Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, we are offering some top tips on how to drive B2B traffic to your website through SEO. Organic Search is one of the best channels for B2B companies that are looking to catch relevant non-brand search demand.

But what is B2B SEO?

B2B SEO is a popular marketing tactic that businesses use to improve the visibility of B2B businesses. Many of these companies view organic search as a method to raise brand awareness, drive traffic, and get sales.

As SEO specialists, we at Intelligency agree that B2B SEO can be an incredibly helpful strategy for companies. However, as is also the case with B2C SEO, you need to approach it correctly.

Luckily, we have some tips for you!

But first! What’s the difference between B2B SEO and B2C SEO?

There are some distinct differences between B2B SEO and B2C SEO, which are:

• The keywords you use– B2C SEO tends to use short-tail keywords, which are shorter and less specialised. B2B SEO focuses on long-tail keywords which are more industry-specific and may contain ‘jargon’.
• The sales cycle- The sales cycle of B2B SEO is a longer process and harder to measure than B2C SEO.
• Searcher capture- B2B SEO focuses on a “buying committee” which is a collection of searchers, rather than individual searchers.

Now, with all this in mind, here are some tips to maximise your B2B SEO potential!

Tip #1: Create an Ideal Customer Profile (ICP)

Before you determine which keywords you want to rank for, you need to understand your target audience. One of the best ways to do this is to create an ICP.

An ICP allows you to determine a target audience, the first step is to identify the key traits of your best current B2B customers. Once these key traits have been listed, you can use them to generate a profile which summarises an ideal customer for your business.

Recognising your ideal customer allows for easier keyword research for keywords which align with your search values and intent. Depending on the size and complexity of your business, multiple ICP’s may be involved.

They key traits to look out for are common factors such as annual revenue, number of employees, the industry, any geographical factors, key personas, and a predicted sales cycle.

A key persona overviews the buying committee as well as the end-users of your company’s services or products. Personas should contain pain points as well which they may encounter, but are solved by the products or services you offer.

Pain points are good for keyword research as well as for content ideas to pull in searchers based on their business’ needs.

ICP’s are a technique that originated in account-based marketing, but you can use them to position your SEO tactics to get ahead of competitors. They help to capture search demand, and bring in the best prospects.

Tip #2: Varied content for the entire buying committee

Now you’re familiar with buying committees, it’s important to not fall into the typical content marketing trap. The trap is only targeting senior leaders at the organisations you want to convert. Senior leaders are actually some of the last people in the buying/sales process.

Instead, take a holistic approach and make appealing content for the whole buying committee, from entry-level employees all the way up to these senior leaders. All the members of committee have some level of impact and influence on the buying process; so making appealing content to all the members increase the likelihood of success.

This is because how a CEO searches B2B is different from home an entry-level employee will search. So do the research and find the keywords and content which will appeal to the various members!

Tip #3: Measure your revenue impact

It’s vital that you measure the revenue impact of organic search traffic. This is because it can help to show that SEO developments aren’t an expense, but an investment into the future.

Revenue impact can be measured using the following:

• Closed-won deals steeming from organic leads
• Contributions to the sales pipeline from organic search traffic

The second measurement is especially important to B2B organisations that have sales cycles that are longer than 6 months.

Consistent reviewing and utilisation of attribution modelling needs to be in place to accurately measure the impact on your revenue. Organic search is one of the many potential traffic sources, so a proper attribution model can ensure it gets it’s due credit.

Tip #4: Clear integration and expectations

Lastly, it’s important to ensure that SEO is touching almost every marketing and sales function in your B2B company.

SEO interacts indirectly or directly with:

• Websites
• Content
• Analytics
• CRM
• Marketing automation
• Paid search
• Business development
• Brand teams
• PR

It’s vital to ensure that SEO is integrated, and that stakeholders understand that it’s important to the success of B2B SEO. Without clear expectations and understanding, SEO may be misunderstood, underutilized, or even forgotten.

Having clear key performance indictatiors (KPI’s) and expectations across stakeholder groups will help SEO integration at your company. You could also hold educational SEO meetings with stakeholder groups so that more people; are on board with adding it to workflows and procedures.

In conclusion

For B2B SEO to be successful and reach its maximum potential, you need to capture revenue, SEO success shouldn’t just be measured by keyword rankings, the amount of inbound links, or page speeds.

Measured SEO by how it affects your company’s bottom line as well. Progress your SEO tactics and strategies to be long-term revenue generators! If you’re not doing this, then it’s not reaching maximum potential.

Hopefully this guide helps with your B2B SEO understanding!

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, X began trialling a paywall to combat bots, YouTube revealed a series of new updates for users, and Google improved the speed of its browser, Chrome.

Let’s get into each story.

X trial paywall in New Zealand and The Philippines

X recently unveiled a fresh initiative named Not A Bot, aimed at curbing the intrusion of bots and spammers on its platform.

Under this program, new users are prompted to opt for a minimal annual subscription of $1, granting them the privilege to post or engage with the existing content. Should they choose not to subscribe, their access will be limited to reading content only.

This approach is primarily designed to trim down the spam and bot activities plaguing the platform. While unveiling this program via a tweet, X emphasized that this fee introduction isn’t directed towards profit generation.

What is the “not a bot” initiative?

The pilot phase of the Not A Bot program is being conducted in two countries—the Philippines and New Zealand, with new users from these regions serving as the initial test subjects. Now, what exactly is Not A Bot? It’s a beta program signifying a trial phase of this new subscription model aimed at new users.

As outlined on a dedicated Help Center page, new entrants from the two designated test countries are required to authenticate their phone numbers. Once verified, the next step involves paying the nominal fee of one dollar to gain the ability to interact with other users on X.

At its core, the Not A Bot initiative is engineered to sift through and eliminate bots, subsequently reducing spam, all in a bid to preserve the platform’s integrity on a scalable level. As a beta program, Not A Bot serves as a public testing phase of this new feature.

While typically a successful beta test transitions into a full-fledged feature, the announcement didn’t specify whether this will be the case with Not A Bot.

The updated Terms and Conditions page elaborates:

“The Not-a-Bot Program is a beta initiative that X is exploring to enhance platform integrity.”

What is included with the paywall?

Delving into the offerings for Not A Bot subscribers, it’s seen that they’ll need to pay for several features that were previously available for free. These include bookmarking posts, liking posts, posting content, responding to posts, and reposting or quoting posts by other accounts.

On the flip side, users who decide against paying the annual fee will have their activities on X confined to following other members, reading tweets, and watching videos.

The Not A Bot Terms and Conditions stipulate that those opting for this program must agree to a clause stating a refund is not in the cards if the program gets shelved.

The new terms dictate:

“All features and functionality of the Program are at the sole discretion of X, and may be altered, paused, or ceased at any moment without a refund.”

Reiterating the official announcement on Twitter:

“Starting today, we’re launching the Not A Bot program in New Zealand and the Philippines as a test. New, unverified accounts are required to subscribe to a $1 annual fee to post & interact with other posts. This test, however, doesn’t affect existing users.

This initiative augments our existing efforts to minimize spam, platform manipulation, and bot activity, with the modest fee ensuring platform accessibility. This is not about profit generation.”

We’ll have to see how this works out for X, whether it will bring in new users, or drive current ones away to alternative platforms like Threads.

YoutTube’s new features

YouTube has revealed over thirty-six new features and design tweaks rolling out globally. Aimed at enriching user interaction, these updates are now accessible worldwide. They modernise the platform’s aesthetics and simplify content discovery.

Numerous features have been introduced to improve viewing.

Let’s learn about the highlights:

Volume Stability

A “stable volume” feature curbs sudden volume changes, offering a steady auditory experience. Initially, it’s available on mobile.

Quick Speed Doubling

By pressing and holding on the player, users can swiftly double the speed to 2x. Releasing reverts it to normal speed. This function is available across the web, tablets, and phones.

Enlarged Previews

Bigger video preview thumbnails appear while scrubbing, aiding in pinpointing desired moments. If unsure about seeking, a simple finger move back and lifting upon feeling a vibration reverts to the original position.

Screen Security

A lock screen feature has been added to avert inadvertent taps on mobile, ensuring uninterrupted viewing.

Advanced Search & Discovery

The newly introduced “You” tab, merging Library and account pages, makes finding content smoother. It’s a hub for your watched videos, playlists, and more.

Voice and melody search features have been added, enabling video discovery by humming, singing, or playing a tune, with an initial launch on Android.

Contemporary, Lively Design

Creators will notice gentle animations on the like and subscribe buttons, offering visual feedback upon viewer interaction.

Top comments will now cycle automatically, showcasing engaging responses. Real-time view and like counters enliven for the initial 24 hours on fresh uploads.

On Smart TVs, a click on the title reveals a menu with video details, making descriptions and comments easily reachable. Similar adjustments are set for web and mobile soon.

New Chrome features from Google

Google has revealed a series of forthcoming updates to Chrome’s address bar, aimed at enabling users to access websites more swiftly. These enhancements are slated for deployment in the coming months across both desktop and mobile platforms.

A Glimpse into the Upgrades

The address bar, a text field atop the Chrome browser, is where users key in web addresses such as “www.google.com.” Google plans to revamp this feature with several new additions including:

• Suggestions for uncharted sites
• Advanced autocomplete suggestions
• Auto-correction for typos
• Bookmark exploration
• A visually refined interface.

In a recent blog post, Google mentioned, “As autumn days grow shorter, you might be on the lookout for ways to make the most of your time. Fortunately, five upgrades are en route to Chrome’s address bar to expedite your browsing experience.”

Discovering New Sites

Chrome is bringing a novel feature to the table to assist users in discovering new websites.

Now, as users type in search queries, Chrome will propose popular and pertinent sites, even those never visited before by the user.

This development offers a silver lining for SEO experts, enabling heightened visibility in Chrome’s address bar suggestions through optimizing their sites for popularity and relevance concerning certain keywords. Even if a user hasn’t visited a site, it might pop up as a suggestion, fostering the exploration of new content based on prevailing popularity and relevance to the user’s search.

Enhanced Autocomplete

An upgraded version of autocomplete is being integrated into Chrome.

Unlike before, where Chrome only suggested previously typed website URLs, it will now autocomplete based on any word, even if the specific URL is unfamiliar to you.

For instance, keying in “flights” might autocomplete to Google Flights if you’ve searched for flights before.

This improved autocomplete accentuates the importance of embedding keywords within your URL structure, catering to users who may increasingly rely on this feature.

Automatic Typo Rectification

Chrome is set to auto-correct typos using your browsing history, eliminating the need to erase and retype erroneous web addresses.

This function will be accessible across desktop, Android, and iOS devices.

Effortless Bookmark Search

Users can now scour through their bookmark folders directly in the Chrome address bar by typing the folder name.

This feature is compatible with both desktop and mobile platforms.

Visual Revamping

The drop-down menu results in Chrome have been aesthetically overhauled to enhance readability and responsiveness upon typing.

According to Google’s announcement:

“With an elevated visual layout, the Chrome desktop address bar is now more legible. Additionally, it’s more responsive, delivering faster results as you commence typing.”

Right now, the autocomplete, typo correction and folder search features are available. The popular site suggestions and visual updates will roll out over the next few months.

Thanks for reading this week’s digital roundup!

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, learn about the new features Meta plans for Reels. Also, details about a new form of DDOS attacks that could affect thousands of websites, and about Google’s new “SEO made easy” videos.

Let’s get into the stories.

New features for Facebook and Instagram Reels

Meta announced this week that it would update Reel capabilities to improve ad creatives.

The three new features aim to improve campaign optimisation and also boost engagement. The three features are:

• Collection ads
• Multi-destination Reel ads
• Swipe left functionality

It’s good for marketers and businesses that Meta is constantly updating Reels because video creative is becoming more prominent on social media, especially for Facebook and Instagram. So Meta improving Reels allows higher-quality, more engaging Reel ads

What are the new features then?

Collection ads

This type of ad is already available on Instagram, but it is being tested for Facebook. A collection ad allows a business to post one large image or Reel with other, smaller images, with the aim being that users can swipe through them. Generally, the intent of each image is to let users learn more about what you’re advertising.

Collection ads are still being tested for Facebook, so only select accounts will have access to this placement. The plan is to roll this out to all business accounts in the future.

Multi-destination carousel Reel ads

Meta is also rolling out multi-destination CTA features for Reel carousel ads on Facebook and Instagram on both iOS and Android.

This feature allows a brand to send users to different destinations such as multiple product pages, helping users find what they’re looking for easier.

Swipe left functionality

Swipe left functionality allows a user to swipe left on a Reel ad and be taken to a product or landing page. It allows a user to learn more about what you’re advertising, potentially boosting sales.

Other new features

Meta has also rolled out some new tools for Advantage +, including:

• Automation tools
  • Automatic conversion to 9:16 resolution
  • 3D motion and depth
  • Aspect ratio variance
  • Sharpening tools and AI upscaling
• Adding music
• Brand suitability

If you want to read the full announcement, visit Meta’s business blog.

New DDoS attack taking advantage of HTTP/2 vulnerability

A newly identified Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) exploit, known as HTTP/2 Rapid Reset, has emerged as a major threat due to its ability to unleash large-scale attacks with relatively few resources.

The exploit leverages vulnerabilities within HTTP/2 and HTTP/3 network protocols, which facilitate multiple data streams between servers and browsers. This means browsers can request numerous resources from servers simultaneously, rather than sequentially.

The exploit was publicly disclosed by Cloudflare, Amazon Web Services (AWS), and Google, and poses a significant risk as it affects the vast majority of modern web servers operating on the HTTP/2 network protocol.

Currently, the absence of a software patch makes virtually every server susceptible to this exploit, categorizing it as a zero-day exploit. However, server software companies are actively developing patches to mitigate the HTTP/2 vulnerability.

How the HTTP/2 Rapid Reset Exploit works

HTTP/2 protocol has a server setting that caps the number of requests at any given moment. If requests exceed this limit, they are denied. There’s also a feature allowing a request cancellation, which deducts that data stream from the preset request limit, freeing up the server to process another data stream.

Attackers discovered that by sending millions of requests and cancellations to a server, they could overwhelm it.

The exploit is extraordinarily dangerous as servers currently lack defenses against it. Cloudflare reported blocking a DDoS attack 300% larger than any previous attack, with the largest one reaching 201 million requests per second (RPS). Google reported an even larger attack exceeding 398 million RPS.

Remarkably, this exploit requires a minimal number of infected computers – as few as 20,000 to launch attacks three times larger than the largest recorded DDoS attacks, significantly lowering the bar for hackers to conduct devastating DDoS attacks.

How to protect against HTTP/2 Rapid Reset

While patches are underway, Cloudflare has already safeguarded its customers against this exploit. In extreme cases, if a server is under attack and defenseless, server administrators can revert the HTTP network protocol to HTTP/1.1 to halt the attack, though at the cost of slowed server performance.

This measure, albeit a temporary fix, is better than facing a complete server shutdown.

This video from Phoenix Security explains the exploit quite well:

Google launch SEO tutorial videos on YouTube

Google has kicked off a new YouTube series, “SEO Made Easy”, with its first video aimed at helping people enhance their website’s performance in search results.

In the opening episode, Martin Splitt from Google’s Search Relations team dives into how websites can tailor their brand name display on Google’s search engine results pages (SERPs).

Splitt, in a brief introduction, mentions the series will serve both beginners and seasoned website owners.

“We have tips for beginners and experienced website owners. We will cover tips, such as using Google Search Console to find low-hanging fruit or using lazy loading for a better page experience.”

Structured data

The premiere episode underscores the significance of structured data for website optimization in the segment titled “Modifying Site Names”.

Splitt starts off by elaborating on a fundamental SEO aspect – employing structured data to personalize site names.

He points out that if Google Search finds it hard to auto-detect your website’s preferred name, structured data can be the key to shaping its display.

Practical tips for structured data integration

For those finding structured data integration challenging, Splitt shares a workaround – maintaining a consistent site name in the title across all pages.

He mentions that some content management systems provide an option to set a site-wide name, while others may necessitate manual addition of the site name to page titles. Yet, he warns that this tactic applies only to subdomains or top-level domains, not on a per-directory level.

Accelerating update recognition by google

After making these alterations, it’s essential to give Google some time to catch up with the updates. To hasten this process, use Search Console and request re-indexing of the homepage.

Future episodes and educational value

The “SEO Made Easy” series showcases Google’s ongoing effort to provide educational YouTube content for webmasters and digital marketers.

This episode lays the groundwork for an extensive journey into SEO strategies, aimed at brightening your website’s presence in Google Search, with more enlightening episodes on the horizon.

As always, thanks for reading this week’s Digital Roundup!

Good afternoon, and welcome to another edition of the Digital Roundup.

This week, Google started rolling out an update targeting spam. Also, Meta released its first generative AI tools, and TikTok is set to start trialling an ad-free subscription.

Let’s learn some more about each story.

New spam update from Google

This week, Google began rolling out its October spam update. The update improves Google’s coverage in languages to target different spam types.

Google stated that the October Spam Update “aims to clean up spam in Turkish, Vietnamese, Hindi, Chinese, and other languages”.

As well as this, Google is also reducing the visible spam in search results, such as cloaked, hacked, auto-generated, and scraped spam.

Previous updates and rollout times

Previous spam updates from Google have always taken a few weeks to roll out, and as long as your website isn’t hosting malicious content, rankings should be fine.

The last update that targeted spam was released this time in October last year, and there was also a link spam update in December 2022.

Meta’s new generative AI-powered tools

On Meta Ads Manager, users can now begin to find its first generative AI-powered tools designed to help campaigns perform effectively.

The three new tools are:

• Background generation
• Image expansion
• Text variation

The tools are rolling out now, aiming to finish by the start of next year.

Let’s learn some more about each tool

Background generation

This tool allows a user to create multiple backgrounds complimenting product images. The aim of this tool is for a user to be able to tailor assets to different audiences.

Image expansion

Users using this tool will be able to adjust creative to fit different aspect ratios across different channels, such as Reels or home feeds.

Text variation

Text variation is what it says on the tin. You can give it the original copy you were going to use on the ad, and it can make multiple variations for you. This stops you from having to come up with multiple variations on your own. You can use different copy for different audiences.

What has Meta said?

A Meta spokesperson has this to say about the new AI tools:

“Today’s generative-AI powered ad features are just a start. We plan to offer advertisers more ways to generate ad copy to highlight product selling points or generate background images in minutes with tailored themes, like outdoor images for an athleisure brand.”

“As we shared at Connect, businesses will soon be able to use AI for business messaging on Messenger and WhastApp to engage with customers – helping with commerce, engagement and support, unlocking instant conversational responses. We’re testing with a small number of businesses in Alpha and plan to scale it further next year.”

“With millions of businesses advertising on our platform, we will continue to take a collaborative approach in developing these features and experiences so that they provide value to businesses and people.”

–Meta announcement

TikTok to trial ad-free subscription

In our final story this week, TikTok may begin piloting an ad-free subscription on the app.

The code for the social media platform has suggested that users may be able to pay $4.99 a month in order to access content with no ad breaks.

There are also screenshots of TikTok asking users if they want to upgrade to an ad-free subscription:

Why this is important

This potential change is important for advertisers on the platform. If this proves to be popular, then it could have an impact on the reach of adverts on TikTok. This would lower the product’s value.

In terms of excluded ads, influencer marketing one-offs or campaigns would still appear on the premium version.

TikTok generates almost all of its profits from ad revenue, which came to a staggering $9.4 billion in 2022. Even more surprisingly, this figure is predicted to quadruple by 2026. It’s no surprise that executives are looking at diversifying revenue streams in order to mitigate financial risk, with a paid model being one of them.

As always, thanks for reading this weeks digital roundup.

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, TikTok began trialling a Google integration, Courts ruled that Facebook can be sued, and ChatGPT now offers new prompt methods.

Let’s get into the stories.

TikTok trial displaying Google Search result links

This week, an X user and app researcher, Radu Oncescu noticed that TikTok is testing displaying links to Google Search Results from its own search feature.

Here’s a screenshot of how it looks:

As you can see in the screenshot, TikTok has added a small link with a Google logo to its search results page. TikTok is also using a disclaimer for the links “TikTok does not endorse or take responsibility for search results from Google”.

What we know

Business Insider wrote more about the Google and TikTok partnership as they had an opportunity to speak to a TikTok spokesperson. They stated that the feature is not an ad unit, and is being trialled globally. The spokesperson also confirmed that TikTok is experimenting with other third-party integrations.

However, Google’s spokesperson declined to offer any comment on whether there’s a financial agreement between the two companies.

This partnership could be due to the fact that Google is concerned about losing its market share to TikTok, and this is a method to drive traffic back to Google.

Once we know more about this, you’ll be sure to read about it in the roundup.

Facebook open to suing over biased ad algorithm

A recent ruling by the California State Court of Appeals has determined that Facebook can be taken to court over allegations that its ad algorithm is discriminatory. This overrules a 2020 decision that had previously shielded Facebook from such legal actions based on Section 230.

Brands that use Facebook’s advertising tools might unknowingly participate in discriminatory ad practices if the platform’s algorithm is found to be biased.

Lawsuit background

In 2020, Facebook was taken to court after claims that it violated civil rights laws. The issue? The platform was said to have excluded women and older individuals from seeing insurance ads.

This issue came to light when Samantha Liapes, a 48-year-old user, tried to find an insurance provider on Facebook but found she wasn’t presented with any relevant ads. She believes her age and gender played a role in this.

Initially, the court dismissed the case. They deemed Facebook’s tools to be “neutral” and determined that the platform was protected by the Communications Decency Act, 47 U.S.C. 230. Yet, Liapes didn’t give up and appealed the decision.

So what’s changed?

On 21 September 2023, the appellate court reversed the earlier decision. They believed the case convincingly argued that Facebook was aware insurance advertisers were specifically tailoring their ads based on user age and gender, contravening the Civil Rights Act.

The court emphasised that Facebook isn’t just a content distributor but actively “creates, shapes, or develops content” using its tools.

ChatGPT adds voice and image prompts

OpenAI has introduced new voice and image functionalities for ChatGPT. Users can now interact with the chatbot through voice or share images for richer conversations. Initially, these features will be available for paying subscribers, with a wider release to free users anticipated soon.

While these enhancements pave the way for vast creative interactions, they also bring potential risks, like impersonation and fraud. OpenAI highlights the possible challenges these updates might pose, especially for advertisers.

How to speak with ChatGPT

To speak to ChatGPT, you’ll need to:

• Go to “Settings“.
• Under the mobile app, select “New Features“.
• Activate voice conversations.
• Click the headphone icon at the top-right of the home screen.
• Choose from one of five available voices.

How does it work?

• After pressing the button, ask your question.
• ChatGPT converts the spoken query into text and consults its language model.
• The response is transformed back into speech and delivered audibly.
• It promises an experience akin to interacting with Alexa.
• Users can select from five distinct ChatGPT voices, though OpenAI sees potential for even more variety in the future.

How to use images as a prompt

To use images, you’ll need to do the following:

• Press the photo button to take or select an image.
• For iOS or Android users, click the plus button initially.
• Discuss multiple images or employ the drawing tool for more precise queries.

How it works?

• It mirrors the functionality of Google Lens.
• Capture and upload a photo; ChatGPT will decipher your query and reply.
• The app’s drawing tool, as well as spoken or typed questions, can help refine queries associated with an image.
• Unsatisfactory answers from ChatGPT can be corrected in real time, echoing Google’s multimodal search approach.

What have OpenAI said about the new prompts?

A spokesperson from OpenAI stated the following:

“Voice and image give you more ways to use ChatGPT in your life. Snap a picture of a landmark while traveling and have a live conversation about what’s interesting about it. When you’re home, snap pictures of your fridge and pantry to figure out what’s for dinner (and ask follow up questions for a step by step recipe).”

“After dinner, help your child with a math problem by taking a photo, circling the problem set, and having it share hints with both of you.”

“We’re rolling out voice and images in ChatGPT to Plus and Enterprise users over the next two weeks. Voice is coming on iOS and Android (opt-in in your settings) and images will be available on all platforms.”

You can read OpenAI’s full announcement on its blog.

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, Elon Musk announced that X may become a paid service. Also, Google began rolling out the September 2023 helpful content update, and TikTok rolled out a new label for AI content.

X could become a paid service

In this week’s top story, Elon Musk announced that he plans to make X a paid platform for all users.

This is an attempt to tackle “rampant bot activity”. Musk revealed scarce details about the fee when chatting to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister.

Unfortunately, Musk didn’t share how much the service would cost, or what features would be included to sweeten the deal.

However, Musk did claim that X’s 550 million users post 100 to 200 million times a day. Which is an impressive statistic. However, it wasn’t clarified how many of these are bot posts compared to real posts.

The above stats mark a 140% increase on the “average monetizable daily active usage” of 229 million reported by Twitter in May 2022, which is before Musk took over.

A significant change

This would be a significant change for users because the platform has always been free. It’s a change that’s so significant, that it could drive them away from a once-beloved platform in their eyes.

On the other hand, it could be good for advertisers, because it may mean they can tap into a higher-quality audience and have fewer issues with bots.

So what’s X said?

Musk told the Prime Minister the following:

“The single most important reason that we’re moving to having a small monthly payment for use of the X system is that it’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots.” “Because a bot costs a fraction of a penny, or a tenth of a penny, but if somebody even has to pay a few dollars or something, some minor amount, the effective cost of bots is very high, and then you also have to get a new payment method every time you have a new bot.” “We’re actually going to come out with lower tier pricing. We want it to be just a small amount of money [and] in my view, this is actually the only defense against vast armies of bots.”

Once we know more about the subscription or one-time fee, we’ll be posting about it for the weekly roundup!

Google roll out September 2023 helpful content update

After releasing a core update not too long ago, Google has now pushed out an update to its helpful content system. It began rolling out last week and should be fully rolled out by the end of next week.

The last helpful content update was the December 2022 helpful content update.

So what’s changing with the update?

With the new update, Google has promised an improved classifier.

The specific details are as follows:

• New guidance for hosting third-party content, as well as what to do after a helpful content system update.
• More points about either removing content or changing the dates on current, published content.
• The words “helpful content written by people” have been changed to reflect the current AI generative content landscape. It now reads “helpful content created for people in search results”.

Google’s dev blog, Search Central, explains more about the update.

What to do if you’re affected by the update

If you’ve been negatively affected by the helpful content update, Google has a list of questions you can run through to analyse the quality of the content on the site. The company stresses that content needs to be helpful or informative, and not just primarily created for ranking well on SERPS.

The list of questions is:

• Do you have an existing or intended audience for your business or site that would find the content useful if they came directly to you?
• Does your content clearly demonstrate first-hand expertise and a depth of knowledge (for example, expertise that comes from having actually used a product or service, or visiting a place)?
• Does your site have a primary purpose or focus?
• After reading your content, will someone leave feeling they’ve learned enough about a topic to help achieve their goal?
• Will someone reading your content leave feeling like they’ve had a satisfying experience?
• Are you keeping in mind our guidance for core updates and for product reviews?

And when it comes to avoiding search-engine first content:

• Is the content primarily to attract people from search engines, rather than made for humans?
• Are you producing lots of content on different topics in hopes that some of it might perform well in search results?
• Are you using extensive automation to produce content on many topics?
• Are you mainly summarizing what others have to say without adding much value?
• Are you writing about things simply because they seem trending and not because you’d write about them otherwise for your existing audience?
• Does your content leave readers feeling like they need to search again to get better information from other sources?
• Are you writing to a particular word count because you’ve heard or read that Google has a preferred word count? (No, we don’t).
• Did you decide to enter some niche topic area without any real expertise, but instead mainly because you thought you’d get search traffic?
• Does your content promise to answer a question that actually has no answer, such as suggesting there’s a release date for a product, movie, or TV show when one isn’t confirmed?

Final comments

It’s important to note that even if you put content fixes or technical fixes in place, it can still take several months of time to recover. Google described the update as an “ongoing effort to reduce low-quality content and make it easier to find content that feels authentic and useful in search.”

TikTok now labelling AI content

Our final story for this week concerns TikTok. If you’re a user on the platform, you may have noticed there’s been an increase in the amount of AI edited content. Whether that’s generated photos using MidJourney, cool stuff you can do with prompts on ChatGPT, or deepfakes of a celebrity.

Well, creators on the platform have been advised to use this new label on any content that’s been fully or heavily edited with AI. The label is similar to the branded content label.

For creators, it’s important that they keep up with the latest community guidelines which TikTok put in place. If you don’t follow them, you can be penalised, especially if you’re making money from the platform.

Clearly labelling AI content helps fight disinformation and deceit from malicious sources, and helps to build audience and creator relationships.

Why the change?

The label is a consequence of the synthetic media policy which comes under the community guidelines. TikTok urge that the labels should be used whenever there’s content that includes likelike images, video, or audio.

The company plans to release a series of educational videos to show creators how to effectively use the label.

“We hope that with time, people will start using these labels just like they do verified account badges and branded content labels, making them another useful tool for creators and viewers to share and make sense of content.”

-A TikTok Spokesperson

As well as the label, TikTok will be renaming all TikTok effects to be TikTok AI effects. Also, it plans to test an automatic “AI-generated” label.

TikTok Newsroom has the full announcement.

Good Afternoon, and welcome to the latest edition of the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, Google’s latest Core Update finished rolling out. Also, we look into how influencer ad spending has grown, and how TikTok is still growing as an alternate search engine.

Let’s learn more about each story.

Google Core Update finishes rolling out

We wrote about Google starting to roll out a couple of weeks ago. This week, Google Search Central announced the rollout has finished.

Google stated on its Search Status Dashboard that the full rollout took 16 days and three hours.

Core updates

The purpose of a core update is to update Google’s search algorithms in order to provide users with helpful and reliable results.

The last update was in March 2023, however, Google updated its product review systems in February and April.

Google has confirmed that as well as the core update, it is beginning to index CSV files.

So what comes next?

Google always stresses that if you’ve been negatively affected by the core update, you need to take time and address the quality of the content of your website, rather than look for quick technical fixes.

Improving technical aspects right away may not lead to improved rankings, so it’s important to focus on the site as a whole rather than just certain aspects.

Influencer ad spend growing faster than traditional ad investment

This week, Insider Intelligency published results from some influencer marketing research, which may surprise you. It was discovered that businesses were investing more into influencer ads than traditional methods.

Brands have been advised to consider changing ad campaign strategies to match the rising popularity of influencers.

Influencer marketing

More and more businesses are embracing influencer marketing daily, and the way audiences consume ads is changing. This isn’t to say that traditional ads don’t work anymore, but it’s important to stay notified of trends and changes so that you can get the most out of ad investments.

Influencer income

The report also included a report on how influencers generate income on their respective platforms. The breakdown can be seen below:

Insider Intelligence had this to say about the report:

“The time to act is now. Influencer marketing spending will rise roughly 3.5 times faster in 2023 than social ad spending will. That’s a testament to the resilience of creators, even amid economic concerns and major competition.”

If you’ve not considered using influencers to market your products or services, now may be the time!

51% of Gen Z women prefer TikTok to Google

According to a survey conducted by Her Campus Media in August, TikTok is the platform of choice for more than half of Gen Z women for searching. Also, it helps influence purchase decisions more than any other platform.

While Google still dominates most of the world (83.5%), the company does acknowledge TikTok as a threat. Recently, TikTok has even launched search ads. Although it’s important to remember that TikTok isn’t a web search engine, you need to be visible whenever users search for relevant topics.

So what does the study show?

Her Campus Media’s survey shows that overall, 74% of Gen Z use TikTok Search. Also, 51% of the survey takers chose TikTok over Google as a search engine. The three biggest reasons for this are as follows:

• The video format of the results (69%) 
• More relatable answers (65%) 
• Personalised answers (47%) 

There’s also currently a trend which reflects some of the findings of this survey. #tiktokmademebuyit reported that videos with this hashtag received 12.4 billion views overall. Nearly 3 out of 4 users from Gen Z have bought something after seeing it on TikTok.

TikTok has influenced purchases for 62% of Gen Z, which is more than any other platform. This figure has increased by 15% compared to a 2022 survey.

Also:

• 70.34% look to influencers.
• 62.31% look to brands.
• 61.17% “somone I trust.”

Also, compared to Instagram 76% of users prefer to watch TikToks over Reels.

The survey used a sample size of 1,821 Gen Z’ers. 97% of the takers identified as female.

If your business isn’t on TikTok and you want to target audiences from Gen Z, now’s the time to start looking into a TikTok strategy.

Good afternoon, and welcome to the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, WordPress announced 100-year domain name registrations, Meta could scrap ads for paid subscribers in Europe, and Google is raising page speeds in an experimental trial.

Let’s learn some more about each.

100-year domain name registration with WordPress

WordPress has announced that businesses can pay a one-time registration fee for their domain name to last 100 years. With the fee, there would also be managed hosting and also 24/7 customer service.

The price is surprising, however, coming to a total of $38,000. It’s important to note that you can only usually register a domain name for 10 years.

WordPress is dubbing this fee the “100-year plan”.

So what comes with WordPress’ 100-year plan?

WordPress’ official announcement stated that the plan comes with the following:

• The domain being secured for 100 years
• Multiple backup locations across the world
• “Top tier” hosting
• Unlimited traffic
• Dedicated 24/7 support

The plan has been designed for individuals, families, and companies who want to cement their legacy.

“Families who wish to preserve their digital assets—the stories, photos, sounds, and videos that make up their rich family history—for generations to come.

Founders who want to protect and document their company’s past, present, and future.

Individuals seeking a stable, flexible, and customized online home that can adapt to whatever changes the future of technology will bring.”

The CEO of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, had this to say:

“Whether it’s giving a newborn the special gift of a domain and lifetime home on the web, or something you put in your will to make sure your website and story are accessible to future generations, I hope this plan gets people and other companies thinking about building for the long term.”

If you want to sign up for the 100-year plan, WordPress has a link on the announcement.

Meta Might Offer Ad-Free Paid Versions of Facebook & Instagram in Europe

Meta is thinking about offering ad-free, paid versions of Facebook and Instagram in Europe according to the New York Times. They haven’t stated how much this might cost or when it will be available. But don’t worry, they’ll still have the free versions that come with ads, says the New York Times.

How could this affect businesses?

If many users switch to this paid version, brands might not reach as many people with their ads. For now, this ad-free idea is for Europe, but it might go to the US later. This act does apply to the UK, but it’s unclear if the ad-free option would be offered to UK users.

Marketers, keep an eye on this! You might have to think about where you want to spend your ad money. Other avenues such as LinkedIn may have to be explored instead.

Why the change?

The European Union has a new rule called the Digital Services Act. It starts on 1 January 2024. This rule asks big online companies, like Google and Meta, to make the online space safer and fairer for businesses. This might be why Meta is thinking about the paid, ad-free versions.

What has Meta said?

Meta hasn’t officially said anything about this new idea. But in 2018, the head of Meta, Mark Zuckerberg, did hint at something like this. He said to the US Senate, “There will always be a version of Facebook that is free.” Sheryl Sandberg, who was a top leader at Meta, also mentioned, “If you want no ads, that might be something you’d have to pay for.”

We’ll definitely be keeping an eye on this, so stick with the roundup to keep yourself updated too.

Google Introduces a Solution to Speed Up Webpages

Google has unveiled a new method to run JavaScript, making web pages load faster. This is great news for website publishers, as it helps improve a new webpage performance measure.

About current page speeds

Web pages need to respond quickly to users. A new measure, called Interaction to Next Paint (INP), will replace the older First Input Delay (FID). To score well on INP, which starts in March 2024, web pages should be super responsive.

The issue? Some JavaScripts, known as “Long Tasks”, take too long to run, causing web pages to be sluggish. It’s like having a slow car on the fast lane – everything gets delayed.

Currently, when users click a button, they often have to wait because these long scripts block other tasks. Google aims to fix this

There are existing coding solutions to make user interactions faster, but they’re not perfect. They solve different issues and sometimes even worsen the problem. Google points out that current workarounds can delay the main task even further.

Google’s proposed solution

Google suggests a fix named scheduler.yield. Here’s how it works:

1. It pauses the long task.
2. Lets the user task run.
3. Once that’s done, the main task continues from where it paused.

This feature has been available for testing in Chrome 115 since July 13th.

Google is inviting users to test this feature in a real-world setting. This “origin trial” aims to collect feedback and understand its effectiveness. There are certain precautions, though. Websites using this should have a backup plan for browsers not using Chrome 115.

This feature is still being tested. But, with INP becoming a crucial measure in 2024, adopting this early might give publishers an edge over competitors. Just ensure you’re prepared for browsers not yet supporting this new feature.

As always, thanks for reading the Intelligency Digital Roundup!

Good Afternoon, welcome to the final August edition of the weekly digital roundup.

This week, after taking them off the platform, X has brought back political ads. Additionally, learn which brands are blocking GPTBot, and about Meta’s new competitor analysis tool.

Let’s get into it.

X and political ads

This week, X has taken back its stance on political ads in the US. In 2019, political ads were famously removed in 2019 when former CEO Jack Dorsey was in charge.

At the time, Dorsey explained:

“This isn’t about free expression. This is about paying for reach. And paying to increase the reach of political speech has significant ramifications that today’s democratic infrastructure may not be prepared to handle. It’s worth stepping back in order to address.”

However, Elon Musk has reversed the decision in the name of “free speech”.

Why this change is significant

Musk’s reversal of the political ad removal is a significant change for advertisers. If you’re working for a cause-driven company, then this might be good news for you. However, if the brand you’re under has nothing to do with politics, then you may step away from a platform that advertises politics that clash with the brand.

In January, Musk relaxed X’s policy on political ads:

Interestingly, this decision to go ahead with political advertising is just a year ahead of the next US presidential election.

What X has said

A spokesperson for X had this to say:

“Building on our commitment to free expression, we are going to allow political advertising.”

“Starting in the US, we’ll continue to apply specific policies to paid-for promoted political posts. This will include prohibiting the promotion of false or misleading content, including false or misleading information intended to undermine public confidence in an election, while seeking to preserve free and open political discourse.”

“We’ll also provide a global advertising transparency center so that everyone can review political posts being promoted on X, in addition to robust screening processes to ensure only eligible groups and campaigns are able to advertise.”

Dozens of brands block GPTBot

A new analysis conducted this week showed that 69 out of 1000 of the most popular websites in the world have blocked GPTBot.

The percentage of websites blocking it is increasing by around 5% per week according to the study, which was carried out by Originality.ai.

Many SEOs have questioned whether or not to block GPT Bot, because they don’t like the idea of training an AI bot without receiving citations, sources, or compensation.

Which websites have blocked GPT Bot?

The 15 top websites blocking GPTBot are:

• amazon.com
• quora.com
• nytimes.com
• shutterstock.com
• wikihow.com
• cnn.com
• foursquare.com
• healthline.com
• scribd.com
• businessinsider.com
• reuters.com
• medicalnewstoday.com
• goodhousekeeping.co
• amazon.co.uk
• tumblr.com

Another interesting observation is that these sites have all blocked GPTBot, but most haven’t blocked CCbot, which is another tool used to train OpenAI.

However, the NY Times and Reuters have blocked both, as neither wants to train AI systems using their content.

The full analysis is available to read on Originality’s website.

Meta’s new branded content campaign tracker

Our final story this week concerns Meta. It launched a new feature this week called “search branded content” which can be found in the ads library. Users are able to filter the database by platform, date range, and username.

Once all of this is filtered, it will allow marketers to perform competitor analysis by seeing details on their approach, relationships with creators, and also campaign frequency.

How does it work?

Lindsey Gamble, a social media expert, posted an X thread with a video of what the tool looks like:

The video shows how to navigate the tool, and how you can use it to gain insights into influencer and competitor behaviour. The influencer filter presents an overview of their ongoing campaigns and brand collaborations. Also, users can also opt to filter results by brand, revealing the influencers associated with their current campaigns.

This tool is being launched at a time when the EU wants more transparency from Branded Content on Meta platforms. The Digital Services Act has launched today, which puts the onus on digital platforms to create safer spaces.

What Meta has said about the tool

A Meta spokesperson had this to say regarding the launch:

“Ads are just one way for businesses to promote a product or service on Facebook and Instagram. They can also work together with a content creator to promote something in a post, story, video or reel. Meta provides transparency about this type of content by showing a paid partnership label on it and by including it in the Ad Library.”

“Use the branded content search to find posts, stories, videos and reels on Facebook and Insatgramt that involved a Paid Partnership. You can filter by app and date.”

“[This tool] is for anyone who wants to see content from a creator who has worked together with a business.”

This tool is available for every business account to use and can be found in the Ad Library.

As always, thanks for reading this week’s digital roundup.

Good Afternoon, thanks for stopping by for the Intelligency Digital Roundup.

This week, Google began rolling out a new core update, Threads launched on desktop, and TikTok now has search ads.

Let’s get into the news.

Google launch August 2023 core update

The biggest story this week comes from Google. This week, Google announced a new core update via X:

If you’re unfamiliar with core updates, they’re designed to make sure that searchers get the best results while searching.

Core updates don’t target specific pages for websites, but they can result in low-quality sites being punished and high-quality sites being rewarded with new rankings.

Core update impact

When Google launch a core update, it can affect SEO performance positively, negatively, or not at all. While they’re being rolled out, you may see a temporary rise or drop in rankings, returning to how they were after the update is complete.

Also, a drop in rankings after a core update isn’t indicative of a content or technical issue, it can be just an adjustment from the update.

Google always stresses that if you see a drop in rankings, focus on improving your website’s quality, instead of looking for technical fixes.

Recovering from a core update

Following the advice given in the last section, if you see a drop in rankings, you should:

• Assess pages with low-performance
• Check what’s leading people to the low-performing pages
• Compare the content to the questions on Google’s help page

Using the above steps will aid in showing where your content isn’t delivering. Then you can use what you’ve learned in order to improve your content for the future.

However, improvements don’t always translate to higher rankings, as there is no guarantee from Google.

Due to SEO being a lengthy process to get results, if you do improve your site’s content, it can take several months for rankings to recover or improve.

The main takeaway from this is to be patient and commit to long-term quality improvements, rather than quick fixes. As I always say, “Rome wasn’t optimised in a day”.

Threads launches on desktop

Threads, Meta’s X competitor, has launched on desktop browsers this week.

This is a significant move for Threads, as it being available on desktop makes it even more of an X competitor. It’s also important because previously, Instagram has always had more of a mobile focus.

While Threads was initially just a microblogging site allowing intimate communication between friends, a web version is a strategic expansion. It could be a response to growing/evolving market demands.

How to access Threads on a desktop

Accessing Threads on a web browser is pretty straightforward. You’ll need to search for Threads.net/login, click through the cookie notice, and then use your Instagram login details to log in.

Once you’re logged in, the main feed looks similar to how it is on Mobile. Like the app, you can:

• reply
• repost
• post threads and add videos/photos
• search for profiles
• See all your notifications

This rollout represents a trend towards platform convergence, here previously mobile-exclusive apps are recognising there is traction to be had by moving to desktops too.

It also has the added benefit for marketers to reach target audiences on Threads from any device.

TikTok search ads

TikTok has brought ads to search results this week. A new toggle in TikTok Ads Manager called “Search Ads Toggle” allows ads to be served alongside organic video results in search results.

TikTok has said this new feature isn’t a standalone ad product, but an extension of TikTok video ad buy.

In the UK, there are around 23.8 million monthly active users on TikTok, so there are a lot of chances for a brand to be found. Google even acknowledged TikTok as a threat to its search business.

How TikTok search ads work

The search ads will have a sponsored label, and they can appear in different positions on search results pages. The factors are:

• Ad relevancy
• User intent from the search query
• Broader learnings from other users

TikTok explained the following:

“The typical search journey starts with a user clicking the search button at the top of the For You feed. From there, they type in a search query, which then yields a series of search results. The ads appear among these search results. Once a user clicks on a search ad, the ad mirrors the in-feed TikTok experience, with users able to continue scrolling through the search results in the order they appear on the page.”

In-feed ads have the Search Ads toggle on by default. If you want to opt out, just use the toggle. You can also add negative keywords, which prevent the ads from running near posts that don’t align with brand guidelines.

TikTok’s internal data states “70% of ad groups with the Search Ads Toggle ‘on’ see more efficient performance when compared to not, as a result of more efficient conversions coming from search ads,”

The full announcement can be read on TikTok’s business blog.

As always, thanks for reading this week’s digital roundup.