A post on Google’s blog has me thinking this week about some things I wanted to share with you all. First of all, I know a lot of you are here on Substack because you wanted to get away from SEO and the game of getting found online. I get it. It’s one of the things that drew me to this platform as well.
But, also, Substack IS online. It’s not a separate thing. It’s one part of the web and even though many of us came here to be able to do the work we love without having to worry about how that work is going to be found, we are still spending a lot of time trying to get our work in front of new subscribers, aren’t we?
Friends, I would love nothing more than to happily follow my inspiration to do the work I genuinely love and never give another thought to marketing and promotion. Before I started writing and publishing recipes online, I was a freelance marketing consultant. When I started my first recipe site, I thought I was starting something new. I thought I was moving away from marketing.
I had fanciful ideas about spending my days in full creative mode, baking and writing, and writing and baking. It didn’t take me long to realize that marketing and promotion are the very foundation of the career I wanted to build. Without them, there was no audience for all that baking and writing.
And without an audience, I had a hobby not a career.
I have been fortunate enough to have built a solid, substantial income from all that baking and writing. But I was only able to do so because I was willing to put a hell of a lot of work into the foundation.
Over the past couple of years, I’ve watched the foundation I worked so hard to build begin to shift. There are cracks. Huge ones. The ground no longer feels solid. Everything feels incredibly uncertain and much of the playbook I built a business on is no longer relevant. I understand the need to be flexible and pivot when pivoting is called for. But the changes are coming so fast and the future is so fuzzy that it’s difficult to know what I’m pivoting towards.
This is the context in which I read this post from Google about AI Overviews and AI Search. I make the bulk of my living from advertising on my recipe websites and AI Overviews are killing me. But something jumped out at me as I read this.
The future of search may be dependent on us asking the questions for which we want to be the answer.
Let me say that a different way: We need to write the questions for which our work is the answer.
I mean that literally. And, yes, this applies to Substack as well. Substack is online. It’s a part of search. It’s in the ecosystem. It may even be central to the future of the entire ecosystem.
The future of Google Search and the future of Substack are inextricably linked whether we like it or not.
Search is no longer only about humans searching the web. Search is now also about humans asking AI to search the web for us. Put another way, search is changing from a process in which humans look through lists of websites to one in which AI does that work for us.
How does AI know that the websites will answer the questions we are asking?
AI gets all of its opinions from us. I think we really need to let that sink in. When we ask it to find answers for us, it is sorting through a gigantic pile of options and then picking what it thinks we want. But, where does it get the criteria for how it makes the decisions about what we want? From us. It gets everything from us.
I think this is so important for us as writers and creators to understand because as AI continues to take over search, and I don’t just mean on Google, I am also talking about Substack, we have some influence and control over training it on not just the answers but the questions. The way we describe our work, the questions we define and answer, and the connections we make between ideas matters more than ever.
The thing that is front of mind for me right now is this: What are the questions for which I want my work to be the answer? And am I stating those questions explicitly?
The future of search may depend on how well we train the robots to recognize that we (ourselves and our websites) are the answer to questions we have already defined.
This is what I want to talk about in the November Mastermind Meeting. If that sounds like a discussion you’d like to be a part of, register here.
And, if you need no further convincing that a deeper understanding of search is essential to building a creative career, this class will help you design the blueprint and give you the nuts and bolts you need to get started.
About Rebecca Blackwell
Food Writer, Recipe Developer, & Founder of Mastermind for Food Writers and The Food Writers Business Lab
Rebecca Blackwell has spent nearly 30 years cooking and baking professionally and has published thousands of recipes. She is the creator of the recipe websites Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot, and the author of the Let’s Get Lost newsletter.
In addition to her work as a writer and creator, Rebecca is the founder of Mastermind for Food Writers, and an Advisor in Residence for Write Up. Through the Food Writers Business Lab, she brings together experienced industry professionals to share practical, actionable education designed specifically for food writers.
Rebecca currently travels full-time by RV and sailboat with her husband, creating recipes, telling stories, and helping other writers navigate the evolving world of food media.
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Questions?
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You're spot on with a different approach to content strat, Rebecca. Several months ago, my agency shifted from SEO to GEO optimization; it's no longer about improving web visibility and ranking on traditional search, but ensuring content is recognized, cited and shared by AI apps. Brave new world out there!