ChatGPT for SEO - Digital Marketing Catalyst

The rise of ChatGPT doesn’t mean the end of SEO. In fact, when used effectively, it can enhance your SEO efforts.

The key is using it correctly.

ChatGPT can assist with brainstorming for keyword research, rephrasing content, generating Schema markup, and more. However, it shouldn’t be relied on entirely. Its data access is limited—especially in the basic version—and it sometimes generates inaccurate or “hallucinated” answers. So, caution is essential.

This guide will cover recommended ways to use ChatGPT for SEO, while also addressing its limitations.

What Is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is a natural language processing chatbot from OpenAI, running on two of the latest and most powerful large language models, GPT-3.5 and GPT-4. This enables it to hold lifelike conversations and assist with SEO tasks.

Using ChatGPT is straightforward:

Sign up into Chatgpt
Type a prompt in the message bar at the bottom
Wait for the bot to respond
Here’s how that’ll look:

Ways to Use ChatGPT

ChatGPT can assist with:

Brainstorming keyword ideas
Crafting content
Writing title tags and meta descriptions at scale
Generating Schema markup
Writing regex
Creating hreflang tags
And much more

It’s also a valuable tool for overcoming creative blocks or rephrasing your content in different styles. Plus, it can support link-building efforts.

These are just some of ChatGPT’s many SEO applications. Below, you’ll find additional ways to leverage this AI tool, along with detailed instructions on how to do so.

How to Use ChatGPT for SEO

Here’s how you can use ChatGPT to help with your SEO efforts, with some example prompts and tips for getting the most out of the tool:

Keyword Research

As you’re probably aware, keyword research is vital to creating content that ranks. Not only does it inform you of what topics and keywords to cover, it also helps you structure your content better.

Keyword research can also help you better meet the user’s search intent.

To be clear, ChatGPT isn’t the best tool for keyword research.

The base version doesn’t have access to any keyword search volume data at all.

But its results can still be useful from a brainstorming perspective.

You can ask ChatGPT directly for keyword ideas—from long-tail queries to Latent Semantic Indexing (LSI) keywords. For example:

As you can see, you can quickly generate a list of keywords with just a few clicks.

While this approach is faster than more comprehensive keyword research methods, it doesn’t provide as detailed results as tools like Semrush’s keyword research features.

As mentioned, the base version of ChatGPT doesn’t offer accurate keyword search volumes. Some suggested keywords may not be fully relevant, and others may have minimal or no search volume.

For example, if we enter one of these keywords from above into Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool, here’s what we find:

Not looking too promising.

That said, it doesn’t happen every time. Occasionally, ChatGPT provides high-volume keywords.

Plus, zero-volume keywords aren’t necessarily a dealbreaker.

“Zero-volume” doesn’t always mean zero searches. Sometimes, tools like Semrush and other keyword research tools lack data for certain keywords.

Some zero-volume keywords may actually receive thousands of searches.

Another point worth mentioning: ChatGPT’s dataset is limited to pre-September 2021.

This means it won’t recognize any keywords or topics that have become relevant post-September 2021.

Still, ChatGPT can be a helpful starting point alongside a premium SEO tool, like Semrush’s Keyword Magic Tool, to develop a list of keyword ideas.

Additionally, you can use ChatGPT to identify:

Long-Tail Queries
Just as a reminder, a long-tail keyword is usually a more specific phrase with lower search volume (e.g., Dalmatian feeding times).

Keywords Related to Your Target Keywords
For example, you can type “Give me a list of related keywords for Labrador exercise routines” into ChatGPT. It will then generate a list of relevant keywords, such as:

Semantically Related Keywords

Similarly, you can ask ChatGPT for semantically related keywords (often called LSI keywords).

These keywords are words and phrases that are conceptually related to your main keyword.

They may not rank for the exact search query you’re targeting. However, they add context for the search engine about the focus of your content. They may or may not be direct synonyms of your target keyword.

To illustrate semantically related keywords, here’s a list provided by ChatGPT:

Creating a list of related keywords can enhance your article’s potential to attract significant traffic by allowing you to address a wider range of subtopics that users are likely to search for.

Classify Keywords by Search Intent

You could take it a step further by asking ChatGPT to create a table outlining the search intent type for each keyword. The chatbot will generate a table that labels each keyword as either “Commercial,” “Navigational,” “Transactional,” or “Informational.”

This indicates the end goal a searcher hopes to achieve by using the keyword, allowing you to determine if they align with the type of content you’re creating.

Will ChatGPT perform as well as a dedicated SEO tool?

Generally, no.

You shouldn’t place complete trust in its guidance. However, it can often point you in the right direction.

Create Keyword Clusters

You can also ask ChatGPT to group your keywords into clusters based on semantic relevance.

For instance, here’s what we received when we asked ChatGPT to cluster paleo diet-related keywords into relevant groups:

While this doesn’t match the keyword organization capabilities of Semrush, it’s certainly a good starting point.

Build a Content Strategy

When developing your website, it’s essential to have a comprehensive content strategy in place. This involves creating topic clusters—hierarchical lists of relevant subjects that you plan to cover in your blog posts.

You want each of these individual topics to address common search queries while also being distinct from one another.

If you publish too many similar articles, you risk keyword cannibalization, where two or more pages compete for the same keywords.

So, how can you generate a long list of unique content ideas?

ChatGPT can assist with this.

By asking ChatGPT to “provide a list of relevant topics to the paleo diet,” you’ll receive results that look like this:

This allows you to uncover topics you might not have considered otherwise. You could even ask ChatGPT to organize the topic titles either semantically or by content type.

For example, you could have the chatbot arrange the content ideas into categories like “blog posts,” “step-by-step guides,” and more.

From there, you can schedule content publishing dates, organize social media posts, and perform content audits.

Semrush’s Social Poster and Content Audit Tool can assist you with these subsequent steps.

Content Creation

So, ChatGPT can’t create and execute your content strategy from start to finish.

But it can help you in several areas of content creation.

Such as…

Generate a Content Outline and Brief

Now that you have the content ideas, the next step is to write the content.

We don’t recommend relying solely on ChatGPT for this task. However, you can use it as a starting point for your own research.

It’s essential to conduct your own competitor analysis and research to develop a thorough brief. You can use Semrush’s Topic Research and Outline Builder tools to discover headings that ChatGPT might have overlooked.

To generate a basic outline, you could ask ChatGPT to “create a content outline for a blog post on the paleo diet and diabetes.”

It will then provide suggested headings:

You can also specify your requirements for the article, including word count, number of headings, and the overall style.

For instance, are you aiming to create a piece with numerous bullet point lists or several tables?

The more detailed you are with your prompts for ChatGPT, the better the outputs will be—particularly when generating content outlines.

You can also ask ChatGPT to create a basic content brief. You can either tell it who the target audience is and what the tone of voice should be, or you can let it assist you in determining those aspects.

For Example :

That said, as always, you should conduct your own research to ensure it’s not steering you in the wrong direction.

Write Your Content

We don’t recommend relying on ChatGPT to handle all your content writing.

While it can produce a rough draft quickly, it is essentially summarizing what it “knows” from the dataset it was trained on and using its next-token prediction capabilities to compose the article.

If you ask it to write “SEO content,” you’ll often end up with writing that is repetitive, keyword-heavy, and lacking originality, along with the inaccuracies we mentioned earlier.

Additionally, it won’t align with Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines (Experience, Expertise, Authority, and Trust).

That said, contrary to popular belief, Google isn’t entirely opposed to AI-generated content.

Recently, Google clarified its position on AI content creation, stating that:

Essentially, as long as your content provides value, it shouldn’t be seen as spam.

However, you should always carefully review, fact-check, and edit any AI-generated content you create.

One effective use case for this could be crafting a straightforward “About Us” section or any other content that isn’t intended for ranking.

Rewrite Content in Your Desired Tone

If you’re struggling to nail the right tone, ChatGPT can help.

For example, let’s say we wanted to make this article more formal:

The key point is that ChatGPT can assist you in refining or enhancing your content. Just don’t depend on it to write the content for you without any oversight.

Remember, you should always carefully review, fact-check, and edit any AI-generated content you produce. For example, if you incorporate content generated by ChatGPT into your writing or collaborate with external writers, you can use tools like Plagiarism Checker to verify their content.

This is why we prefer this use case over the previous one. You can input content you’ve already created (ensuring accuracy) and use it to overcome writer’s block, ultimately producing something that resonates better with your target audience.

Get FAQs Related to Your Content

An FAQ section in a blog post addresses the questions your audience is eager to have answered.

This can enhance the overall value of your article and also help you rank in the “People Also Ask” section on Google.

Simply ask the bot, “What are some common questions related to [topic]?” and you’ll receive a comprehensive list of suggested ideas.

You can even request it to provide rough drafts of responses to those FAQs, like this:

Alternatively, you could use the prompt, “Here’s a writing sample. Please list any questions you might have while reading it,” followed by your writing sample.

As you can see, you’ll receive a list of FAQs that you could potentially incorporate into your article.

You might decide to include them as standalone FAQs at the end of your content, or you could address them throughout the text to ensure readers aren’t left with lingering questions after finishing your article.

If one of the suggested questions stands out as particularly significant, you could even create a separate section in your article to address it.

Generate Killer SEO Meta Title Tags and Meta Descriptions

Well-crafted title tags and meta descriptions can greatly enhance your search traffic.

They offer context for both users and search engine crawlers. A compelling title tag and meta description can persuade people to click when they might not have otherwise.

The text from a page’s title tag is used by Google to create the blue title link for that page, like this:

Meanwhile, the page’s meta description is typically used by Google to create the description that appears below the title link:

You can use ChatGPT to create meta titles and descriptions effortlessly, at scale. Like this:

That said, don’t simply rely on ChatGPT’s work for these. Its outputs are often too lengthy.

While there’s no strict limit, it’s generally advisable to keep your title tags to 60 characters or less and your meta descriptions to around 160 characters. This way, they’re less likely to be truncated or rewritten by Google.

(You should also thoroughly fact-check anything that ChatGPT generates, as mentioned earlier.)

However, you can still gain significant value from this use case by asking ChatGPT to generate 5-10 different ideas for title tags and meta descriptions for a specific webpage.

Then, you can select and modify the one you like best.

Discover content gaps

To achieve full authority in your niche, you need to identify and address all content gaps.

By this, we mean every topic related to your main keyword that your competitors may or may not have covered.

With ChatGPT, you could simply list all your headings and ask the bot to pinpoint content gaps.

Alternatively, you could request it to create a content silo map, from which you can identify and mark off unexplored topics.

You could take it a step further by identifying more niche content gaps. Select one of the topics mentioned above and ask ChatGPT the following:

For each suggested topic in the original content silo prompt, you can generate numerous topic ideas that you might not have initially considered.

Review the suggested titles before creating pages for each one—you may find that some could lead to keyword cannibalization, or that some have little to no search volume.

Discover Knowledge Gaps in Individual Articles

You can also use ChatGPT to identify knowledge gaps found in individual articles.

When you finish writing an article, how do you measure comprehension? In other words, how do you know you’ve covered all bases of the topic?

Do you compare it point-for-point with your competitors and see how it sizes up?

No—that would be a big waste of time.

Especially when you can literally copy and paste your article into ChatGPT and ask it to “find content

This approach will enable you to create the most comprehensive article on the internet.

Alternatively, you can copy and paste your own articles along with your competitor’s into ChatGPT and ask it to identify any topics your competitor has covered that you may have missed.

Content optimization

You can use ChatGPT to uncover new content optimization opportunities for your article.

Remember: ranking at the top of SERPs requires more than just keyword stuffing.

Your content needs to align with user search intent, be unique and engaging, include the right keywords, and be easily understood by search engines. If these criteria aren’t met, your page might not rank (though exceptions exist, like having a high Domain Authority (DA)).

As we’ve emphasized in this article, ChatGPT can assist with this, but there are additional techniques we haven’t yet covered, such as:

Rephrasing: If you encounter duplicate content or plagiarism concerns, paste the text into ChatGPT and ask it to “rephrase/reword this content while maintaining its meaning.” ChatGPT will offer alternative phrasing options.
Sentiment Analysis: You can ask ChatGPT to analyze your content’s tone. For instance, request it to “assign a positive, negative, or neutral sentiment for the following text…” followed by your article. This can help you verify if you’ve achieved the intended mood.

Featured snippet targeting

You can enhance your content further by using ChatGPT to help you secure featured snippets—whether list, table, or paragraph format (note that it can’t yet assist with video snippets).

The featured snippet, often referred to as position #0, is the highlighted answer that appears above regular search results. For brands, earning this spot can result in a substantial traffic boost.

While winning a featured snippet can be challenging, ChatGPT can make the process much simpler.

You can then integrate this suggested snippet into your content. Start by adding a new H2 with the question as the title, then place the ChatGPT-generated snippet beneath it.

Be sure to edit ChatGPT’s suggestions to make them sound less AI-generated and more human—adjusting them to match your brand’s unique tone of voice.

Create Optimized YouTube Descriptions

You can use ChatGPT to craft compelling video descriptions that help your YouTube channel stand out among millions of others.

Like meta descriptions, YouTube descriptions should clearly outline the video’s content. Achieve this through concise writing and by incorporating relevant keywords.

While there’s no strict rule on description length, within the 5,000-character limit, ensure your description is:

Valuable: Clearly states the video type, such as a tutorial or vlog.
Concise: Keeps unnecessary content to a minimum.
Well-Formatted: Includes bullet points, bold/italicized text, and headings where possible.

Let’s put ChatGPT to the test:

While it doesn’t contain bullet points, you could always prompt the tool to add some in:

Proofread Your Writers’ Work

You can use ChatGPT not only for basic proofreading and spell-checking but also for much more.

Suppose you own a content-writing business where success depends on delivering clear, accurate, and well-crafted articles.

Failing to meet these standards could cost you clients.

Fortunately, ChatGPT can review your content before you send it to clients.

ChatGPT can also help with fact-checking to a certain extent (emphasis on “certain”).

As previously mentioned, ChatGPT’s knowledge is limited, so it won’t guarantee 100% accuracy, but it can flag areas that may need further review. (You can then conduct additional research to confirm its suggestions.)

If you’re writing on unfamiliar topics, you can run your text through ChatGPT by asking, “Are the following paragraphs accurate…,” and pasting any sections you’re unsure about. ChatGPT can then help validate or clarify your points.

Let’s see what response ChatGPT provides when asked this (the paragraph may look familiar):

Here’s the response we received:

It’s clear the initial sentence caused some confusion for the tool (showcasing ChatGPT’s limitations).

However, it still manages to provide a solid analysis of the content’s accuracy.

Moreover, if ChatGPT identifies inaccuracies, it offers correction suggestions. While these may not always be entirely accurate, they provide a starting point for improving your content.

Additionally, you can input the company’s communication guidelines into ChatGPT. Then, by pasting your article, you can ask ChatGPT how well the guidelines have been followed.

Here are some useful prompt ideas:

Are all the required headings included?
Have all the necessary keywords been used?
Is the correct tone of voice applied?

ChatGPT also excels at identifying passive voice and rephrasing sentences in active voice. It can even spot areas for improvement and provide suggestions.

As always, it’s wise to review these suggestions carefully. ChatGPT’s phrasing might occasionally be too lengthy or not quite right for your specific tone. Use discretion to decide what works best.

Need Awesome CTAs?

If you’re promoting a product or service, ending your articles with a compelling call to action (CTA) is essential. A CTA is the closing line that invites readers to take the next step and become customers.

CTAs encourage readers to explore more of your content, purchase a product, subscribe to your service, or take similar actions based on what you’re offering.

Despite their straightforward nature, CTAs are often tricky to get right. They frequently lack enthusiasm and can feel bland or forced.

The good news? You can ask ChatGPT to generate engaging CTAs that inspire action and align with the search intent you’re targeting.

Take a look at this:

As with all AI-generated content, it’s best to refine it to match your brand’s unique tone and vocabulary. Still, it provides a strong foundation to build on.

Link Building

Backlinks are the cornerstone of any strong SEO campaign, and ChatGPT can help you identify and (ideally) acquire high-quality ones for your site.

How?

By guiding you toward prime outreach opportunities within your niche.

Backlinks serve as endorsements from one site to another. When your domain gains a backlink, it’s a signal that another website finds your content valuable.

While organic backlinks are ideal, you can kick-start the process by actively seeking them.

This is where ChatGPT comes in. If you’re new to link building or lack a strategy, you can ask ChatGPT to develop one for you.

For instance, you can request a list of backlink ideas tailored to your niche, like this:

The above selection can serve as inspiration for who to reach out to.

However, keep in mind that ChatGPT cannot provide a list of specific outreach sites, as demonstrated below:

You’ll need to locate suitable domains on your own, but at least now you have some helpful tips on where to start searching!

Create Outreach Emails For Backlinks

If that’s not enough backlink support, you can also ask ChatGPT to draft an outreach email for you.

A successful outreach email needs to stand out among the flood of other requests. Many emails end up in spam, but those that offer real value to the recipient are more likely to be acknowledged. A strong outreach email should clearly explain to the webmaster how linking to your content will benefit them (as shown in the prompt below).

ChatGPT can help you craft a personalized outreach email to pitch your ideas to other sites.

Simply start with this prompt:

“I own a [your niche] website. Create a backlink outreach email template explaining how linking to my content can add value to other websites.”

ChatGPT will then generate a basic email template, such as:

You can then replace the blanks with details specific to your domain.

While this may seem somewhat generic, you can tailor your prompt to include the unique services your business provides. You might also experiment with the tone, depending on the website you’re targeting. Some might appreciate a more playful or humorous approach, while others may prefer a formal style. Do some research, then let ChatGPT assist you in crafting the ideal email.

ChatGPT’s link-building capabilities don’t end there; it’s also highly useful for securing HARO (Help a Reporter Out) backlinks.

Anyone who has tried this link-building method knows you have to act fast if you want to be the one who wins the link. On top of that, your response has to stand out from the hundreds of others.

As demonstrated throughout this guide, ChatGPT is effective at both.

To pursue a HARO link, I’d start by asking the tool for a brief answer to the query mentioned in the HARO request:

Sometimes the output is quite long, so you can ask ChatGPT to shorten it:

ChatGPT is great at creating catchy email subject lines to help your message stand out in a journalist’s inbox. Simply ask it to generate a list of subject lines on your topic, and pick the one that resonates most with you.

And there you have it—a solid response to a HARO request with just a few minutes of effort.

Pretty neat!

Get Anchor Text Recommendations

The effectiveness of backlinks and internal links can be reduced by weak anchor text (the clickable part of a hyperlink).

For backlinks, anchor text appears on external websites, allowing site visitors on those platforms to reach your domain by clicking the link.

The anchor text is nearly as critical as the backlink itself. If it’s too lengthy, irrelevant to the linked page, or looks spammy, it could harm your site more than help it.

“Exact match” anchor text (anchor text that includes your main keyword) is acceptable but should be used sparingly.

If you’re uncertain, you can use Semrush’s Backlink Audit tool to evaluate your anchor text and pinpoint weak or spammy anchors that might be undermining your link-building efforts.

Then, you can use ChatGPT to generate relevant anchor text suggestions, such as:

After this, you can reach out to webmasters and ask them to update the anchor text to one of the suggested options above. Alternatively, you can save these suggestions for future links you’re planning to build.

The anchors ChatGPT provides are also a great starting point for your internal linking strategy. Using more exact match anchors for internal links is ideal, but coming up with a variety of options can be challenging.

ChatGPT can assist if you provide it with a list of page titles you want to link to:

Generate robots.txt Rules

If you’re not familiar with robots.txt rules, no problem—ChatGPT can be your guide.

robots.txt is essentially a text file that search engine spiders read to determine which pages to crawl or index and which to avoid.

A robots.txt mistake could lead to crawling and indexing issues. But if you don’t know how to create a robots.txt file, how can you prevent these errors?

Simple—just ask ChatGPT to generate the correct robots.txt rules for you, like this:

This not only helps you understand robots.txt rules but also reduces the risk of errors in your file.

You can also use ChatGPT to review your robots.txt file. If certain pages aren’t being crawled or indexed, try asking ChatGPT to check if your robots.txt is blocking them:

In the example above, any pages with /wp-admin/ in the URL aren’t being crawled, as intended.

However, if this were a category on your site that you did want to be crawled, you could ask ChatGPT to adjust the robots.txt file accordingly:

Generate .htaccess Rewrite Rules for Redirects

It’s not just content writers who might feel a bit threatened by ChatGPT; it’s also making waves among coders. While it’s not taking over, the tool is incredibly helpful for writing code.

If you need to set up a 301 or 302 redirect on your webpage, you can ask ChatGPT for .htaccess rewrite rules. 301 (permanent) and 302 (temporary) redirects help direct users from one URL to a new or temporary location.

You can implement this in the .htaccess file using code generated by ChatGPT:

This ensures the redirect is implemented correctly and guarantees that your web users reach the intended location.

Notice that we misspelled the new URL in the prompt (.om instead of .com). ChatGPT detected this error and corrected it in its output!

That said, always double-check that the slugs or URLs it provides in the code match your actual site URLs. ChatGPT is highly reliable with code, but a quick review never hurts!

Create Regular Expressions (RegEx)

Regular Expressions (RegEx) is a type of programming language used to identify text pattern matches. Like with many complex programming tasks, you can now generate RegEx with ChatGPT.

By using RegEx with Google Search Console, you can identify the search queries driving the most traffic to specific sections of your website.

This approach helps you discover a variety of new keywords to target in your content.

While Regular Expressions simplify tasks, they can be challenging to understand.

Fortunately, ChatGPT can handle the heavy lifting for you.

For example:

You can then apply this RegEx to filter ‘Performance on search results’ in Google Search Console.

This will display a list of search queries starting with one of the specified words, along with the clicks and impressions they’ve generated for your site.

Generate hreflang Tags

In simple terms, hreflang tags are HTML attributes that inform search engines about the language and geographical target of a webpage.

This helps search engines display the page in search results for users in the specified region or using the correct language.

If you have multiple versions of the same webpage in different languages, it’s essential to add the appropriate hreflang tags to each one.

Back in 2018, John Mueller called hreflang tags “one of the most complex aspects of SEO”—well before the arrival of ChatGPT.

Now, you can use AI to generate a list of all the hreflang tags you could ever need:

After generating the hreflang tags, insert each one into the <head> section of the relevant URL. Be sure to replace the example URLs with your actual URLs!

Schema Markup

Finally, you can also use ChatGPT to generate schema markup code.

Schema markup helps search engines better understand what your content provides to users.

It’s also an effective way to capture more space on the SERPs.

Schema markup can enable embedded features on Google, called “rich snippets.”

For instance, you could use schema markup to display your company logo, business address, or review rating (among many other options) in search results.

This gives your webpage a more professional and appealing look for web users.

To gain rich snippets, you’ll need schema markup code—which ChatGPT can generate for you.

For example, if you provide ChatGPT with this prompt:

You’ll receive a schema markup code, which will look like this:

Which will continue like this:

You can use the Schema Markup Validator on Schema.org to verify if the code generated by ChatGPT is accurate.

Plus, you can even ask ChatGPT where to place the code within your HTML file. Pretty neat!

ChatGPT Browser Extensions for SEO

The possibilities don’t stop there—there are plenty of ChatGPT extensions to boost your SEO efforts.

You can browse for ChatGPT extensions in the Chrome Web Store under Extensions.

Here are two I’d recommend trying:

AIPRM

AIPRM (Artificial Intelligence-Powered Response Manager) enhances ChatGPT by offering a vast library of prompt suggestions.

These pre-made prompts are designed to generate highly useful SEO-focused responses from ChatGPT.

For instance, you could choose the “Fully SEO Optimized Article including FAQs” prompt.

After selecting a tone, writing style, and keyword, you’ll receive a response that looks like this:

For best results, I’d recommend upgrading to a premium AIPRM account. Writing style and tone options are very limited on the free version, as shown below:

WebChatGPT

Due to the cut-off date of its training data, ChatGPT doesn’t have access to information beyond 2021. Unless it’s specifically provided with recent updates, it remains unaware of changes after that date.

This limitation might be addressed in the future, but for now, you can use the WebChatGPT plug-in to access more up-to-date information from ChatGPT.

With this plug-in, ChatGPT can pull in web results alongside its own data, enabling it to provide the latest information for your research.

How Has ChatGPT Impacted the SEO Industry?

It’s clear that ChatGPT has simplified content marketing strategies significantly.

As shown in this guide, there are countless ways SEOs can integrate the tool into their daily tasks. It streamlines content research and writing, but it doesn’t replace the role of an SEO expert.

A human touch is still needed to bring creativity and originality to content. Humans, by nature, are creative thinkers.

ChatGPT, in contrast, follows a structured code and can’t think outside the box. Its output is entirely based on existing data, not original ideas.

Moreover, ChatGPT challenges the very purpose of search engines. Why would someone use Google—with its ads, spam, and irrelevant content—when they can get an instant, targeted answer that meets their search intent?

This question is what triggered Google’s “red alert” when ChatGPT was first released. Without search engines, what role would the SEO industry play in the future?

Fortunately, there’s room for both search engines and ChatGPT to coexist.

This balance becomes clearer when examining the positive and negative impacts ChatGPT has had on the SEO industry:

Pros:

Article Planning — ChatGPT can help brainstorm headings, title tag ideas, keyword suggestions, and more. It handles the preliminary work, allowing writers to focus on the actual writing.
Domain Coding — Need hreflang tags, robots.txt rules, or .htaccess rewrite rules but aren’t familiar with coding? ChatGPT can generate the necessary code for you.
Meta Tag Creation — If you’re struggling to craft meta tags that capture your content, ChatGPT can generate expressive meta titles and descriptions. With a bit of tweaking, you can create meta tags that improve both user click-through rates and search engine understanding.

Cons:

Easier Access to SEO Knowledge — You don’t need to fully understand .htaccess or Regular Expressions, as ChatGPT can handle these tasks. While convenient for some, it reduces the competitive advantage for SEO experts.
Quality of Writing — Google has long fought against spammy content, a challenge now amplified by ChatGPT’s human-like but sometimes repetitive, keyword-stuffed prose.
Risk of Duplicate Content — ChatGPT relies on its limited training data and may struggle to produce unique content, sometimes repeating itself, which can become frustrating.

Overall, ChatGPT is advancing the SEO game, but it’s essential to use it carefully and pair it with premium SEO tools (which I’ll cover next) to get the best results.

Is ChatGPT the Only SEO Tool You’ll Need?

While ChatGPT is useful for SEO, it’s not the only tool you’ll need (so don’t cancel those premium SEO tool subscriptions just yet).

You can rely on it for basic keyword research, crafting meta descriptions, and creating content briefs aligned with search intent, but ChatGPT isn’t 100% dependable.

Its output can sometimes feel vague, inaccurate, and, as you’d expect, a bit robotic.

Moreover, ChatGPT can’t handle more advanced SEO tasks. For site audits, backlink analysis, and competitor research, a premium SEO tool is essential.

I’d recommend using ChatGPT to simplify certain aspects of SEO, but there are other tools you should prioritize.

Semrush, for instance, provides comprehensive content support. It helps you identify impactful keywords, analyze backlink profiles, and assess competitors.

These are just a few areas where Semrush outshines ChatGPT’s capabilities.

FAQs

How much does ChatGPT-4 cost? As of April 2023, OpenAI offers various pricing options for ChatGPT-4:

Individual Users:
- Free Version: This provides access to the GPT-3.5 model, including unlimited messages, interactions, and chat history, at no cost.
- Plus Plan: For $20 per user per month, this plan includes access to the advanced GPT-4 model, faster responses, a larger context window (32K tokens), and added features like DALL·E image generation and advanced data analysis.
Businesses and Developers:
- Team Plan: Available for $25 per user per month when billed annually or $30 monthly. This plan includes all Plus features with higher message caps and team collaboration options.
- Enterprise Plan: Tailored for large organizations needing advanced features and customization, with pricing available through OpenAI’s sales team.

For developers and businesses using the GPT-4 API, costs depend on token volume. For example, using the Davinci-002 model costs $2.00 per million tokens.

Note: Prices are subject to change. For the latest details, visit OpenAI’s website.

Has ChatGPT affected Google’s traffic levels? As of late 2023, ChatGPT has not significantly impacted Google’s traffic. Google’s search market share remains dominant, with ChatGPT’s traffic making up only around 2% of Google’s web traffic. Google’s global search market share saw a slight decrease from 92.34% in October 2022 to 91.53% in October 2023, but this isn’t necessarily due to ChatGPT.

That said, ChatGPT’s release initially put Google on “code red,” given the chatbot’s potential to deliver accurate, intent-based answers. However, its impact on Google’s overall traffic is still unclear.

How can I mitigate the risks of using AI-generated content in SEO? Google may penalize AI-generated content if it doesn’t meet quality standards. Google acknowledges that AI can produce helpful, valuable content, so it doesn’t impose a blanket ban on AI-produced material.

To reduce the risk of penalties, consider revising all AI-generated content. Use ChatGPT to draft the foundation, such as headings, but always rewrite and expand on its output. Avoid copy-pasting ChatGPT’s content directly into your website; instead, rephrase it in your unique style.

How can users ensure they are using ChatGPT ethically and responsibly in SEO? To ensure ethical SEO content creation with ChatGPT, use tools like Originality, AI Writing Check, or similar AI detection tools. ChatGPT’s responses sometimes draw heavily from its data sources, so using a plagiarism checker helps identify AI-generated content.

When reviewing ChatGPT-generated work, ensure all facts and data are current. ChatGPT’s training data is outdated, so it’s essential to verify the accuracy of any information it provides.