Author: John Lang

Table of Contents

• What exactly are AI Overviews?
• What type of queries/questions asked to Google usually trigger an AI overview answer?
• How can your business stand a better chance of appearing in the AI Overviews?
• How to better optimise your on-page SEO
• Why is it essential to keep your content marketing, i.e blog posts, up to date
• Why Google E-EAT is now more critical than ever
• It’s essential to write your business’s content marketing using a conversational tone and a lot of question-and-answer writing style.

Introduction

Artificial intelligence is something of a buzzword in 2025. As a matter of fact, at the recent Google I/O conference, the subject was the main topic of conversation. It’s changing how people gain answers, how the Google SERP looks, and how Google Gemini is now part of most modern Google Android phones.

There’s too much happening in AI right now to cover this in just one blog post. However, with that said, we can concentrate on one area, which is Google AI Overviews, which is a hot topic among many Bristol SEO companies right now.

What are Google AI Overviews?

The best description we have heard is that Google AI Overviews comes from a synthesised answer. Which sounds complicated, yet the simple way of explaining it is that Google is simply understanding your question in a much more exact way. Google then supplies an answer gained from multiple businesses, mashing them together into the information, and presenting the answer in a pleasant paragraph or two.

There’s now a race on, that’s among businesses to make sure that they get mentioned as a source of the information shown in the Google AI Overviews. So, for example, if someone were to ask, “I am a first-time driver, how can I bring my insurance premiums down?” The business linked as a source of a Google AI Overview answer could be getting thousands upon thousands of extra monthly visitors.
Will an AI Overview answer be presented for every query?

Entity building

For a long period in search engine optimisation, various marketing companies were banging on about the “semantic web”, “entity building”, “things not strings”, do you remember that?

Well, that is good because we think it is linked to AI.

The well-known things, “Will Smith”, Margaret Thatcher”, “Adam Sandler” celebrities, landmarks, events, products, you name it if it’s a thing, a well-known entity, and you want to know about it, well, this is likely to trigger a Google AI Overview.

Like when you’re sitting across the sofa watching a film, you want to know how old an actor is:

So you ask Google Gemini, “How old is Sir Anthony Hopkins?”. At the same time, you’re pushing popcorn in your mouth, well, this question asked on Google will likely trigger a Google AI Overview, as one of the best actors in the world, Anthony Hopkins, is a well-known entity.

Right, I got it. So, which searches are unlikely to trigger an AI overview from Google?

YMYL- so crucial advice, that could mean you base an essential decision on, which impacts your life, well, that’s unlikely to be triggered as an AI Overview answer to appear, or just yet.

That’s because AI can generate some unpredictable answers (inclusions). You may ask,

How do I start divorce proceedings, which may come out with something you didn’t expect, such as “Do you not want to leave him? Perhaps marriage counselling is best for you?”- so that’s why YMYL questions are unlikely to trigger an AI Overview response.

You get our drift.

So, for now, most marketing companies believe that the YMYL searches are less likely to show a Google AI Overview answer. That’s at least while Google is fine-tuning its responses.

I run a business; I need to get in on this. How can I increase my business’s chances of appearing as a Google AI overview answer?

So, AI Overviews is fed and works by reading businesses’ content marketing. When they are used, they are cited as a source.

So there’s our first clue on how to increase your business’s chances of appearing in an AI Google Overview answer.

For your content marketing to be cited, well, it needs to be really and one more good.

Think Google E-EAT, think long form content marketing, think good on-page SEO, think so many powerful backlinks it crashes your Excel spreadsheet when you read them.

Yes, you got it, traditional SEO is not dead, at least not for now. That’s because the content marketing must be written well if you want it to appear in Google’s organic results and be used as a Google AI Overview answer.

Conversational answers

Ever asked someone a question, then you wished you hadn’t, because they are waffling on, boring you, to the point you nearly fell off your seat? Been there?

Well, this is the same with content marketing.

Bore the reader, stick a ton of unnecessary detail, drone on, waffling until the cows come home, well, you’re going to lose the reader’s interest. Plus, Google may not know what you’re waffling about, either.

So please keep it to the point.

Write in short, sharp, to-the-point sentences. Demonstrate to Google and the reader you know what you’re talking about (Google E-EAT), but don’t go overboard so that they feel they are reading a university dissertation, when they may want a recipe to make a chicken korma for their tea.

Please keep it on point, show you know your stuff, and don’t overdo it.

Keep the information up to date.

In the world of AI, things move fast.

Calculations are made of how good your content marketing is and how up-to-date and relevant it is.

So, if someone wants advice on anything, it’s safe to say Google wants to offer up-to-date information.

They don’t want to cite an article from 2018 when an article has been written in 2018 but clearly shows its been updated, well every year since its been updated, and the revised date gets updated and re-indexed, this work is more likely to be cited, as its clear the author wants to keep the work up to date as possible.

Keep your Google Business up to date.

So, if someone asks where the best burger takeaway place in Clifton open late tonight is, Google will turn to Google Business profiles near that person.

So, keep your Google Business profile updated with opening hours, business information, phone number, and address. Then, when Google has multiple listings to pick from, it’s likely to come down to reviews, so get as many positive reviews as you can, but don’t fake them.

Google E-EAT

Your business’s content marketing must be well-written. Whether a main page or a blog post, it must have a high Google E-EAT score.

Need help to improve your company’s search engine optimisation?

We have SEO experts who can help you.

We are working with more and more companies in the South West of England.

This includes Bristol and Bath. Therefore, if your business wants to improve its organic or local SEO, why not give us a ring?

Date: 08/05/2025

Author: John Lang, Bristol

Introduction

It does seem as of late, Google is rolling out a new update, well what seems like every 5 minutes. This has meant that sometimes, as soon as one Google update roll-out has happened, it’s only a very short period before another occurs.

However, there are some updates which we don’t believe have had a significant effect on the majority of businesses (as long as they have followed white hat SEO best practices).

However, this update is different and sustained regarding the ranking flux that is being witnessed. From what we can see, it is substantial update affecting many businesses, and it seems to have frozen businesses in place in the Serp’s for some time now.
Google Search Console.

We are a well-known SEO agency serving the South West of England. Therefore, we work with companies in Bristol and the neighbouring city of Bath, so we can only comment on what we see for our marketing company and clients.

But here we go:

The impression data has substantially increased in Google Search Console over the last 3 weeks.

Not just that, it seems volatile, meaning it goes up and down, and every 2.5 hours or so.

Now, as an agency that likes to keep a close eye on our clients’ SEO analytics, we have to say that we get a good sense of what the impression data should be, yet at the moment, it looks pretty high.

That means we think it is higher than what we would typically be if we were to compare it with a baseline daily figure.

So, what can we take away from that?

We can presume that we think Google is testing an algorithm change, and we believe what is coming will be big.

Google Update May 2025

So, for the past year, there have been multiple Google updates, and we saw a lot of volatility, for example, during March there was a large Google update.

What makes the May 2025 Google update different is that this seems sustained; the ranking flux appears to be held for what we think is a prolonged period.

Why is Google rolling out this update?

We still cannot say the exact reason for the ranking flux that we seem to be occurring at this moment in time. After the Google update has rolled out, we can see which businesses have emerged higher and which have moved down the SERP’s.

Using various SEO tools, we can decipher which companies were negatively impacted by the Google update.

We are a marketing agency with our fingers on the pulse, which means, like other leading agencies, you get a good sense of what work your direct competitors are working on when improving their SEO.

What changes did your agency notice?

We have noticed keyword position changes; the most apparent change is in Google Search Console regarding impression data.

If you have been monitoring the exact keywords for consecutive years, you get a sense of the daily impressions and the fluctuations that can occur.

However, this seems to be more than that; for some SEO keywords, the fluctuations in terms of daily impressions seem to have increased by over 50%.

On top of that, keyword positions will be detailed in the Google Search Console. However, these do not reflect what is shown in the SERP for some of the clients we are working for.

What this means is that at this moment in time, we cannot tell how this Google May 2025 update is impacting the SERP.

What websites were affected?

Some business sectors we work with have seen a positive uplift, while others seem to have been put into a deep freeze.

What we mean by that is after substantial link building efforts and adding content marketing, the SERP seem to remain frozen.

This, we would say, has carried on from the Google updates back in March 2025. We would therefore state that this seems to be some continuation of that rollout.

Why wouldn’t we recommend making any changes right now to your SEO

After significant Google updates, whether a Google update or a Google core update, we would not recommend that any business make changes to their SEO straightaway. The reason is that it often takes multiple days, if not sometimes weeks, for the rollout to roll out fully.

Therefore, some businesses jump into making changes, which can magnify the drop in rankings.

Let’s give you an example: some businesses may believe it’s a link penalty, then disavow good quality links, which will, of course, cause a drop in the business’s organic rankings over the long run.

Therefore, you must take your time and let the Google update fully roll out, and then you can evaluate where your business has moved.

During Google’s updates, the ranking flux often causes the website to move down or up, but only temporarily. Then, after the update has fully rolled out, you may move into a new position, which may stabilise for a while.

How have your Bristol clients been affected?

Our Bristol clients have moved up, yet before we pat ourselves on the back for our hard work, we must wait until the Google May 2025 rollout has fully rolled out.

Why is Google rolling out so many updates?

It used to be the case that the Google updates, or at least the large ones, had names assigned to them, such as Google Panda, Penguin or Hummingbird.

SEO companies would have an excellent idea of what the Google update purpose; for example, it may have been targeting link spam.

But now, well, things are very different.

The rollout of new Google updates is much more frequent, plus many SEO businesses do not know what the updates are targeting. We are therefore very much in the dark, and all we can do is the same as many other businesses: track the changes in our SEO tools.

How can you better equip your business for Google updates?

So some businesses, well, 100% of their sales may come online, which means that when a Google update is rolled out, and changes are made to Google’s core algorithm, the business can be massively affected in terms of sales it can generate.

Therefore, the U.K. businesses we represent and work with naturally they will want a way to better protect themselves from such updates.

However, all you can do is follow Google E-EAT’s advice and white hat best practices.

Then our second piece of essential advice is this: don’t make massive changes to your SEO or website during a rollout.

So many businesses panic when Google is rolling out a significant update.

They start changing page titles, the content marketing, and the links for example.
But don’t, you have to wait.

Wait and see how the Google update has impacted your business’s rankings after the rollout, and then make changes.
Don’t make changes to your business’s search engine optimisation (SEO) during a roll-out because that can amplify the swing of where your business will rank post-roll-out.

How can we help?

We are Digital Tailors, an SEO agency serving Bristol and the neighbouring city of Bath.

We are a white-hat SEO company that can offer fixed-priced SEO packages that start from just £1k per month.

We work with various businesses, from solicitors to construction companies. If your business needs a tailor-made SEO and marketing solution, we are the company to call in the South West of England.

Our top Google business profile optimisation tips

Introduction

Setting up a Google Business profile is incredibly important for any business in Bristol. It can often be fully set up and created in a short period. However, adding as much detail and optimising your business profile as possible is essential.

Also, the Google Business profile will occasionally need some maintenance. For example, regularly update your opening hours or perhaps update the team photo from time to time.

The importance of a Google Business Profile is that you optimise it, and then you could come up and appear in the top 3 Google business map results in your area.

This can therefore send a lot of shoppers to your website if you achieve this.

What exactly is a Google Business profile?

Google (Alphabet) offers this service for free.

Plus, you can set up this account in a short period, in less than an hour most of the time.

You can add important business information to your profile, such as your website’s URL, business name, and other essential business information, such as the businesses opening hours.

Remember that you could be competing with hundreds, if not thousands, of other Google Business profiles. Because Google’s algorithms now shorten the number of businesses that get displayed to 3 at any one time, competition is therefore now fierce and hypercompetitive in most cities like Bristol.

Therefore, your agency needs to optimise the listing. A lot of work goes into the behind-the-scenes to do this. An example of this work would be raising the business’s authority, which means getting backlinks and obtaining genuine customer reviews.

Plus also you should maintain the profile, and ensure that all information is precise and you have consistent citations (NAP).

Does my business even need a Google Business profile?

The short answer is that an incredible amount of marketing statistics show that many people find local businesses through Google Business results. Google itself has reported that 46% of all searches have local intent. Whether you’re a plumber or a barrister, you have to ask yourself can you afford not to advertise your business within the Google Business results?

What is the local three-pack?

So seasoned SEO consultants among us, which have been around for a while helping companies improve their local SEO will know, Google once displayed seven businesses in Google Business results (7-pack).

However, Google’s algorithm has changed massively since then. So has the design of the page, which Google presents as the local business results. For example, you used to be a seven-pack, which means there are many more opportunities for a business to get onto the first page and shown in the Google business results.

Since then, Google’s algorithm has changed substantially and become more sophisticated than ever.
Results have been shortened now to just 3 or less results, therefore its now hypercompetitive to get any business rank there.

Setting up your Google Business Profile

We fully appreciate the fact that when you are setting up a business, say in Bristol, you will often have quite literally 1 million things to do.
However, what businesses underestimate is how vital the Google Business profile is to their company. Often, they think it’s something that could set up a matter of minutes and then forgotten about.

However, established businesses know that a properly optimised, and set-up Google Business profile can help attract a lot of customers if it ranks on the first page of Google.

Proximity.

However, please consider that in an area like Clifton Bristol, let’s say that you run a solicitors practice, you still have often a lot of competition.

Therefore, you must often compete with at least 10 other Google Business profiles around your city. Often a lot more, but lets say 10 companies as an example.

Therefore you will often face stiff competition.

Take the time to set up the account properly.

Then it’s a matter of optimisation, which can involve regularly updating your Google Business account. It also consists of obtaining genuine customer reviews and high-quality backlinks to your website to improve your authority.

NAP consistency

You have to take into account nap consistency.

This again is something that some small business owners can sometimes overlook.

You have to take into account that nap consistency must be 100% accurate.

NAP / Business citation issues can arise when changing business premises, that’s if the business fails to update their business citations.
Therefore, you have what I called conflicting business citations, if the NAP details point at two different addresses.

Change of holiday hours

When you change your holiday hours, this presents a brilliant opportunity to update your business profile.
Another reason Google can drop a business profile and replace it with a competitor’s profile is that it might be considered as having outdated business information.

For example, if a business profile is left unchanged for say 10 years, Google might start to feel that the details, such as the opening hours, are possibly incorrect.

Therefore, it was a good idea, from time to time, to visit your business profile and update it.

How To Verify Your Google Business Profile Listing

Verify your listing

This is important because, from our perspective as a well-known SEO agency, you’ve seen businesses set up in Google’s business profiles yet not verify them.

However, because it is unverified, other businesses might try to claim it, or people might try to make amendments by suggesting edits that are not accurate.

For example, in our experience, we have seen a business profile, where a competitor has marked all the opening hours as closed. This can harm the business as it was actually meant to be marked as open during that time, and therefore would confuse customers who visited that page.

Therefore, to lock your business profile listing, which means verifying it, showing that you own it, and that only your business can edit the details.

Do you have a duplicate listing?

Your business may have already set up a Google business profile?

It could be a Google Business profile, which Google itself might have automatically set up?

Therefore, look to see if your company already has a Google profile set up, because you might just need to claim ownership of an existing listing.

Business description and category

So this is a fairly common mistake, lets say you run a fencing business, which is categorised as construction company. However, if you categorise it as fencing and garden services, for example, this is much more accurate in terms of the services that you offer as a business.
Therefore, take the time to look through business descriptions and categories, and select the one most suited to your business.

Back links

Backlinks are an essential part of local SEO.

As they can improve the businesses Google EEAT score. . This can mean that Google prefers your business profile of your competitors because it is clear that many powerful links have chosen to link to your website.
Come to us

We are looking to work with new businesses in Bath and Bristol’s busy, bustling city.

We offer affordable SEO services, if you would therefore like a no obligation quote why not call us today.

What are PR links in SEO?

Table of contents:

• What exactly are PR links, and how can they be utilised to enhance a business’s SEO?
• What are the main benefits of building PR links?
• Why a business needs to improve its Google EEAT score
• Ways that you can use PR link building to gain more links
• When a business wants to improve its organic search engine optimisation, many agencies start talking about link building. One way a business can build links is through PR link building.

Are backlinks still a crucial part of the organic and local SEO process?

Yes, in short, backlinks remain a crucial part of the SEO process.

It is essential to remember that backlinks, or links as they are often referred to, are still widely regarded by many Bristol marketing agencies as the most critical ranking factor. That means if you want your company to rank on the first page of Google in this city, you often need backlinks.

However, as we will discuss later, you only want the best links. Your business should only build high-quality links. The links need to be relevant to your business sector.

This then helps to pass link equity through to your website pages, which is also sometimes referred to as link juice. This can help the page rank higher on Google if it has a lot of quality links.

So, how many backlinks do we need?

You can never have too many high-quality links.

That’s because high-quality links will help your website rank on page one of Google and maintain its position.

However, low-quality links and spam links have the opposite effect. They damage your SEO, which means your business moves down Google’s rankings.

And here’s the thing: obtaining quality links, such as those from the BBC, is incredibly challenging.

A significant amount of time can be spent building links only to obtain one link. That’s why we say you can never have enough quality links because creating them is so challenging.

Many companies attempt to cheat by creating spam links. Google will detect these low-quality backlinks, and as a result, Google may issue a penalty. The business could, therefore, obtain a link penalty. This means the website could be “de-indexed.” This means that the company will not appear in any search results for any search terms.

If a business is de-indexed on Google, it could be due to a link penalty. You often then have to work with an SEO agency in Bristol and assist with Google penalty recovery. It can take a considerable amount of time to recover from a penalty.

How can PR backlinks help my business?
Suppose your business receives a significant number of high-quality links from reputable sources, such as the BBC, an independent newspaper, and Wales Online. In that case, these links can help improve the company’s SEO.

What does “link velocity” mean?

Link velocity refers to the rate at which backlinks are being established. You want quality links, but you don’t want to make a mass of links all at once. Instead, you want to build quality links over a sustained and long period. Therefore, before you start building links, consider link velocity and if you wish to create links over a long period.

Let’s talk about what exactly PR links are

PR links, in short, are a type of backlink, whether that be do-follow links or no-follow links, that originate from a website such as a newspaper; this can be used to impact a business’s SEO positively. However, it’s imperative that when building links to improve your company’s search engine optimisation, all the links built are always white hat.

For example, a mere mention of your business or a link regarding a new shop opening on a newspaper website can help boost your company’s SEO. It achieves this by attracting more visitors, and Googlebot will index a new link. If it’s a good link, this can improve your business’s search engine optimisation.

How do you obtain PR backlinks?

Journalists and PR companies need a reason to link to your business. However, when you win an award, launch a new product, or open a new store, newspapers —whether local or national —may want to write a story and link to your business.

Your business sector

Let’s say, for a second, you run a solicitor’s practice. You might win a business award for the best solicitors practice in South West England. This allows various websites to write a story about it. The best links often come from newspaper websites or websites related to your business sector, which then write a story about the award you have won.

The semantic web

Google has utilised the Semantic Web for a considerable time. Google has something called a “knowledge vault.” Essentially, you don’t just need backlinks to enhance your business’s search engine optimisation.

You can also have just mentions of the business.

For example, your business’s name could be crawled and indexed, and then it is picked up by Googlebot.

The more your business is mentioned online, the more links you receive from quality websites, and the more Google perceives your business as a leader in its sector.

Google EEAT is now very important.

Google EEAT is now an essential part of the SEO process. For those who are unfamiliar with what Google EEAT means, let us provide a brief explanation.

Google EEAT stands for experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness. Now, the element we are interested in discussing in this article is authoritativeness. The reason is that the more times your business is mentioned, the more links from quality websites you have, the more your authoritativeness will improve.

For example, top-leading businesses often have a massive number of do-follow backlinks from high-quality companies with a high Domain Authority (DA).

Therefore, businesses of all sizes, whether small or large, should aim to improve their Google EEAT score—a crucial part of enhancing a business’s Google EEAT and the authenticity aspect of the work. Therefore, to do this, you need to obtain quality backlinks.
They Provide More Clicks

Helping to obtain more visitor numbers

By having a lot of backlinks from high-quality websites, such as the BBC, you can also attract many more visitors through these links. That’s because people will click on the links to find your business. Therefore, they help to bring more customers to your website. Additionally, the more links that Googlebot crawls and indexes from high-quality websites, the more your organic SEO will improve.

Trustworthiness

We mentioned Google EEAT a little earlier. We have discussed attractiveness, but you should also consider how to improve your website’s trustworthiness. One way to do this is to get your brand or company mentioned on leading websites. For example, if you run a law practice, mentions in a leading publication, such as the Solicitors Journal, can significantly improve the trustworthiness of your business.

The reason is that Google will crawl and index not just links but also brand mentions of your company. Therefore, if your brand is mentioned on leading websites relevant to your business sector, then this can improve your company’s organic SEO. A good example, for instance, is a solicitor’s practice, which can be found on a website like the Solicitors Journal, having won a business award.

Journalist requests

Quite often, a journalist will write a story, but they may lack expertise in your business sector.

Let’s give you an example of what we mean. At this time, in writing, the stock market globally is being affected by the Trump Traffic. Now, what could happen here is, let’s say you run a broking business, then you might offer to answer a journalist’s questions. Then, by helping the journalist with a question they have, you can sometimes request backlinks in return. For example, “Joe Blogs at Abacus Trading” says the following.

This is beneficial for your business’s search engine optimisation, as you can obtain a brand mention plus a backlink as well.

Link-worthy content marketing.

It’s worth putting the time and effort into writing helpful and high-quality blog posts.

If you examine companies in our business sector, there are Moz and Backlinko, which have a substantial number of incoming backlinks. The reason for this is that the content marketing is of excellent quality.

Therefore, our best advice is not to settle for “content thin” content marketing; instead, you have to create top-quality, well-written content marketing.

Again, the work should have a very high Google EEAT score.
What happens then is that Google’s algorithms may decide to rank that work high on Google. The page may rank high on Google. This means it could potentially reach tens of thousands of readers per month.

Some of these readers may link to your work. They could even be sometimes a business which sells the same products or services as you.

However, if they are in another part of the UK, they may not consider your business a competitor.

For example, a dentist could conduct a survey to determine how many patients felt more confident after undergoing cosmetic dentistry.

Then, based on the survey results from 100 people, the findings might be mentioned in other dental practices across the U.K.

Therefore, by conducting that marketing research, you can obtain more links and brand mentions as well.

Sometimes, your business will be mentioned online, let’s say, a supplier who mentions that they work with your business on their website.

For example, there might be a banner which shows your company logo as a company that they supply goods or services to.

This is a brilliant opportunity to request backlinks from that supplier. They could even make your company logo a backlink by making the actual picture the link. However, it’s better if you have your brand mentioned, say, in an article.
Ensure that the anchor text is written in a white-hat manner. Additionally, the links you should obtain should only come from high-quality websites that have a high Domain Authority (DA) score.

How our business can help:

We are an SEO agency that serves customers in Bristol. We can help to get your business onto page one of Google. For a free quote, why not call us?