I joined a panel hosted by the Associated Press in November 2023: AI’s Effect on Search and Your Website Visibility.
In preparation for the webinar, I sent out a 15-question survey for journalists. Below are the results.
- Total Responses: 15
- Response Timeline: Nov. 7-13
- Countries Represented: 5
While I received fewer responses than I had hoped, there was a diverse range of job titles:
- CEO
- CTO
- Director of Audience
- Editor-in-Chief
- Editorial Director
- Editorial Program Manager
- Executive Editor
- Product Manager (3)
- Publisher
- Senior Content Marketing Manager
- Senior Editor for Audience, Product and Innovation
- Senior Product Manager, SEO
- SEO Editor
Here are the teams the respondents represented at their respective organizations:
- Audience Development (3.5*)
- Editorial (3)
- Tech/IT (3)
- Product (2.5*)
- Business/Revenue (2)
- Marketing (1)
*One respondent listed multiple departments, so I split two of them in half
Now, to the questions.
Understanding AI
Without looking it up, can you write what the acronym “AI” stands for?
- Correct answer: Artificial Intelligence
- Correct responses: 14 (93.3 percent)
- The only incorrect answer was “automatic intelligence”
Without looking it up, can you write what the acronym “LLM” stands for?*
- Correct answer: Large Language Model
- Correct responses: 12 (80 percent)
- Three incorrect answers:
- Limited ____ Material?
- language learning model
- I don’t know
*Some people wrote “larger” instead of large or “models” instead of model. I counted those as correct
Affecting SEO Traffic
Have you noticed a significant change in organic search traffic in 2023?
To complement the survey, I analyzed the accounts of nine newsrooms who have had Google Analytics 4 set up since Oct. 1, 2021.
- Five of the nine have seen Google Organic traffic go down year-over-year (Oct. 2022 – Sept. 2023 vs. Oct. 2021 – Sept. 2022).
That’s 44.4 percent up and 55.5 percent down, in the small sample size. But it roughly matches the survey results, where 33.3 percent of participants reported traffic slightly or way up, while 46.7 percent reported traffic slightly down or way down.
Which of the following analytics tools does your newsroom use?
- Google Analytics 4 is by far the most popular data analysis platform in newsrooms.
Using AI Tools
- More than half of respondents reported using AI tools at least daily
How often do you use AI tools as part of your workflow?
- Chat GPT was the most popular tool used (60 percent) and DALL•E was third (33.3 percent). Both are made by OpenAI
Which of the following AI tools do you use?
The final response above, which is cut off, said “It’s my understanding that things like spell check, maps, automation and Siri are a form of AI.”
For what tasks do you use AI tools?
- The most popular tasks AI is used for are:
- Data analysis (60 percent)
- Editing text and summarizing content, respectively (53.3 percent each)
- Taking notes (46.7 percent)
The cut-off answers here are:
- “Drafting emails, brainstorming and as a thought-partner”
- “sending emails, generating social media copy”
AI Updates, Future Perspectives
How do you keep up with the latest changes in AI?
- Newsletters (80 percent) and social media (66.7 percent) are the most common ways people stay abreast of AI changes and updates
Are you concerned about losing your job by the end of 2024 as a result of AI advancements?
- Most people (80 percent) are “not at all” concerned about losing their job in the near-term
Are you concerned about losing your job by the end of 2024 as a result of AI advancements?
- None of the respondents view AI as “harmful” to the news industry
Closing Thoughts
I also asked: “Is there anything else you would like to add about how AI is affecting your organization’s search strategy?”
Here are some of the more interesting responses:
“You can now blame the AI if the graph is showing a downward trend without taking a close look at any possible alternative explanations. Everybody says AI multiple times a day without having a clear idea about what we want it to do for us.”
“I worry that small newsrooms will be left behind because we do not have the specialized teams to get ahead of this looming challenge. I have been working tirelessly to get ahead of this for most of 2023, and even that feels like a drop in a bucket compared to what we need to do. I would love to get a group of smaller publishers together to see if we might pool funds to hire subject matter experts to help us get ahead of the looming challenges. If you are interested in this, I would love to chat!”
“We are hamstrung a bit by corporate refusing to use generative AI at all, at the moment. It’s a boogeyman to a lot of our newsrooms — I understand the fear, but not even trying to use AI in helpful ways kinda slows us down.”
Share your thoughts in the comments about AI’s effect on newsrooms.
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