enough resources to invest in growing and repairing brand visibility in organic search.&nbsp;</li>



<li><strong>What&#8217;s really happening:</strong> The team is building tools to make the brand work faster, and the brand work is often moved to the back burner. The tools and workflows will get finished (or tossed/replaced) eventually. The 9 months of citations, mentions, and reviews that were not earned this year cannot be backdated.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">The job must have an owner, and the owner often is whoever built it (which isn’t always the right person long-term). The owner is the only one who knows what it does when it breaks, so when they take PTO, the task reverts to manual until they’re back.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">None of that maintenance shows up anywhere on your marketing team over time (unless you hire a position for this responsibility alone, like a content engineer or marketing engineer), same as the build.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>This isn’t an argument against building.</strong> I (Kevin) am continuously building and testing new things for myself and my clients, and building is essential.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">But this has shown me that homebrew AI is still uneven. It genuinely collapses some tasks and quietly makes others much slower, and the two look identical from the distance of your leadership board (until somebody has spent three weeks on building and fixing something).</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">For smart marketing leaders, the skill worth developing right now is being able to clearly name and defend:</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>When an AI workflow or automation makes sense for your team, and when it doesn’t.</li>



<li>When AI work experimentation increases efficiency rather than draining time from real brand-building and lead-generating work.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Don’t reinvent the wheel. I (Kevin) made this mistake at Shopify when I was leading a small army of engineers: I spent way too much of their capacity building tools from scratch that we could buy, which prevented us from building more impactful work. Skip doing this to your growth team.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><em>This post first appeared on the author’s website and is republished here with permission.</em>


Your marketing team has never spent more hours working in, on, and with AI. I (Kevin) think every marketer, especially every SEO, has this backlog of tools or shortcuts that they always wanted to build, unrestricted by engineering. But in the process, we end up building things that we could often pay (little money) for.
I’m pro AI use (that’s pretty clear if you’ve been reading for some time), and I’ve seen the positive impact of vibe coding and AI automation. But efficiency isn’t automatic. It comes from asking “when,” “what,” and “why.”




In late 2025, METR ran 16 experienced developers through 246 real tasks, half with AI tools and half without. 
The developers expected AI to make them 24% faster. It made them 19% slower. Even after seeing their completion times, they still believed AI had made them about 20% faster.
That gap is the AI productivity paradox. AI can make work feel faster while moving effort into prompting, waiting, checking, correcting, and maintaining the system. (The METR study above has since rerun the study in 2026 with higher productivity but admittedly skewed results.)
Marketing teams are especially exposed because they’re building their own workflows. Every hour spent maintaining an internal tool is an hour not spent publishing, earning mentions, or strengthening the brand that search engines and AI systems recommend.
This new “homebrew AI work” doesn’t have the visibility of “real work,” so it’s often unaccounted for and the true cost is unanticipated. It’s “meta” work: working on how to get work done.
That cost is paid from somewhere, and organic visibility work often pays the bill.
View embedded content



AI removed moved the work
HubSpot reports 91% of marketing leaders say their teams use AI, and 66% say their company builds its own internal AI tools for marketing. Many of those projects don’t appear in your team’s marketing plan or project management tool.
Simply asking your marketing team whether internal AI tools are saving them time won’t actually tell you whether or not it’s doing so. Just like the 2025 METR study, they will say yes, they will mean it, and they’ll probably be wrong.



Growth marketers and organic search strategists are among the earliest adopters of AI tooling and workflows, because:
Understanding the technology is now a part of earning visibility inside it.
LLMs are literally built on language, which is central to organic search and marketing overall.
The time it takes to learn, pressure test, and examine the technology is now a job requirement. It’s also real new work stacked on top of the old work, and the old work didn’t shrink.
This past year I have watched internal teams build custom AI workflows and tools, on top of the ones they already pay vendors for.
Building your own in-house AI tools is addition, not necessarily efficiency. While it feels like instant productivity, with a rush of extra dopamine on the side, it also requires ongoing maintenance. 
AI doesn’t delete work, but instead removes work from doing the task to building, learning, and maintaining the thing that does the task. That time investment shows up on no dashboard, and the bill for those hours? Often paid for by the work that has a longer lead time before it hits a strong ROI (like earning more organic AI mentions).
Your team isn’t an outlier when it comes to these hurdles, and the frustration surfaces when stakeholders ask why the AI tooling hasn’t paid off yet in scaled content production.
The AI work itself is a new production line item.
One person’s shortcut becomes someone else’s time suck
Your growth and organic search team’s new work is paid for out of the old work. The hours often come out of content production, digital PR, community and UGC presence, and third-party review campaigns. 




BetterUp Labs and Stanford surveyed 1,150 full-time U.S. workers about what they call workslop: AI output that looks “finished” and isn’t.
41% got workslop in the previous month. Each time, it took an average of 1 hour and 56 minutes to sort out. At a 10,000-person company that runs past $9 million a year.
The sender saved 20 minutes. Someone else spent two hours sifting through what was sent. On a dashboard that counts output, the sender looks great, like they saved time. The time savings were eaten elsewhere.




Workday’s study puts a number on the rework: for every 10 hours AI saves, companies hand back about 4 in fixing and rewriting weak output. An Upwork survey of 2,500 leaders and workers reported the itemized version: Among employees who use AI and say it added to their workload, 39% point to time spent checking and fixing AI output, 23% to learning the tools, and 21% to just being handed more work.
When marketing attention gets pulled, the work with a slower ROI or murkier attribution is what gives to the meta work of homebrew AI or wading through workslop. The unsexy, unglamorous work that multiplies brand authority is often the production flexible enough to steal time from, because it’s a longer-term play for customers. Things like:
Publishing enough depth on a topic that you become the obvious source.
Earning mentions on the sites AI answers actually pull from.
Showing up in the Reddit and YouTube threads your buyers read.
None of that work produces a quickly visible result or an easily attributable lead, sometimes for weeks or months after the work is initiated. (Even though some of the tasks can be automated with AI.)
That opportunity cost may be one reason teams resist adopting custom AI workflows.
Every AI workflow becomes software to manage
A workflow works on the day you finish it. All the time spent in meetings, AI engineering, and team (i.e., user) interviews counts as work even before the usable workflow is in place. 
Then, on the first day your team uses it, it immediately starts to degrade.
Then the model version changes, or someone surfaces an issue or hurdle that appeared when using it. The tool it plugs into ships an update, and the thing stops working on a Tuesday, and it throws a wrench in the rest of the week.
From a practical perspective, every single workflow your team builds creates a small permanent job to maintain. Those jobs accumulate over time. 
What your executives think is happening: You’re using AI to build more efficient workflows and save time and money.
What your individual contributors think is happening: AI doesn’t work right. Every output they receive needs deep revision, or a workflow or project doc needs regular updating and tweaking to solve. 
What your strategists think is happening: Tons of time spent on workflows, not enough resources to invest in growing and repairing brand visibility in organic search. 
What’s really happening: The team is building tools to make the brand work faster, and the brand work is often moved to the back burner. The tools and workflows will get finished (or tossed/replaced) eventually. The 9 months of citations, mentions, and reviews that were not earned this year cannot be backdated.
The job must have an owner, and the owner often is whoever built it (which isn’t always the right person long-term). The owner is the only one who knows what it does when it breaks, so when they take PTO, the task reverts to manual until they’re back.
None of that maintenance shows up anywhere on your marketing team over time (unless you hire a position for this responsibility alone, like a content engineer or marketing engineer), same as the build.
This isn’t an argument against building. I (Kevin) am continuously building and testing new things for myself and my clients, and building is essential.
But this has shown me that homebrew AI is still uneven. It genuinely collapses some tasks and quietly makes others much slower, and the two look identical from the distance of your leadership board (until somebody has spent three weeks on building and fixing something).
For smart marketing leaders, the skill worth developing right now is being able to clearly name and defend:
When an AI workflow or automation makes sense for your team, and when it doesn’t.
When AI work experimentation increases efficiency rather than draining time from real brand-building and lead-generating work.
Don’t reinvent the wheel. I (Kevin) made this mistake at Shopify when I was leading a small army of engineers: I spent way too much of their capacity building tools from scratch that we could buy, which prevented us from building more impactful work. Skip doing this to your growth team.
This post first appeared on the author’s website and is republished here with permission.

AI adoption can turn marketers into unpaid (ineffective) software teams, while the real work absorbs the opportunity cost.

The AI hours nobody on your marketing team is counting

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy.jpg" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Your Schema Says One Thing. Google&#039;s NLP Sees Another. That Gap Is Your Content Strategy" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy.jpg 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-768x432.jpg 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-1200x675.jpg 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>See how to audit entity recognition, uncover competitor advantages, and strengthen your brand's visibility. Join us for the next SMX Now.

<div><img width="1920" height="1080" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy.jpg" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="Your Schema Says One Thing. Google&#039;s NLP Sees Another. That Gap Is Your Content Strategy" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy.jpg 1920w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-768x432.jpg 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/smx-now-schema-google-nlp-content-strategy-1200x675.jpg 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Your schema tells search engines what your brand is. But that doesn’t mean Google’s systems understand it the same way.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">That gap can reveal where your content strategy is falling short.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Our next <strong>SMX Now</strong> on Sept. 16 at 1 p.m. ET will feature Ray Martinez, VP of SEO at Archer Education. He’ll show you how to measure the difference between the entities you define and the ones Google’s natural language processing (NLP) actually recognizes.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">You’ll learn how to build an entity audit using schema.org markup, the Google Cloud Natural Language API, and an agentic coding tool such as Antigravity, Claude Code, or Codex. The process turns your existing schema into a queryable knowledge graph, then compares it with competitor content to uncover topics they cover, gaps they miss, and entities Google doesn’t yet connect with your brand.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Martinez will also show you how to turn those findings into action. You’ll learn how to create content around under-recognized entities, strengthen those connections with structured data and internal data, and make your pages more retrievable and citable across search and AI engines.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">You’ll leave with a repeatable way to measure discoverability, find content opportunities, and track whether Google and AI systems are getting better at understanding what your brand actually does.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong><a href="https://www.bigmarker.com/third-door-media/your-schema-says-one-thing-google-s-nlp-sees-another-that-gap-is-your-content-strategy?utm_bmcr_source=SMXNow">Save your spot</a></strong>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph">


Your schema tells search engines what your brand is. But that doesn’t mean Google’s systems understand it the same way.
That gap can reveal where your content strategy is falling short.
Our next SMX Now on Sept. 16 at 1 p.m. ET will feature Ray Martinez, VP of SEO at Archer Education. He’ll show you how to measure the difference between the entities you define and the ones Google’s natural language processing (NLP) actually recognizes.
You’ll learn how to build an entity audit using schema.org markup, the Google Cloud Natural Language API, and an agentic coding tool such as Antigravity, Claude Code, or Codex. The process turns your existing schema into a queryable knowledge graph, then compares it with competitor content to uncover topics they cover, gaps they miss, and entities Google doesn’t yet connect with your brand.
Martinez will also show you how to turn those findings into action. You’ll learn how to create content around under-recognized entities, strengthen those connections with structured data and internal data, and make your pages more retrievable and citable across search and AI engines.
You’ll leave with a repeatable way to measure discoverability, find content opportunities, and track whether Google and AI systems are getting better at understanding what your brand actually does.
Save your spot

See how to audit entity recognition, uncover competitor advantages, and strengthen your brand's visibility. Join us for the next SMX Now.

SMX Now: Find the entity gaps holding back your content strategy

<div><img width="1672" height="941" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard.png 1672w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1672px) 100vw, 1672px" /></div>Google Ads’s AI Dashboards let advertisers turn simple text prompts into visual reports with AI-generated summaries.

<div><img width="1672" height="941" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard.png" class="attachment-large size-large wp-post-image" alt="" decoding="async" srcset="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard.png 1672w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-768x432.png 768w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-1536x864.png 1536w, https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-Analytics-dashboard-1200x675.png 1200w" sizes="(max-width: 1672px) 100vw, 1672px" /></div>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Google Ads&#8217; new <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-ads-adds-gemini-powered-dashboards-for-real-time-insights-477254">AI-powered Dashboards</a> are rolling out to some accounts, letting advertisers create visual performance reports with simple text prompts.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Driving the news</strong>. AI Dashboards started appearing in some Google Ads accounts following Google&#8217;s announcement of the feature in August. You can use simple text prompts to turn account data into visual reports, Google said.</p>



<ul class="wp-block-list">
<li>Instead of manually building a report to investigate a performance change, you can describe what you want to analyze and have Google generate the visualization.</li>
</ul>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Why we care.</strong> Building reports in Google Ads has traditionally required you to manually select metrics, dimensions, and visualizations. AI Dashboards shift much of that work to Gemini, letting you describe what you want to analyze while Google builds the report.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>The details</strong>. The feature goes beyond building charts.</p>


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-full"><img decoding="async" width="523" height="417" src="https://searchengineland.com/wp-content/seloads/2026/09/Google-AI-dashboard.png" alt="" class="wp-image-487458"/></figure>
</div>


<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Each report also includes a real-time AI summary that explains the &#8220;why&#8221; behind the data, according to Google. That lets you use the dashboard to understand what changed in campaign performance and what may be driving those changes, rather than simply reviewing the underlying numbers.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>The big picture</strong>. Google is increasingly putting AI between advertisers and their campaign data. It has also introduced <a href="https://searchengineland.com/google-analytics-adds-ai-insights-and-cross-channel-budgeting-to-home-page-469629">AI-powered insights</a> on the Google Ads homepage and Ask Advisor, its in-product AI agent, as it shifts toward workflows where advertisers can ask performance questions in natural language instead of manually navigating reports.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>Bottom line</strong>. AI Dashboards reduce the work of building Google Ads reports, letting you spend more time interpreting insights rather than creating them.</p>



<p class="wp-block-paragraph"><strong>First spotted. </strong>This update was first spotted by paid search expert Thomas Eccel, who shared it on <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/posts/thomaseccel_ppc-googleads-share-7499398632211677184-8amY/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">LinkedIn</a>.</p>


Google Ads’ new AI-powered Dashboards are rolling out to some accounts, letting advertisers create visual performance reports with simple text prompts.
Driving the news. AI Dashboards started appearing in some Google Ads accounts following Google’s announcement of the feature in August. You can use simple text prompts to turn account data into visual reports, Google said.
Instead of manually building a report to investigate a performance change, you can describe what you want to analyze and have Google generate the visualization.
Why we care. Building reports in Google Ads has traditionally required you to manually select metrics, dimensions, and visualizations. AI Dashboards shift much of that work to Gemini, letting you describe what you want to analyze while Google builds the report.
The details. The feature goes beyond building charts.




Each report also includes a real-time AI summary that explains the “why” behind the data, according to Google. That lets you use the dashboard to understand what changed in campaign performance and what may be driving those changes, rather than simply reviewing the underlying numbers.
The big picture. Google is increasingly putting AI between advertisers and their campaign data. It has also introduced AI-powered insights on the Google Ads homepage and Ask Advisor, its in-product AI agent, as it shifts toward workflows where advertisers can ask performance questions in natural language instead of manually navigating reports.
Bottom line. AI Dashboards reduce the work of building Google Ads reports, letting you spend more time interpreting insights rather than creating them.
First spotted. This update was first spotted by paid search expert Thomas Eccel, who shared it on LinkedIn.

Google Ads’s AI Dashboards let advertisers turn simple text prompts into visual reports with AI-generated summaries.

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