ChatGPT Atlas: SEO, backlink skills set for extinction
Technology and innovation have long possessed that special power to render skills and sometimes an entire industry obsolete and useless. Many today continue to be apprehensive of latest developments in technology such as artificial intelligence, robotics, machine language and other recent innovations. They fear their jobs and livelihood are on the line. Their fear is not without basis though. Over the past decades, we have seen technology render skills and jobs obsolete.
Typists were once hotcakes in offices and organisations. They ensure written communications are professionally done in a timely and organised manner. First the personal computer reduced their influence and today, mobile devices have confined that once useful skill to the dustbin of history. I don’t know of any organisation today which needs a typist. Companies manufacturing typewriters have since changed gear and joined the innovation wagon or closed shop.
Like typists, switchboard/receptionist call routing is no longer a desirable or marketable skill. Direct dial extensions, mobile phones, VoIP systems, Google Voice, auto attendants and IVR systems have all made switchboard receptionist job dated. Coupled with that is the fact that today, an increasing number of internal and external communications by organisations and individuals happens online, without the need for phones.
I’m sure we all remember Nokia, once the largest phone maker in the world, running on the Symbian operating system that was loved by millions. Then came the Android operating system wave. The Android was free, it was flexible, enabling faster innovation and app development. The world immediately took to Android like fish to water. Nokia failed to read the room and in no time became sidelined, losing its exalted position to newer brands like Samsung and others. It was a similar story with BlackBerry, which also once dominated the business phone market with BBM and QWERTY phones. Like Nokia, it became too enamored with its own image in the mirror and failed to realise that the Android train is picking its passengers. BlackBerry was forced to exit the phone business eventually. That is what technology and innovation do.
The introduction of Atlas
ChatGPT Atlas, OpenAI’s recently released browser, like Android, may just be shaping up to test the resolve of traditional browsers such as Google Chrome, Opera, Edge, FireFox, Safari, etc. Atlas may just have rewritten the script for the browser industry.
So, let’s examine Atlas and the likely impact it may have on keywords, the SEO and backlink spaces.
OpenAI designed the Atlas browser around its flagship chatbot, the ChatGPT, enabling it to integrate AI directly into web browsing. Atlas is built on open source Chromium, which makes it compatible with many of the current web standards and extensions. According to OpenAI, Atlas was built to make ChatGPT more central to everyday web use. Such integration is expected to reduce the friction between generative AI and browsing.
Is Atlas a game changer?
It is obvious OpenAI hopes to develop new revenue models by challenging for control of the search engine market and by extension Google’s substantial ad revenue.
Atlas has shown promise. The demonstration I saw highlighted the browser’s key features which will give it an edge over traditional browsers such as Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge, Firefox, and others. Unlike traditional browsers, Atlas has an embedded chat window, a sidebar that lets a user engage AI to summarise contents of the search results or analyse data without switching apps. The browser has an in-page editor. What that means is that a user can simply highlight texts, an email, a story, or a report and request ChatGPT to edit the highlighted portion and the editor goes to work immediately.
Atlas also has an agent mode, which if enabled can independently perform routine tasks for the user. For instance, Atlas can go shopping for a user or fill a form or perform other tasks from start to finish.
These features make browsing very convenient, intuitive, fast, and more exciting, and will no doubt boost productivity. A user can perform multiple tasks at once on Atlas without moving out of the window, something a user cannot achieve with traditional browsers.
Atlas versus Traditional browsers
Traditional browsers thrive on keywords to display search results. The search engine worms have been programmed to pick popularly used words, terms, and phrases, and so when a user searches for something, the worms pick contents containing those keywords or terms for display on the first two pages ahead of others. In other words, traditional search engines function well with keywords. This gave rise to search engine optimisation (SEO) skills, where SEO experts try to infuse keywords into their online contents to ensure the browser display their sites on the first page of a search result. Atlas is built differently. It’s very intuitive and function well on regular human language. So, for instance, while using Atlas, a user doesn’t need to know keywords or how to optimise such. The user can simply put a regular everyday term related to his search and Atlas will comb the web and bring the best possible results, not the site with the most optimised content.
Atlas is about conversation. The browser considers backlinks as secondary consideration while for a Google Chrome, links and search results are primary consideration and AI secondary. Because Atlas has inbuilt AI, it can help a user perform repetitive tasks, if enabled. It’s automated while traditional or legacy browsers aren’t.
How Atlas may rewrite the search engine scripts
The convenience, speed, multiple tasks functionality, and automation by Atlas may see it increasingly win markets from traditional browsers. And as the browser, gains momentum, we are likely to see other players introduce similar browsers.
Since the AI infused browser is indifferent to keywords and backlinks, content experts will begin to modify their contents to deemphasize keywords and craft them in line with the human conversational style favoured by Atlas. Organisations will also start to rethink their content strategy to ensure they write high quality content that will resonate with audiences as opposed to the current focus on ranking. It is such robust, relevant and high quality content that Atlas and others like it that will soon come on board will pick up and display the sites prominently.
With Atlas setting the pace, we may be about to witness a more interesting and exciting online content generation landscape devoured of keywords, SEO, and backlinks.
