We still measure cars in horsepower.

Which is pretty funny when you think about it. We invented an entirely new way to get around, but somehow kept the horse as our unit of measurement.

But I guess that's how we humans work. Whenever something new comes along, we use old ideas to make sense of it. And there's nothing wrong with that. Horsepower is still useful, after all.

I think we're doing the same thing with AI.

We're measuring AI visibility like we measured SEO rankings. We're using the same old KPIs to judge a completely different way of discovering information. Heck, we're even hiring marketers using job descriptions that look like they were written before ChatGPT existed.

Again, not necessarily a bad thing. We have to start somewhere. But at some point, shouldn't we ask whether these old ways of thinking still make sense?

If we were starting from scratch today, knowing what AI can do, would we still measure, hire, and work the same way?

That's what this week's articles got me thinking about.

Anyway, on to the links!

Meme of the week

This week’s meme celebrates the release of iPhone Duo.

—

Quick search marketing news

• Google launches Universal Cart. Shoppers can save products from multiple retailers in one cart across Google Search and Gemini, monitor prices and availability, and check out through supported merchants. Search is moving beyond helping people find products to helping them actually buy.

• Google is increasing the visibility of inline links in AI responses, testing prominent links to official websites, and improving how users discover news and sources.

Best of the week

Bravery is the Most Important KPI: Don't confuse what you can measure with what actually matters. Perfect data doesn’t exist. As I’ve argued previously, great marketing is risky as hell. The best marketing leaders need to have the courage to invest in things that clearly make the business stronger, even when they can't reliably predict or attribute the ROI. Not everything worth doing fits neatly into a dashboard.

Re-imagining AI Visibility KPIs in a Query Fan Out World: Everyone today cares about AI visibility. But guess what? You can be visible AND anti-recommended. Imagine proudly reporting that ChatGPT mentions your brand, only to discover it's telling people to look elsewhere. We’ve transplanted the SEO metrics we’re familiar with to AEO, but maybe what we need is a completely new set of KPIs. As Wil Reynolds suggest in the article, KPIs like “Mentions by influencers” or “Striking distance” (e.g., When I run these 10 prompts 20x each we show up on X% of them.)

GEO is a Distraction: Wil Reynolds is trying to rethink AI visibility. Marie Haynes goes even further. She analyzed data from 100 websites and found that traffic from all LLMs combined was equivalent to just 0.73% of Google organic traffic. So why are we so obsessed with AI mentions? Marie argues that the bigger opportunity is preparing for agentic search, where AI systems increasingly help people take action and make purchases. Google's new Universal Cart (mentioned above) offers a glimpse of that direction. Maybe getting mentioned by AI isn't nearly as important as making your business one that AI-powered systems can help customers buy from.

I Analyzed 1,100+ Marketing Job Posts. They’re Stuck In 2023: Emily Kramer's analysis of 1,100+ marketing job posts found that only 15% ask marketers to build AI workflows, agents, or skills. So it's not just our KPIs that are outdated. Even our job descriptions seem stuck in the past. We're talking endlessly about how AI is transforming marketing, but apparently haven't updated what we expect marketers to be able to do.

How to Automate Content Creation: A Follow-Along Guide: I did not write this post to get a job with Emily. Or her list of companies. But hey, I qualify now! Jokes aside, even if you absolutely hate using AI to make content (FYI, using AI doesn’t mean making slop), one of the best use cases is to use AI to update your content. Because updating content is no one’s version of fun (well, not mine.) Got a bunch of articles that need updating? Pick the most boring, repeatable part of that process and see if you can automate it. That's exactly what I did. And yes, save your soul and use that energy to make better things.

 

See you next week,
Si Quan

P.S. Liked this week’s Digest? Forward it to a friend or tell them to subscribe here.