Evergreen strategy and Reddit/AI

Learn how evergreen experts are thinking about the rise of artificial intelligence and forum UGC content

Aug 26, 2024

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Hello, and welcome back. Jessie here, inconsolable at the close of the softball season, but hyped on Toronto’s ravine system. Saturday, I walked with Hidden Rivers on the path of what would have been a massive and hugely intrusive downtown highway — had activism and common sense not prevailed. Walking tours of your own city: Extremely cool!

This week: Evergreen in the context of Reddit’s surge and Google’s AI Overviews feature. We’re looking at how evergreen experts are thinking about the rise of artificial intelligence and the expansion of forum content on the SERPs.

Join our community of more than 2,000 news SEOs on Slack to chat any time.

Let’s get it.

Evergreen and the rise of AIO

Google launched AI Overviews, its AI-powered summaries, in the United States in May 2024. The goal, Google said, was to “help people quickly find information and explore all the web has to offer.” Since its launch, Google has dialed back the visibility of the feature. According to recent reports, AIO visibility has declined significantly, showing on less than 10 per cent of all queries.

As we covered previously, it’s entirely possible Google’s AI Overviews are a flash in the pan (or, as Barry Adams puts it, a “storm in a teacup”).

Google does not provide click or impression data Google Search Console for AI (this is also true for another feature, Top Stories, where publisher content often shows up.). A handful of tools — for example, ZipTie.dev and Sistrix— provide some (but definitely not all) data.

Note: AI Overviews are affected by Google core updates, John Mueller says. “These are a part of search, and core updates affect search,” he said in a LinkedIn comment.

Given the decline of visibility, as well as difficulty to accurately track performance, many newsrooms are continuing to simply monitor AI Overviews impact, rather than use it as a reason to make significant changes to their audience strategy.

In The Telegraph newsroom, the emergence of AI has prompted useful conversations about how to demonstrate to readers that the outlet is trustworthy. Mary Sheard, head of evergreen SEO, and Lucy Aplin, head of news SEO, say they have used AI as a chance to have more conversations around ways the brand can communicate to Telegraph readers they’re trustworthy.

It’s a chance to ensure they’re not overly reliant on just being a well-known brand.

The bottom line: AIO is less visible than ever, but AI itself isn’t going anywhere. Monitor AI Overviews if they show up in your region — what topics or categories serve summaries most over — and track the data as much as you can.

Evergreen and the rise of Reddit

The massive surge in visibility of Reddit on Google Search results prompted many newsrooms to carefully evaluate their audience strategies.

During the Helpful Content Update, Google made a number of changes to the algorithm for organic results, including boosting visibility for some forums and adding a forum tab on results, while also drastically throttling traffic to many sites.

Remember: The Helpful Content Update was an algorithm update that launched in September 2023. It’s a site-wide update aimed at diminishing content that was created primarily to rank well in search engines, rather than to help or inform people.
The result of the update, however, was widespread traffic declines for a significant number of websites — many of which have not yet recovered. (It’s debatable whether some sites hit by the updates even deserved these visibility declines, based on what Google had previously communicated publicly.)
We’re currently midway through another algorithm update. There's a small chance some of these publications will see the arrows start to point back up. Some have seen marginal improvements, according to Lily Ray and Barry Schwartz, including House Fresh.
The Helpful Content Update was added to the core system earlier this year.

Following the HCU, Reddit experienced a massive boost to its visibility in SERPs. Research by Amsive reported a 1,328 per cent increase in visibility for reddit.com between July 2023 and April 2024. As well, in early 2024, Google and Reddit struck a $60-million deal that allows Google to use Reddit’s content for training the company’s artificial intelligence models.

This is despite the messaging from Google that indicated that creating valuable, people-first content would help them, versus being outranked by a subreddit thread.

“Our biggest losses over the past year have been to user-generated recommendations, despite Google’s consistent messaging that they value expertise,” Lauren L'Amie, the vice-president of SEO at The Infatuation says.

That gap between what Google says to do — write high quality, expert-driven content — and what it rewards on the SERP — that user-generated content — has vexed many. Many publishers are now trying to determine how they can leverage that forum content.

“I think it’s important to recognize the value Google is obviously placing on experience-based, user-generated content and think about how we can incorporate those concepts in our own way,” says Kyle Sutton, director of SEO at The Points Guy.

“On the other hand, I think Reddit is getting something of a free pass right now in terms of SERP visibility,” he adds.

That unearned visibility might be tamped down in the current or future algorithm updates.

For now, using Reddit to help inform coverage is a point of experimentation for several publishers. Lauren at The Infatuation mines Reddit for questions people are asking and hands that data off to editors to inform their content updates.

“That has been really helpful in giving editors more ways to update content,” she says.

Using Reddit for “content inspiration” is a tactic also employed by Louisa Frahm, SEO director at ESPN.

“Similar to other social media platforms like TikTok, it’s helpful to scan Reddit for breakout trends and questions that can transfer into search-friendly explainers,” she explains.

Instead of trying to beat Reddit, Ella Jinadu, the SEO manager for TimeOut, focuses on the overall SERP for the targeted query. She analyzes the URL in the lower positions and works on improving her content to outperform it.

Using competition on the SERP from Reddit as motivation to improve content is something news SEO strategist Chelsey Heath agrees with: Maintaining visibility in results is about “providing trustworthy content that provides context” that readers can’t get elsewhere.

Meanwhile, Alli Berry, an SEO consultant, suggests that brands should consider being more active on Reddit forums. Notable publishers like Puck, New York Times Opinion and Rolling Stone have leaned into Reddit in recent weeks. If you have a community editor, this is work that’s likely underway.

Participating in Reddit forums is a “way to have a little control over the narrative,” Alli says.

It’s the job of audience editors to ensure their journalism is in all the places readers might engage with it, and Reddit is nearing the top of that list.

Advertising in relevant forums, Alli says, can be worthwhile, given just how much more visibility Reddit gets and how engaged the communities can be.

It’s something Lauren’s teams at The Infatuation have considered, too, as a way of regaining some of those audience eyeballs.

However, John Shehata, founder of NewzDash and former global vice-president of audience development strategy at Condé Nast, says audience editors should be primarily focused on things firmly within their control (i.e., on-site promotion, apps or newsletters).

While Reddit is massively visible now, that could change with any algorithm update. SEOs should stay focused on things they can actually influence (which mainly is on-site content).

That’s something Mary echoes, saying The Telegraph is taking the position of “not chasing it too much, as they're not a direct competitor.”

Focusing on what you have control over — creating high quality content readers will find useful — is something Louisa also preaches.

“Regardless of Google’s volatility, there will always be value in utility content. If our audience has a pressing question, we will do our best to write a corresponding article,” says Louisa.

The Telegraph goes further, explaining that readers who click on Reddit are different from one who click over to a reputable publisher.

“We think users come to our site for completely different reasons,” says Mary. “They're expecting an expert hotel review, not what a bunch of random people who went in 2012 think.”

The bottom line: Even as Reddit’s surge in visibility frustrates audience editors, the site offers publishers access to groups of readers who are very interested in a topic. It can also help uncover questions readers are asking. Smart SEO editors should consider what Reddit offers and the ways it can improve the reach of our journalism.

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