Google is pretty transparent about acknowledging its competition.

Google’s competition page tells us 61% of product searches start directly on Amazon.

At Fortune’s Brainstorm Tech conference, Google’s Senior Vice President spoke openly about how younger users turn to apps like TikTok and Instagram instead of Google Search or Maps to discover places and things to do.

He went on to talk about how these users tend to look for immersive content rather than purely typing in keywords.

40% of young people go to TikTok or Instagram when looking for a place for lunch.

Users are looking for information in more places and in entirely new ways than just Googling or using traditional search engines.

By downloading the right app, they can bypass search engines altogether. For music? Spotify. For travel, use TripAdvisor or Expedia. The list goes on.

And we can’t forget about generative search and AI-generated responses to queries.

With the right prompts or questions, ChatGPT and similar language learning models can provide mostly accurate responses without the user needing to sift through pages and blocks of text for the answer.

ChatGPT reached 1 million users just five days after OpenAI released it to the public. Many people were proclaiming it to be the next Google killer. The truth is that it only took 2% of Google’s market share. However, ChatGPT’s rapid rise proved that users are willing to adopt new search methods if they better understand their search intent.

Surprisingly, even with ChatGPT and other generative search platforms seeing serious mainstream use, Google’s market share has remained relatively stable, ranging from roughly 91% to 93% over the past eight years. (It’s important to note that this data does not account for TikTok searches because all search activity occurs in-app.)

However, instead of interpreting this as proof that Google is disruption-proof, it points to the fact that its iterative approach, willingness to experiment, and constant updates has kept it one step ahead.

In the past year alone, Google has made several key updates and necessary changes to compete with TikTok and the new ways people search for content and information.

So what will Google do next?

How will these changes affect your business and your content?

How can you future-proof your content?

And what exactly is Google looking for?

Google’s 2023 Updates

In 2023, Google implemented several significant updates to its algorithms and search engine functionalities. Here's an overview of the major updates:

Introducing the Launch of New AI Search Engine: "Search Generative Experience"

The year 2023 witnessed a revolutionary milestone in search technology as Google unveiled the "Search Generative Experience." This state-of-the-art AI search engine marked a significant advancement, integrating advanced artificial intelligence to deliver more intuitive, accurate, and contextually relevant search results. It showcased Google's unwavering commitment to harnessing AI capabilities to enhance the user search experience, potentially reshaping the way we seek and retrieve information online.

Noteworthy Update: Four Core Updates

In a noteworthy departure from the previous year, Google implemented four core updates throughout 2023, occurring in March, August, October, and November. These updates constituted part of Google's ongoing efforts to refine the quality and relevance of search results. Each update aimed to further enhance the algorithm, impacting website rankings and visibility across the web. The increased frequency of updates emphasized the dynamic nature of search algorithms, requiring webmasters and SEO professionals to stay agile and responsive to these changes in order to maintain or improve their search engine rankings.

Renaming and Update to Review Algorithms

In 2023, Google rebranded the "Product reviews" update to the more inclusive "reviews update," reflecting a broader focus on all review-related content. This change acknowledged the diverse range of reviews beyond just products, encompassing services and experiences as well. With three significant reviews updates rolled out in 2023, Google emphasized the significance of high-quality, informative, and trustworthy review content. The November update, being the final confirmed update of its kind, marked a significant milestone in Google's journey towards refining how reviews impact search rankings and content evaluation.

Helpful Content Update

The "Helpful Content" Update in September 2023, spanning from September 14 to September 28, brought about a significant shift in how Google evaluates and prioritizes content. This update placed greater emphasis on content that genuinely adds value, utility, and satisfaction to users, reinforcing Google's commitment to a user-centric approach to search.

Key Takeaways from Google’s 2023 Updates

Google's updates in 2023 can be seen as part of their ongoing effort to refine the search experience. In an increasingly complex digital landscape, Google aims to remain relevant, efficient, and user-centric. Let's take a closer look at what Google is trying to achieve with each update:

Launch of New AI Search Engine: "Search Generative Experience"

• Enhanced Search Experience: Google leverages AI to revolutionize user interactions with search engines. The goal is to provide more intuitive, contextually rich, and accurate search results. The aim is to create a more conversational and human-like interaction.

• Innovation in Search Technology: This showcases Google's commitment to staying at the forefront of technology, particularly in AI. The goal is to improve its core service - search continually.

Four Core Updates

• Improving Relevance and Quality: Google intensifies efforts to refine its algorithms. This focus is to improve the relevance and quality of search results, ensuring they align with user intent and offer high-quality content.

• Adaptability and Responsiveness: With more frequent updates, Google encourages webmasters and content creators to adopt adaptable and responsive SEO strategies. This shift discourages over-reliance on algorithm manipulation and promotes a more organic, user-focused approach to content creation.

Renaming and Update to Review Algorithms

• Broadening Review Content Scope: Google acknowledges the importance of diverse review content beyond products, including services and experiences. This expansion aims to enhance the reliability and usefulness of review content in search results.

• Trust and Authority in Reviews: These updates combat spammy or misleading content. Google ensures that reviews are trustworthy, detailed, and genuinely informative for users.

Helpful Content Update

• Prioritizing User-First Content: The Helpful Content Update emphasizes Google's commitment to a user-first approach. By prioritizing content that genuinely benefits and engages users, Google encourages creators to focus on quality and utility over SEO gaming techniques.

• Discouraging Low-Quality Content: This update aims to reduce the prevalence of low-quality, unhelpful content in search results. Google encourages content creators to add real value for end-users rather than solely optimizing for search engines.

How Google is Responding to TikTok

TikTok is increasingly becoming the go-to search engine for younger users, specifically Gen Z. This is due to several key factors that give it an edge over traditional search engines like Google:

• User-Friendly and Relevant Results: TikTok provides quick and easily digestible results that are highly relevant to users' interests. Its algorithm, powered by machine learning, delivers relevant search results and aligns them with users' interests based on browsing habits. This personalized experience particularly appeals to users seeking quick answers about their specific interests.

• Efficient Search Process: Traditional search engines often require users to sift through ads and sponsored content to find genuine answers. They also generate results based on commonly used keywords, which can lead to generic suggestions. In contrast, TikTok offers a more streamlined and user-centric search experience, delivering results that feel tailored and relevant to the specific query.

• Tailored Algorithm and Privacy: TikTok's algorithm is finely tuned to users' preferences, collecting data on engagement, such as browsing habits, likes, shares, and comments. This approach enables the platform to match search terms with user intent more accurately. Furthermore, unlike traditional search engines that track previous queries and browsing habits through cookies, TikTok searches remain more anonymous, which can appeal to privacy-conscious users.

• User Control with Hashtags: TikTok empowers users to use hashtags to control their search results' intent better. Hashtags allow users to narrow their searches to specific categories, trends, or creators, resulting in a more focused and customized search experience.

• Appeal of Relatable Content: Google and similar search engines often prioritize content from authoritative sources and SEO-optimized web pages. This sometimes excludes more relatable, spontaneous, and creative content like the videos popular on TikTok. Younger users are drawn to TikTok because it offers informative, entertaining results created by individuals they find relatable.

To respond to these shifting dynamics and compete with platforms like TikTok, Google is likely to focus on enhancing the personalization and user-friendliness of its search engine. This may involve refining its algorithms to better cater to the preferences of younger users, integrating more diverse and relatable content types, and possibly simplifying the search process to reduce the prominence of ads and sponsored content in search results. Additionally, Google might explore new ways to engage younger audiences, potentially through more interactive or visually driven search features.

How to Future-proof Your Content

Google E-A-T, also known as Double-E-A-T, represents an evolution of the initial E-A-T concept utilized by human quality raters to assess Google's search ranking systems. The original E-A-T encompasses Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. In December 2022, Google introduced an additional "E" to this concept, denoting "Experience." This addition signifies a shift in Google's approach to evaluating web content, placing greater emphasis on the practical experience of content creators or the subject matter they discuss. This change recognizes that real-world experience is crucial in establishing credibility and delivering valuable content alongside expertise, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness.

Google understood then, just as it does now, that the platforms that provide the best experience to the user will win in the future. TikTok satisfies users by giving them much more than a simple search result. TikTok immerses users. Generative search provides users with custom answers at rapid rates.

Future-proofing your content is about creating great user experiences. If you focus on creating quality content, you will be rewarded instead of penalized by updates and algorithm changes. Measuring user experience can be achieved through user engagement, which entails monitoring how users interact with content, reflecting their interest and satisfaction level.

Metrics such as time spent on a page, click-through rates, comments, shares, and return visits provide valuable insights into how users perceive and value the content. To create more captivating content, it is crucial to understand your audience's needs and interests. Tailor your content to address their questions, solve their problems, or entertain them resonantly. Interactive elements like quizzes, polls, or infographics can encourage active participation.

Consistently utilizing analytics helps identify the types of content that perform best, enabling you to adapt your strategy accordingly. Remember, relevant, informative, and entertaining content naturally fosters higher engagement, resulting in a positive user experience.