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Are Google’s “AI Overviews” relevant for B2B?

Are Google's “AI Overviews” relevant for B2B?

If you’ve been following our research on generative search for B2B marketing, you may have noticed it’s been quite a while since we looked at Google’s offerings. More than a year in fact, when Google’s generative search tool was still called “Bard”. (We weren’t all that impressed, to be honest https://sharpahead.com/blog/bard-bungles-b2b-bing-better/.)

Things move so fast in generative AI that 2023 is kinda the Cretaceous Period. But we do have an excuse for our neglect of Google’s generative search – the mainstream functionality, now called “AI Overview”, hasn’t been available in the UK.

That’s changed as of this Google announcement in August 2024. So it’s time to bring our research up to date and see how Google’s generative search functionality stands up against Bing and ChatGPT for B2B research.

We’ve used our standard methodology to evaluate AI Overview. Will it be better than Bard for B2B? Read on!

(Spoiler: better than Bard but still bad for B2B. But – some interesting new SEO opportunities for B2B marketers.)

Accessing AI Overviews

There’s no special interface for AI Overviews. They just appear as part of Google’s search results for some searches. Here’s an example of an AI Overview showing in one of our tests:

You’ll see there’s a header with the four pointed “AI star”, followed by a chunk of formatted text that looks a bit like, say, a ChatGPT response. (There’s also a scattering of link icons, which we’ll come back to later.) The AI Overview itself can take a moment to appear, though it seemed to show up pretty much immediately in our tests.

It’s not obvious why some searches trigger AI Overviews and others don’t. In our research, around 2/3 of our B2B test searches showed AI Overviews – so it’s a common, but not universal, feature of the Google SERP. Google says here “You’ll find AI Overviews in your Google Search results when our systems determine that generative AI can be especially helpful – for example, when you want to quickly understand information from a range of sources.”

Google might change things over time so that more searches show AI Overviews. But at the moment we couldn’t find any way to encourage an AI Overview to appear if Google doesn’t want to show one. In particular, repeating a search doesn’t seem to generate an AI Overview if one wasn’t shown the first time. (It’s also worth noting that the availability of AI Overview differs by language and from country to country.)

AI Overviews can show in both desktop and mobile searches. But note that they DON’T currently show unless you are logged in to Google. So if you follow our normal advice for search engine research and do your test searches in an incognito/InPrivate window – to avoid biasing your results with personalised results – you won’t see AI Overviews. There’s no obvious reason for this as AI Overviews don’t seem to be personalised.

So quite a few little mysteries there for dedicated Google watchers. But enough prominence for AI Overviews in B2B searches to make them of interest to B2B marketers.

Interacting with AI Overviews

If you’re used to generative search with ChatGPT or Bing Chat, the options for interacting with an AI Overview will seem a bit…minimal.

In particular there’s no “chat” functionality here – you can’t carry on the conversation with a follow-up question. And there’s no equivalent of the wonderful time-saving ChatGPT features like “put those results in a summary table” or “add in the latest pricing information from the supplier websites”. What you get from AI Overviews is what Google decides to give you based on your initial search string, take it or leave it.

There’s one notable exception to this. Remember those little link icons that we mentioned earlier? Clicking or tapping on those does a sort of drill-down into the AI Overview. For example in this result from our tests:

…we’ve clicked on the link icon next to the bullet point about “shared budgets”, and as a result a relevant link from a WordStream article has appeared in the top right. That’s useful if you want to check on references or visit the relevant original source links. But it’s not exactly life-changing.

So…is it any good?

Hmm. It’s better than Bard, but that’s a low bar.

In our tests for a range of realistic B2B research queries, the results were mostly underwhelming. There were several cases where it seemed the AI Overview didn’t really understand the intent of the query. And some concerns about relevance and accuracy. A few examples from our testing:

  • We asked “How should I split my budget between Google Search and LinkedIn Ads”. AI Overview replied with a rag-bag of plausible but unhelpful information, such as “It’s often better to control your spend by adjusting your bid rather than your budget.” (see the screenshot above for the full results)
  • We asked “What are the pros and cons of edge data centres” and got the result shown below. It includes some valid but very superficial information that’s unlikely to be of much use in real-world B2B buying research. And it lists “Security” as both a “pro” and a “con” which suggests some muddled AI thinking.
  • We asked “What are the best alternatives to WP Engine” and got a useful, if minimal, shortlist of WordPress hosting suppliers, but also some off-the-wall suggestions like Kentico and Sitecore – suggesting that AI Overview really didn’t get the point of this question.

ChatGPT-4o absolutely nailed these same questions in our tests. So this isn’t a fundamental limitation of generative AI for B2B research. AI Overview just isn’t as good as its competitors.

We think most B2B researchers would struggle to find a use for AI Overview results in their current form. They are too superficial and not reliable enough. There is one possible exception though.

A bright spot at the bottom of the funnel

Some of our test questions are deliberately very “bottom of funnel” i.e. simulating a researcher who is checking out a shortlisted supplier. And AI Overview is a little bit more useful for these.

Here’s an example where we used the query “Is YPO a good value supplier of school equipment?”:

Now this isn’t a particularly incisive analysis – pretty much all of the sources are taken from YPO’s own website or from YPO-issued press releases. So if you’re looking for an independent view, this is disappointing.

But what is, perhaps, useful is the way that AI Overview has organised the different pages of the source material. In the screen capture we’ve clicked on the “Frozen prices” bullet point, and AI Overview has shown a particular page from the YPO website that is relevant to that aspect of the “good value” question.

We saw a few examples of this in our bottom-of-funnel tests. AI Overview is effectively performing like a subject-specific site map, picking out and grouping the most relevant pages of the supplier’s website.

It’s not a game-changer, but it might save some time in some bottom-of-funnel B2B research.

Implications for B2B search marketing

We flagged here how generative search is a commercial problem for Google. Google’s business relies so heavily on paid search, and paid search is so tightly bound up with the user experience of the traditional SERP. Google has optimised the SERP user experience over many years to give the maximum yield from paid ads while still delivering value for searchers. Anything that changes that user experience is a threat to Google’s supremely-optimised business model.

So it’s no surprise that AI Overview doesn’t change the layout of the SERP very much. In our tests we noticed the following:

  • AI Overviews are initially presented in a compact form (with a “show more” button). They don’t take up much space until that button is pressed, so they don’t perturb the SERP layout all that much.
  • If there were already search ads at the top of the page, they still appear above the AI Overview.
  • AI Overview itself doesn’t contain any ads – though it does contain a lot of organic links (which one could imagine might one day share space with ads).

So if you’re working on paid search for B2B marketing, probably nothing much changes for you at this point.

If you’re working on B2B SEO, AI Overviews are opening up some new opportunities for your content to show organically.

What should B2B marketers do now about AI Overviews?

Our tests suggest that AI Overviews in their current form won’t make much difference for most B2B marketers. Frankly, the results just aren’t good enough to be useful for B2B research. Real B2B buyers are going to use other tools. And AI Overviews don’t have a big impact on the existing paid and organic features of the SERP, so existing PPC and SEO strategies won’t need to change at the moment.

But, as ever, our tests are just a snapshot of a rapidly-evolving technical landscape. And there’s enough of interest in AI Overviews that it’s worth gaining a little bit of experience with them now so you can gauge their importance for your own brand and industry and get ahead of any surprises. So our advice is to try them out. There’s no cost and no signup requirement, since AI Overviews are a standard feature of the Google search engine now. Some suggestions:

  • Try out some realistic searches for your own industry – remembering that you need to be logged in to Google! – and see what AI Overviews appear.
  • Experiment with searches at different stages of the funnel.
  • In particular, it’s worth focussing on some bottom-of-funnel, brand-related searches – perhaps for your own brand and for those of your competitors – where AI Overviews can be a little more useful at present.

And as always, watch this space for ongoing developments in the world of B2B generative search!

If you are interested in how Generative Search might impact your B2B marketing strategies, or if you need help with any other aspect of your B2B digital marketing, please get in touch. A 30- minute discovery call is free, and we’ll do our best to be helpful even if you don’t want to work with us right now.

High-performing B2B lead gen landing pages: design and information architecture

High-performing B2B lead gen landing pages: design and information architecture

This is the second in a series of blogs looking in detail at landing pages for B2B.

Last time I explained why landing pages are so important for B2B lead gen activity.

This time we’ll look at how to create a good B2B lead gen landing page – the layout, copy and information architecture decisions that go into the landing page design process.

More “guidelines” than actual rules

Confession time. I’m a terrible graphic designer. My brain just isn’t wired right for that type of work. (Fortunately, I have a great team of excellent designers at Sharp Ahead to cover for me!) So I’m certainly not going to try to tell you exactly what your landing page should look like.

But even if I were the world’s greatest graphic designer, I still couldn’t tell you what YOUR landing page should look like. There’s no single formula for a B2B lead generation landing page. Design and content choices depend on your target audience, your branding, your competitive positioning and many other factors.

My strength is a good sense of user experience and an understanding of the B2B conversion journey. And from that I can share some general principles about B2B landing page design. In other words, I can give you some guidelines about what your landing page needs to DO.

We use these guidelines all the time when we’re designing and reviewing lead generation landing pages. Keep these in mind in your own landing page projects and your pages will have a better chance of success.

Guideline 1: stay oriented on the user journey 

Your lead gen landing page is not a standalone user experience. It’s a mid-stream stepping stone in an intended user journey. Keep this in mind when you are making design decisions. 

What will bring the person to the page? Most likely it will be one of your paid search ads, or some other form of paid media. You’ll have a precise idea of the likely search term and the copy (and images, if any) that the person will have seen in the ad.

If you want to keep the forward momentum in the visitor’s journey, the landing page must continue the “scent trail” that you established with the ad. For example:

  • Wording of ad and landing page copy should be consistent and in particular the landing page headline should closely match the ad’s headline. (We call this “message match”, and it’s good for both increasing conversions and for boosting your Google Ads quality score.)
  • Any graphics from the ad should be visually consistent with the landing page’s graphics.
  • Both the ad and the landing page should be clearly associated with your company name (or product brand name).

If you don’t do those things you’ll create doubt in the visitor’s mind. If the landing page seems to be about a different subject from the ad, the visitor might assume there’s been a mistake. If the landing page isn’t clearly associated with the correct company, the visitor might assume the page is a scam of some sort, or at least a third-party intermediary trying to inject themselves into the sales process. Nothing good will come from those sorts of doubt! “Doubt is the conversion-killer.”

What’s the call to action? You want the target visitor to DO something as a result of visiting the page. Most likely, that’s to get in contact with you so they can engage in a sales conversation. The overarching purpose of your page is to persuade and enable the visitor to achieve that action.

The content that you choose to put on your landing page needs to serve some purpose in advancing the visitor towards the desired action. If it doesn’t do that, it doesn’t belong on your landing page.

The threat of the back button! Never forget that your expensively-acquired visitor is a single click away from gone forever. Your page needs to compete with all of those other blue links or shiny social feed items on the visitor’s previous page. You need to be concise and to the point. Junk the fluff. Which bring us to…

Guideline 2: This End Towards Prospect – the crucial above-the-fold section

Like a rocket ship, the top part of a landing page is the most important! The section that displays above the page fold on a desktop browser is your “payload”. If you don’t engage the visitor here, they’ll hit the back button. If that happens, it doesn’t matter how much wonderful, persuasive content you had below the fold. That person will never see it.

So the above-the-fold section is where you must bring your best game.

Things I’m looking for above the fold in a good landing page design:

  • A clear, highly-visible headline that is message-matched to the ad that brought the visitor to the landing page.
  • Ultra concise, legible copy that confirms that your product or service is a relevant solution for the target visitor’s problem.
  • Some form of social proof, or something else that instantly establishes credibility.
  • A graphical layout that makes it clear there is more information further down the page, with a reason to keep scrolling.
  • A clear, simple-to-follow call-to-action.
  • A sufficient presence of your company name and branding that makes it clear this is a legitimate page and you’re happy to put your name to it.

That’s it. Everything else can go lower on the page.

In particular some things I DON’T want to see above the fold:

  • Monster foreground graphics that eat up so much space there’s no room for other content.
  • Noisy visuals and animation, that draw the eye away from the other features. Keep your graphics simple and low key, and don’t use animation or video unless that is absolutely the best way to communicate the essential features I’ve listed above.
  • Huge blocks of text that can’t be skimmed by a busy, easily-distracted visitor. Your text must be concise and easy to skim.
  • A form with an intimidating number of compulsory fields. Hide the form in a pop-up, or put it lower on the page.
  • Popups and other visual clutter (except for the essential cookie consent notice).

Be particularly wary of using photos and videos of real faces in this part of the page. Our brains are hard wired to look at faces so they draw the viewer’s attention like a magnet – which means other, more persuasive parts of the page will be ignored. Don’t show faces unless the face is somehow central to your story.

Some technical aspects to remember when designing the above-the-fold section:

  • The page fold falls in different places depending on the size of a user’s browsing window. If you do your design work on a huge screen, be mindful that your average user’s page fold will be a lot higher than yours – so things on the lower part of your screen won’t be visible to them.
  • When your page is live for a real user they will see your consent banner and potentially other pop-ups that are added by your martech stack. For example, they might see a live chat window. These might hide some of the key elements of your page. Test your landing page in the live environment before you finalise the design. You might need to move things around so that your cookie bar doesn’t conceal some crucial element!

Lastly, don’t be too clever in this part of the landing page. You need to grab the visitor’s attention quickly and you can’t assume they are motivated to put a lot of cognitive effort into understanding your page. This isn’t the place for tricky puns or subtle attempts at thought leadership. Keep it simple and direct.

Getting this above-the-fold section right is HARD. You have limited screen real estate and so many things that you want to say to your visitor! But you must make those prioritisation choices if you want to maximize the performance of your landing page. If you’re doing this part of the design process right, those trade-off choices should feel agonising and brutal.

The top section on mobile

The same principles about the above-the-fold “payload” apply on a mobile device. And that makes the layout trade-offs even more painful because, obvs, a mobile’s screen is a lot smaller than a computer’s. But you have a little more leeway about the “fold”. It’s more natural to scroll down on a phone than on a computer. (And it’s HARDER for a person on a phone to hit the “back button”.) So a person browsing your landing page on a phone screen might scroll through, say, two or three screenfuls before they reach a decision about your page.

So instead of “these things MUST be above the page fold”, on mobile we can change that to “these things should IDEALLY be above the page fold, but if not, they MUST be present in the first two or three screens”.

In any case, remember that your landing page is going to look very different to a visitor on a mobile device than to someone on a computer. But that mobile user is just as likely to become a good lead. (For most of our client campaigns we find around 50% of our leads come from mobile visitors.) So pay attention to the mobile experience.

User testing for a landing page

Once you’ve made all those agonizing decisions about what to put above the fold and what to push down the page, wouldn’t it be good to have some way to test whether you have them right?
A word to the wise: the above-the-fold section of a landing page design makes a great subject for a 5 second user test. Enough said.

Guideline 3: obsess about the call to action

All of your good work so far will come to nothing unless you have a good call to action and your landing page design works well in support of that CTA.

You should obsess about this aspect of your landing page and do everything you can to optimise it. A 10% improvement in the effectiveness of your CTA means 10% more leads. Simple as.

There is such a lot to say about the landing page call to action that I’m going to give it its own blog article. So stay tuned for that next time!

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