SEO 101 Ep 516: Surveying AI SEO Acronyms and Why Google’s Review Changes Worry Local Businesses

Summary

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SEO 101 Ep 516: Surveying AI SEO Acronyms & Why Google’s Review Changes Worry Local Businesses

Podcast: SEO 101
Hosts: Ross Dunn & Scott Van Achte
Release Date: November 27, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Ross and Scott break down major industry changes, focusing on the evolving world of AI SEO and Google’s recent moves—especially those that could disrupt local business, such as new Google Maps features and the controversial reintroduction of anonymous reviews. The hosts offer frank opinions on whether emerging “AI SEO” acronyms are creating clarity or confusion, dissect the implications of new Google and ChatGPT announcements, and spotlight practical updates on Google Business Profiles.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Adobe to Acquire SEMrush

(01:39–04:15)

• Adobe’s intention to buy SEMrush for nearly $2B has rattled the SEO industry.
• SEMrush reported $376.8M revenue in 2024, with 111,000+ paid users; hosts debate the high valuation and worry about future service quality.
• Ross: “Someone said that, you know, when Adobe buys something, it’s where they go to die. So we’ll see how it goes.” (03:09)

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2. Rise of AI SEO Acronyms: Confusion or Progress?

(04:16–09:17)

• SEO, AI SEO, GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), ASO (Answer Search Optimization), AISO (Artificial Intelligence Search Optimization), and other new acronyms are proliferating.
• Scott: “The terminology in AI era search is evolving… GEO is emerging as the most popular label for optimizing brand visibility across AI platforms.”
• Only 14% of marketers use “SEO” to describe optimizing for AI search, but 84% recognize “GEO.”
• Acronym proliferation reflects a desire for precision, but also leads to confusion—especially for clients.
• Ross: “If I’m talking to clients, I say AI SEO. I don’t say GEO. I don’t say any of these stupid terms. Drives me crazy.” (07:46)
• Hosts agree: underneath the buzzwords, optimizing for AI search is an extension of core SEO skills and strategy.

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3. Google Thanksgiving Update & Holiday Timing Frustrations

(09:19–10:05)

• Another unexplained Google update hits just before Thanksgiving; hosts joke about Google’s habit of pushing updates right before major holidays.
• Scott: “You want to go away for Christmas? Nope. You’re going to be working on your website instead.” (09:25)

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4. AI Advancements: Google Gemini 3 & ChatGPT Enrichments

(10:05–16:47)

Google Gemini 3:

• Newly announced—improved reasoning, deeper multimodal understanding, and agentic capabilities.
• Scott (quoting Gemini): “Deeper structural reasoning, superior mathematical and abstract reasoning, and higher coding accuracy.” (10:39)
• Ross: Warns the publicly available AI lags far behind what’s used internally, citing interviews with top AI figures.
  “AI... that stupid assistant we have right now... is long gone in what’s happening behind the scenes.” (11:03)
• Notably chilling stat: leading AI figures guess there’s a 20–50% chance AI could eliminate humanity.
  • Ross: “That’s Russian roulette. Like that’s crazy.” (13:33)

ChatGPT Adds Images to Answers:

• GPT-5.1 now includes relevant images alongside text answers, with source attributions; available across web, iOS, and Android (14:48–15:31).

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5. Google Maps & Local SEO: “Know Before You Go”

(17:11–18:40)

• Two new Google Maps features rolled out: “Know Before You Go”—tips on parking, bookings, entrances, etc., pulled from online reviews and info.
• Scott: Sees potential for abuse: “I could maybe game it a little bit to hurt my competition… I think it should be something that at least is controlled somewhat by the business owner.” (17:30)

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6. Controversial: Google Reintroduces Anonymous Reviews

(18:52–24:02)

• Announced as a “Secret Santa” holiday feature, users can leave reviews under nicknames like “Eager Elf.”
• Google claims reviews remain tied to Google accounts, but only nicknames are shown publicly.
• Hosts express deep concern over local businesses facing even more fake or extortion reviews, worrying abuses will spike.
  • Ross: “They just essentially said, hey all you hackers and nasty people out there, you can go, you can use anonymous reviews now… you’re going to, because they actually get a better chance of being able to extort you.” (19:33)
• Only benefit they see: privacy for sensitive-service reviewers (e.g., therapy), but overall negative impact for local businesses.

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7. Google Business Profile Changes: Scheduling & Multi-Location Posts

(26:28–28:31)

• Now possible to schedule posts and publish to multiple locations at once—saves agencies/owners time.
• Scott: “Why haven’t they had this forever? So many things allow you to schedule posts.” (26:48)
• Review of humorous/unreasonably frequent Google Business Profile name changes over the years.

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8. Mueller Files: Background Video, SEO Impact & GEO “Detox”

(29:31–36:10)

• Background video (even large) doesn’t harm SEO if correctly loaded after main content—use proper preload settings and poster image.
• Joke about “GEO Detox” services inevitable as AI-generated content starts to clutter the web.
  • John Mueller, quoted: “Don’t forget all the GEO detox work that will be paid for next year. The cycle of, ‘SEO’ life.” (34:50)
• Reminder: don’t lose your content’s unique voice amid formulaic AI optimization tips.

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9. (Mini) Rant: Organic Results Drown in Google’s SERP Overload

(36:10–38:54)

• Scott shares frustration: published a new post that hit #1 organically within hours—but was buried beneath ads, AI overviews, carousels, and other SERP features.
• Scott: “If you’re number one for everything and you’re thinking, this is great, why am I not getting traffic? …Google’s putting so much crap above your number one.” (38:46)
• Both hosts reminisce about the “10 blue links” era.

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Notable Quotes

• Ross Dunn [03:09]:
  “Someone said that, you know, when Adobe buys something, it’s where they go to die. So we’ll see how it goes.”

• Scott Van Achte [04:32]:
  “Can we just stick with SEO and just say it’s for AI? I don’t know… What you do doesn’t change.”

• Ross Dunn [07:46]:
  “If I'm talking to clients, I say AI SEO. I don't say GEO. I don't say any of these stupid terms. Drives me crazy.”

• Ross Dunn [13:33]:
  “Of the leaders in AI, the most positive person has approximately said that there’s a 20% chance that AI will eliminate humanity. 20%. That’s the most positive outlook. That’s Russian roulette. Like that’s crazy.”

• Scott Van Achte [17:30]:
  “I could maybe game it a little bit to hurt my competition… I think it should be something that at least is controlled somewhat by the business owner.”

• Ross Dunn [19:33]:
  “They just essentially said, hey all you hackers and nasty people out there, you can go, you can use anonymous reviews now… you’re going to, because they actually get a better chance of being able to extort you.”

• John Mueller (quoted by Ross) [34:50]:
  “Don’t forget all the GEO detox work that will be paid for next year. The cycle of, ‘SEO’ life.”

• Scott Van Achte [38:46]:
  “If you’re number one for everything and you’re thinking, this is great, why am I not getting traffic? …Google’s putting so much crap above your number one.”

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Timestamps for Main Topics

• 01:39 – Adobe to Acquire SEMrush
• 04:15 – SEO vs. AI SEO Acronyms, Industry Confusion
• 09:17 – Google Thanksgiving Update
• 10:05 – Gemini 3 & AI Progress
• 14:48 – ChatGPT Image Update
• 17:11 – Google Maps “Know Before You Go” Feature
• 18:52 – Google’s Anonymous Review Changes (Secret Santa)
• 26:28 – Google Business Profiles: Scheduling/Multi-location
• 29:31 – Mueller Files: Video Impact, GEO Detox Joke
• 36:10 – SERP Overload and the Diminished Value of #1 Rankings

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Tone & Style Highlights

• Candid, sometimes irreverent skepticism about industry trends.
• Clear preference for practical, user-focused SEO over jargon and hype.
• Willingness to dig into technical nuances, but always with actionable advice for beginners and business owners.
• Light, banter-filled transitions even when topics are heavy or contentious.

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Conclusion

This episode is a tour through the noisy crossroads of traditional SEO, new AI-driven search trends, and Google’s ongoing platform changes. The hosts give actionable perspectives for both newcomers and pros, indicating what matters, what’s noise, and—crucially—what actually impacts search visibility and local business reputation.

Listeners will leave with a critical eye on industry buzzwords, an understanding of current and upcoming Google features, and a sober awareness of how rapidly evolving AI and search landscapes are reshaping best practices.

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Transcript

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[Ross Dunn]

Hello and welcome to SEO 101 on WMR FM. Episode number 516. This is Ross Dunn, CEO of Step 4th Web Marketing, and my co host is my company senior SEO Scott Vanak. All right, well, we've got a good show to put together to get today. We're going to start off with pretty big news. This is a number. A couple weeks. All right. How long has it been since our last episode? I guess it's been a week or two. But anyways, it seems like a long time. And since then, Adobe has announced their intention to acquire Semrush, which shook our industry a bit. That's pretty impressive, especially considering the acquisition is probably going to be nearly $2 billion. They expect it's going to close in the first half of 2026. And, you know, I guess, you know, for 2024, SEMrush reported 376.8 million in revenue. I. I just don't get where these 2 billion things come in. But anyway, wow.

[Scott Vanak]

In a million years, if you had asked me What I thought SEMrush would be worth, it wouldn't even be close to their reported revenue for 2024. I had no idea they were making that kind of money. I think it said they had 111,000 paid paid users and you know, their rates are bonkers lately.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, they nickel and dime the crap out of you. I not a big fan aspects of what they do. I like a lot and I always have. I love their system for doing any kind of research. It's what I've used since they started, but it just got kind of ridiculous. It's too bad. Anyway, someone said that, you know, when Adobe buys something, it's where they go to die. So we'll see how it goes. Hopefully semrush will survive in some way or form, at least in the base form that I love using it for, which is doing analysis of a person's existing rankings right off the bat. I mean it's not perfect, but to be able to go in there and just see where someone probably is and what they mean. Up doing an up and down and you know, whether they had good rankings last year or whether or not they've been in an upward swing for the last five years, all it's just very useful. Data is not dead on, but just a picture is fantastic. It's worth a thousand words from these, these kinds of tools. All right, what's next? My favorite topic, SEO.

[Scott Vanak]

I know you love it.

[Ross Dunn]

GEO or AI? SEO or aso.

[Scott Vanak]

And oh heaven, you forgot LLMAO was not a band in like the 90s or something. Llmfao, right?

[Ross Dunn]

All right, well fill us in.

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah. So what do you use? Yeah, there's so many. Like can we just stick with SEO and just say it's for AI? I don't know. So the terminology in AI era search is evolving as everybody knows with geo. Generative engine optimization is emerging as the most popular label for optimizing brand visibility across AI platforms. Survey data has shown that 84% of marketers recognize GEO, but only 14% use traditional SEO to describe optimizing brand visibility. The rise of AI specific terms like ASO and answer. Wait, aso? Yeah, I don't think I've seen that one answer. Search optimization. Talk about awkward. And aiso. Artificial intelligence search optimization reflect a shift towards more precise language and AI driven search strategies. I don't like either of Those terms, by the way, companies are hiding under broader term AISO hiring. What did I say?

[Ross Dunn]

Hiding.

[Scott Vanak]

Hiding.

[Ross Dunn]

Well, sure.

[Scott Vanak]

Well, I guess I'd want to hide too, I guess. Hiring, hiring under the broader term aiso, indicating a preference for AI related SEO skills. The market continues to see SEO as fundamental, which is good, with AI elements being layered on top to adapt the search and discovery dynamics. I was actually going through our site and I found an old post and it was what is the difference between SEO and SEM? And it kind of fits here too. Like SEM is SEO is a subset of SEM and AI, O, geo, whatever you want to call it, is a subset of SEO. It's all just SEM, really.

[Ross Dunn]

So. Well, that's what I like to say. But that's. I think that article was probably written by me because I hate these terms being used so wrong.

[Scott Vanak]

It was.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, yeah, but SEM, Search Engine Marketing, I mean, you know, to me that includes search engine optimization. Includes. It's an umbrella term. Yeah, but no, it's become bastardizing industry. They say search engine marketing is things like paid ads and all that kind of stuff. It's not SEO.

[Scott Vanak]

That's true.

[Ross Dunn]

That's what they say. I don't see it that way. I don't see it that way at all. But that's whatever. Doing it makes no sense to me that they do that.

[Scott Vanak]

It's kind of the same though. Like if we're looking at these AI terms, it's just what do people want to call it? I mean, what you do doesn't change. So I don't know. But with the AI stuff like did. Oh, you don't have this list in here. I just want to point out some of these because I hadn't seen some of these. So we've got geo, aeo, aiso, which you just said, aio, Artificial Intelligence Optimization. There's llmo, S, xo, Search Engine, sorry, Search Experience Optimization, LLAMAO and aiso. It's like, can we just pick one? I guess that's kind of the point here is a survey is like trying to pick what are people using versus what do people want to use. And I think there was a bit of a disconnect because in that one article at Search Engine Land, marketers tend to lean towards geo, geo. And I thought I saw the opposite for what? I can't find it now. Darn. The end users were using different acronyms. So you kind of as a marketer, you want to use the acronym that your customers are probably using, even if you don't like it because that's what they're using. I don't know.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, I mean, if you really want to make it simple, you'd think AI SEO. It's what people understand. If I want, if I'm talking to clients, I say AI SEO. I don't say geo. I don't say any of these stupid terms. No, try to be crazy.

[Scott Vanak]

What's a generative engine? Nobody knows what that is like we do, but it's just the average person.

[Ross Dunn]

And the problem is there's enough unethical jerks out there who are trying to confuse people with these terms. They're baffle gabbing them. I'd just like to say, yeah, in SEO, we do AI SEO. That's just another form of search engine optimization. That's it. It's that simple. It doesn't have to be anything more than that. And just put your antenna up when that's what I tell my clients anyway. Put your antenna up for the bullshit. When someone's writing and using all of these, these terms, it to me, it just looks to me like they're trying to be self important and trying to scare people. It's not always the case, I grant you, but I'm very careful to look out for that. It's not. It is a. It is a diff. It's a difference. It is a fairly substantial change in how everything is going to work. Granted, it's enough to give us, you know, nightmares when we think about all the different changes that are coming, but it's also exciting. And it's all just part of SEO. That's my pick.

[Scott Vanak]

I agree.

[Ross Dunn]

All right, well, let's jump into SEO news. The Google Thanksgiving update. What's this all about?

[Scott Vanak]

This is another update that we don't know anything about that Barry's reporting on starting this week. A couple days before Thanksgiving. And I'm just mentioning it. So if you see anything crazy, let us know. And also to point out the fact how Google loves to do updates right before holidays. They're known for. Hey, you're going to take a long weekend? Nope. We're going to stop that right now. You want to go away for Christmas? Nope. You're going to be working on your website instead. Why don't they just wait till Monday? Cyber Tuesday. Wait till after Cyber Monday. Right. And I don't know, but too easy. Keep your eyes peeled for a turkey update. He should have called it the Turkey update. That's what I would have done.

[Ross Dunn]

All right, well, Google has released Gemini 3. This is from Sundar Pichai. He's the CEO of Google. He says and now we're introducing Gemini 3, our most intelligent model that combines all of Gemini's capabilities together so you can bring any idea to life. Google added that Gemini 3 has state of the art reasoning, deep multimodal understanding, powerful vibe coding, improved agentic capabilities. And Scott has asked Gemini what makes it better. What are these questions?

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah, I just said hey Gemini, what makes you better now with being three? I said that really badly. Anyways, the answers it gave me was a deeper structural reasoning, superior mathematical and abstract reasoning, nerd and higher coding accuracy. So there we go. That, that's. Those are the three things that Gemini told me are the best.

[Ross Dunn]

So. All right. Well, it likes to brag about itself. There's some pretty phenomenal videos right now on YouTube if you look for them, that are interviews with top AI talent and where they think things are going. And one in particular I'm going to try and hunt it down during the show and I'll bring it up again. But I thought was fascinating and it talked about how just as we all suspect, if you put any thought of it, you probably realize that the AI that we see, the model that we're able to access is not the model that other people can access. They can hire, they can use much higher end. They probably already have Gemini 4 in Google or something close to it that they're using and their partners are using. This is definitely the case, I believe it was for OpenAI. There are higher levels of AI that are being used before it's being passed on to the public. So when I see Sundar say our most intelligent model, it's our most intelligent model for the public. And the reason I bring this up is in this interviews with these incredibly talented people, they're generally quite blunt. His last one definitely was and he said that we have no idea what's coming. It's just, you know, we all think of AI as being that, that stupid assistant we have right now that kind of works once in a while and has a lot of dumb thoughts and says silly things and that's gone. That's. It's long gone in what's happening behind the scenes. What's coming with these agentic models that we're already seeing. But in the next level is night and day. It's just that big a change that's coming. So I, you know, talking to people and the average person who isn't as deeply into this as I am and our colleagues and stuff, they just have kind of Dismissed AI as being this dummy thing that, yes, someday we'll get smarter. It's not someday. It's already happened. We just haven't seen it yet. And it's coming out. And I think Gemini 3 is the first shot off our bow on that. Apparently it's that much better. So I'm really interested to give it a shot and see whether or not how much better it is. But it is extremely sobering, to put it mildly. You know that. And this. I'll finish this last stat because this just blew my mind. Of the leaders in AI, the most positive person has approximately said that there's a 20% chance that AI will eliminate humanity. 20%. That's the most positive outlook. That's Russian roulette. Like that's crazy. Or is the person I was watching and again, I wish I had a sharper memory, but said his is 50%. He lives at 50. 50. Well, let's just keep soldiering on and building it then. Yeah. 50.

[Scott Vanak]

50.

[Ross Dunn]

Oh, crazy.

[Scott Vanak]

Flip of a coin. Do we live? Do we die? Well, we don't know yet. Let's build it and find out.

[Ross Dunn]

Well, we might get some neat stuff and we'll definitely be getting richer. Those big guys are going to get richer. That makes everyone happy, I guess. Oh, brother.

[Scott Vanak]

Anyway, makes some crazy people happy.

[Ross Dunn]

While you do this, I'll look up that. That particular video. But yeah, this is ChatGPT adds more images to answers. What's this all about?

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah, so we've got a new update over at ChatGPT and it will be expanding image use for whatever you're searching for. So it's getting images from the web for answers about people, places, products and other common topics. Images will be added where they can add clarity. They will appear next to the most relevant text. In the result, clicking these images will allow you to see their original dimensions and source attribution. And it's now available on web, iOS and Android and it is only functioning currently using GPT 5.1. So look at that. You found the video. That was like beautiful timing.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah.

[Scott Vanak]

So just. Yeah, I've been kind of waiting for something like this.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah. Yeah. So the. The name of the video is we have 900 days left. How's that for scary? That's the title.

[Scott Vanak]

New Defer My Mortgage Renewal and Stop.

[Ross Dunn]

Paying and oh man, it's crazy. It's. By the person being interviewed was Imad Mostak. Probably butchered the name. I'm sorry. Not that he cares. He's certainly not listening, but. And he's the person who invented him and his team invented stable diffusion. He's all about creating AI for the public and not making it closed doors. He wants everyone to be able to see it, to make it open source, that kind of thing. Pretty cool guy. A really, really, really interesting and frankly kind of bone chilling interview because he doesn't hold back. He says what's wrong with the system and what they're doing and why they shouldn't be doing it. It's crazy. Well worth the watch. Anyone listening? So, yes, I'm nerding out on this stuff. I can't help it. It's just too crazy how much is happening right now and so we're not even seeing a sliver of it, I think really.

[Scott Vanak]

So if you're I, I think the word's narcoleptic. When you fall asleep easily, if you are that this is a cure because it's going to wake you up and your eyes are going to pop open and you're not going to be able to sleep and you're going to have waking nightmares and yeah. And then thank Ross. Give him a call. He particularly likes if you call his cell phone at 2am so.

[Ross Dunn]

Oh brother. All right, well, so there's some new Google Map features in local SEO News and we're going to end off with another whammy here and a little rant because that I think you will all understand the reason for. But why don't you do this beginning part there? Scott? No. Before you go.

[Scott Vanak]

Sure. Know before you go. So this is a new There are two new search features or map features that Google added the week of November 20th. Somewhere around there, Know before youe Go is a neat little section that Google Ads on its own, pulling information from user reviews and things it finds online. And it displays parking tips, secret menu items, ways to book a reservation, details about where the entrance is, if it's obscure, that sort of thing. This is rolling out on in the US right now on iOS and Android. I get a bit nervous about stuff like this because I don't like how it's pulling this information from reviews and whatever else it finds online because that tells me I, I could maybe game it a little bit to hurt my competition. Like tell them the entrance is around the back in the alley next to the dumpster. I don't know, like, you know, you depending on where Google pulls this content from, I, I think it should be something that at least is controlled somewhat by the business owner. But maybe it will be someday. I don't know. So might be a Great. Great feature. We're going to find out. We'll see how well AI does it discovering these tips and how good they actually are.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, we will. And we'll see some really fun mistakes, probably.

[Scott Vanak]

Oh, we'll complain about those too. Stay tuned to a future episode. We'll talk about it for sure.

[Ross Dunn]

Well, this one really fired me up. And a lot of people are fired up about this. Google has. And they did it in such a kitschy way too. It was just a terrible article. This one in the sense they just. What do they say they called it a Secret Santa. Let me just read it because it was just so cringy. Oh poop. It's the wrong URL. Oh, you were using Search Engine Land 0. Darn it. I had the original out. I thought you had the right one.

[Scott Vanak]

Mine's not wrong, it's just different.

[Ross Dunn]

Sorry. Yes.

[Scott Vanak]

Not my fault if all the major players are reporting the same story.

[Ross Dunn]

Okay, I managed to click through invited. Okay, so it's called Secret Santa. So get this. Be your local business's Secret Santa. Leaving a great review for that bakery with your favorite pumpkin pie is a simple way to spread some holiday cheers. If you prefer not to use your real name, why, you can choose a nickname and profile picture to be associated with your reviews. So you can give that helpful, helpful shop a five star review as Eager Elf or Julia loves sweets. And don't worry about grinches trying to spoil the fun. Our built in protection still monitor for. Still underline that. Still monitor for suspicious and fake reviews24.7 since no matter what nickname you use publicly, reviews are still associated with your Google account behind the scenes. This feature is rolling out this month globally on Android, iOS and desktop. OMG. So they just essentially said, hey all you hackers and nasty people out there, you can go. You can use anonymous reviews now. It doesn't matter that it's connected to their Google account. These people are doing it anyway. Honestly don't think it's going to change how they do it. But you are going to, because they actually get a better chance of being able to extort you. I mean, we talked about that in a past show where there are extortions happening regularly for local businesses where guys are posting many, many negative reviews and then saying hey, we'll take these down for X amount of dollars in bitcoin. And that's happening all the time right now. This one of the benefits. Okay, I'll give a benefit. And we were talking about this earlier, a benefit in air quotes because I really don't think it's much of one is that like therapists and people who normally never get reviews might find this really helpful because people can leave a personal review and, and feel like they're not telling everyone that they've got an issue. That sounds grand. I love that idea. But it's not going to help their Google business profile when there are fake names. It just looks fake. It's not helping anyone. Anyway, they claim that this is not going to lead to more spammy reviews. Like because they're still doing their review. How bad are they now? It's terrible. Like there's a ton of garbage out there. How can they say that they're doing a great job and then add this to the mix? I just don't see the point. Even if I. Sorry, go on.

[Scott Vanak]

You're talking about how they are doing a terrible job getting rid of bad reviews. Like how often have you seen. This is an example that I'm making up. But I've seen similar things. Like maybe for a car rental place and it says one star. Worst pizza I've ever had. Stuff like that. Where maybe it's the review for the wrong business or someone's just being an idiot. Google can't seem to find those. How are they going to find these ones where they're written up and crafted to look real. But they're extortion based.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah. And those are the extortion ones that they're hopefully truly trying to help weed out. I actually believe they probably are. And of that new form that they set up and all that information. But I just think they're inviting more mayhem and misery for very little benefit. I just don't think it's going to be worthwhile. And you know, I did a Little Research in November 27, 2012 is approximately. Because that was when the article was written, but approximately the time when Google removed the ability to leave an anonymous review and they connected it to a Google profile. It says from now on reviews will be posted publicly under your Google name and picture. Remember the Google days. Anyway, your name on previous reviews will appear as a Google user. So from that point on, you couldn't leave anonymous reviews. And I think we all breathe a sigh of relief because that's just so much better. But I just don't see an upside to this. If I'm. If I'm wrong, please tell me, like what. Where do you see this being a real benefit? Listeners, you know, drop a note. I would love to know if I'm missing something entirely. I will be the first to admit I just don't see this being anything but bad news. Fingers crossed it isn't, but I just don't see it being a good thing.

[Scott Vanak]

No, it's going to be bad.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah. All right.

[Scott Vanak]

It just gives us more material.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, exactly. Well, let's take a quick break and we come back. We're going to talk a bit more about Google Business Profiles.

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[Scott Vanak]

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[Ross Dunn]

Welcome back to SEO 101 on WMR FM hosted by myself, Ross Dunn, CEO of Stepforth Web Marketing and my company senior SEO CEO Scott Vanak. Okay, Google Business Profile profiles. Add scheduling and multi location publishing to Google posts. Fill us in.

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah, so just a couple new features. If next time you're logged into your account, check it out. Scheduling a post is now an option so you can type out your post and pick your day and time for when you want it to appear. Which to be honest, why haven't they had this forever? So many things allow you to schedule posts. All social media platforms allow. Well, do they all. I don't know. There are lots of tools out there. I don't know why Google took so long, but they've done it now, which is great. I think it's going to make life easier for a lot of people who manage multiple accounts. You know, you can go through in the day and just, you know, put out your 20 posts for the month. I mean you can't always think that far in advance, but sometimes you can and, and that's great. And if you have multiple locations, you can now manage them a bit more easily. If you say you have a post you want pasted across all your locations, you can post it once and with a single click transfer that post to all locations that you're managing. So that could be good as well, maybe spammy, but probably not because the locations are in different places.

[Ross Dunn]

No, it's great. If you got a sale or something that's important, that's great. We don't deal with too many multi location businesses. We got a few and we love working on them. But it's kind of like if you think about how long has been Google Business, how long have Google Business Profiles been around? Obviously by other names over the years, but a few. Why has it taken it so darn long for this to be implemented? I know, anyway it's, I'm glad it has, I'm so glad. It must be making people very happy. I'm sure a lot of them are using third party tools, using the Google Business Profile API to do this, but now they can do it within the system, which is great. Good for you Google. Keep it up.

[Scott Vanak]

Oh, I just asked AI real quick what were all the previous Google Business Profile names? And it gave me four, but I thought there were more than that. Google Places, Google+Local, Google My Business, Google Business Profile. Was there another one in there?

[Ross Dunn]

I thought there was one. Right. Anyways, but in there relatively short, you know, it's probably been hmm, 17 years, I'm not sure how long. Ask Google there. Well, how long is Google Business? How long has it been around Google Local, it's what, 2008, 2009? Not sure.

[Scott Vanak]

Thinking, thinking, thinking, thinking. 2014. June 11, 2014. So 11 years less than I thought.

[Ross Dunn]

And you think it's changed their name? I think you think about it, they Changed that name four times in that time. That's crazy.

[Scott Vanak]

I guess that's every two and a half years. I guess when we do our New Year show, it's going to have to be what's Google business profile going to be called by the end of this year?

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, exactly. All right, well, let's jump into some Mueller files here. Background video loading is unlikely to affect SEO. A website owner posted to Reddit's r SEO asking if 100 megabyte video would hurt SEO. If the page prioritizing loading a HERO image. Sorry, it would hurt SEO. The page prioritizing loading a HERO image and content before the video. Sorry, you're gonna have to read this. He wrote this.

[Scott Vanak]

If the page prioritizes loading the HERO image before the actual video, the video loads in the background while users can already see the post. This is like word for word from the post. So I guess it was essentially, if you have a large video, in this case, they're using 100 meg example, like, why is it so big? Maybe try to make it smaller. But if it's loading in the background and other stu prioritizes first, is that going to hurt SEO? And John's response? I don't think you'd notice an SEO effect. Google's Web.dev documentation recommends using preload equals none on video elements. This helps prevent browsers from downloading video content until it's needed. Also this, when videos are loading in this effect in this manner, they don't affect your core web vital scores. So you're, you're good as long as it's loading in the background and not, you know, the user opens the page and now they have to wait for this 100 megabyte video to download while nothing happens. Yeah, that's going to be bad. That's definitely going to be bad. You can also add a poster attribute which provides a placeholder image while videos continue loading in the background. And I'm not familiar with a poster attribute, so I need to look into that because I'm curious, but.

[Ross Dunn]

So I'm not sure if this is what I was thinking, but one of the things I love to do, and this might just exactly be it, but I like to torture Dennis, our developer, by saying, okay, can you please put an image in here that when clicked, will load the video. So it's like a thumbnail. Not a thumbnail, but it's a graphic that looks much better than the placeholder that's put in by whatever YouTube or whatever system you're putting there that doesn't have ads that's designed with your branding and all that stuff. And when someone clicks on the play arrow, it kicks in the actual video and it disappears and the video kicks in. It looks so much better. It loads better. It's just win, win, win. But yeah, it's a little bit tricky to do.

[Scott Vanak]

I'm just pointing something else out because of people like us up here in Canada where cell phone plans are absolutely tragic. We, you know, I think most places, you know, you get unlimited data at top speeds and you don't have to worry about it. Well, here, fortune for data. And if you have 100 meg video and I open up your website and you're using 100 megs of my data plan to view your menu page, I'm not going to be very happy about that. So, you know, think about that when you're putting video on a mobile site that your users, you know, may not have unlimited data capacity.

[Ross Dunn]

So, and this doesn't make much sense. I mean, I think there's more, must be more detail here because 100 megabyte video doesn't mean it loads all at once. You would load, you would, you would buffer perhaps a couple megs before you start playing. So I think it depends what's going on there. I don't know, it doesn't sound like the question. I think there's more to the question. This is what I'm getting at anyway. I would agree. I don't think you'd see an SEO effect there. It makes sense. Good sense. And a little on the lighter side here. Google's John Mueller joked on the future of GOT talks. I love this because we've talked about this before too, but in response to a small rant from Ian Lurie. I love his rants, they're just great. He was mocking geotactics. So I'll just read off this. So, Ian Lurie, all of you talking breathlessly about GEO and then telling me your big tactic is to create better, more detailed content. Content and cloaked AI bot only pages are making me pray for an asteroid that much harder. John Mueller responds, quote, don't forget all the GEO detox work that will be paid for next year. The cycle of, quote, SEO unquote, life. Yeah, need we say more? I'm sure that's going to be a line item for many people. So many people are thinking that SEO's so simple now that they can just follow these things and do this GEO layout and that's all they're going to need to do and everything should be Rewritten this way. I mean, don't get me wrong, we're testing it on stuff, we found good results. I'd be very reluctant to load it on every single thing we do, at least without. And I guess if I did do that, I'd have to know ahead of time that I'd be willing to change it all next year when I do that. GL Detox. Yeah, there's a. There's a payoff and a certain amount of work involved. But one of the things that I've written about recently on SEO Grok, which unfortunately I'll be changing the name up soon, but that's another thing I'll talk about in the next show is that following the AI, the guidelines for content these days that provide AI with its most friendly content, you know, broken into headings, starting with it too long, didn't read at the beginning, all of these, these check marks that you should be following, these boxes you should be checking off. Well, it's. It's going to be too formulaic and at some point it's just going to be gross for people to read. Unless you're doing it very, very well, which of course I hope you are. But try to maintain your voice, create a style that uses that, but not completely. That is still going to be great. Great for AI, but it's something you can be proud of next year. Ten years down the line, even that is just great quality, but still has that piece of you in it and isn't just AI. Just keep that in mind, okay? Because you'll be far happier and you won't have to spend that money next year or the year after doing the Geo Detox. It's very unlikely. Anyway, do keep it in mind. It's just a small thing, but it.

[Scott Vanak]

Would be a big mass deletion of N Dash.

[Ross Dunn]

Yes, yes. And to end things off, because I've had my fair share of rants, Scott has one.

[Scott Vanak]

It's like kind of a rant and a praise at the same time. I've mixed feelings about this. So this morning I posted a new blog to our Step 4th blog. And it's like we talked a few episodes ago about how to maintain rankings after redesign. So this blog post is like a high level overview of my really, really big article and then it links over to that and stuff. And so I did that this morning, put that live and within a couple hours it was ranking number one organically. Like within a couple hours. Like, I feel like I don't see that sort of thing happen that often, but For a very long tail phrase, how do I maintain search engine rankings after a website redesign? So it's not a phrase that I really care a lot about. It may never get any tr, but it was just like a quick test to see if it's in the index and see what's happening. And it was ranking number one organically. So at first, like, this is awesome, but there's an issue with the search result that, and this is a reason I'm even bringing this up, because it ticked me off. So when you do a search, at least in that instance when I did the search, the first four results were paid. And under the new sponsored thing where it's, you know, you can't tell they look like they're organic until you look closely. So that's annoying. First four results, then we've got AI overviews. Thankfully. Actually this article I wrote is featured in the overview. It's cited in the, in the thing. It's a second citation, which is awesome. But to see that you have to expand the overview. Then you have to click the pay per click and then it pops out on the box. Does anybody do that? Like I do, but not really. So I don't even know if that is any use. Then after AI overviews, there were nine links from sources across the web. A search feature at Google that shows sometimes. Then there were three videos in a video search feature. Then there was a discussion and forum search feature. And then my single organic ranking for me, which was great, but only one, only one organic ranking. And then there were two more paid listings and then one more organic listing. Okay, so now we've got two way down the page. This is a long page at this point. We're way down, buried. Then there's a people also ask feature and then six more organic listings at the very bottom. And it's just like this long forever page. And I thought, let's pretend this is a really high volume winning search term that everybody's fighting for. You're number one. You're still hardly getting any of it because you've got so much clutter above it. It's really, I wouldn't say zero click because there are other things that people will click on. But as a search result being number one, you know, if you're number one for everything and you're thinking, this is great, why am I not getting traffic? In some cases, this can be it. Because Google's putting so much crap above your number one. You just don't get the clicks even when you're the best. So I don't know. It makes me mad.

[Ross Dunn]

I know. I miss those. Those 10 blue link days with the.

[Scott Vanak]

Paid ads down the sidebar. Yeah, it was perfect.

[Ross Dunn]

That was the best. We're sold.

[Scott Vanak]

Speak for yourself. I'm 29 still.

[Ross Dunn]

Yeah, of course. Here. Yes.

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah, of course.

[Ross Dunn]

Well, we haven't published a video yet, so no one knows.

[Scott Vanak]

I have so much hair, too. For those of you out there trying to visualize what I look like, I have this big, beautiful head of hair. Not Bald at all.

[Ross Dunn]

100% agree. Yes. Okay. Well, on behalf of Myself, Ross Dunn, CEO of Step 4th Web Marketing, and my company, Senior SEO Scott Van Ak, thank you for joining us today. If you have any questions you'd like to share with us, please feel free to post them on our Facebook group, Easily found by searching SEO101podcast on Facebook. Have a great week and remember to tune into future episodes, which air every week on WMR fm.

[Scott Vanak]

Yeah. Thank you for listening, everybody.

[Ross Dunn]

Foreign.

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