VMP 264.5: Will Your Practice Survive Google SGE?

Brandon (00:00:00) - Welcome to the Veterinary Marketing Podcast, where it's all about how to attract, engage and retain clients to your veteran hospital using digital marketing. My name is Brandon Breashears. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen. In today's episode, you're going to be talking about a massive shift that is going to be taking place here in marketing, and I can't overstate how important this is. I'm going to be screaming this from the rooftops because things are changing. There is a massive just change in order in terms of technology here that we are seeing. There's going to be major changes that if you're not up to date on this, you're not thinking about this. It's going to be difficult for you. You're going to be in a world of hurt. And so my hope for you is that at least start thinking about this in this episode. It's an in-between episode. We're not going to have super deep dive into this today, but this is going to be very important in the future. Which leads me to the next things I'm be talking about.

Brandon (00:00:55) - And deep diving on these topics here for the next year. I think that the changes that you're going to be seeing in the digital marketing world are unprecedented. Um, there is so much coming up that is exciting and scary and interesting. And if you continue to do things the way that you've always done them, you're going to be left behind. Guarantee it. So if you would like to avoid the pain that's going to come from that, be sure to subscribe in iTunes, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts from. So let's just jump right into today's episode. There are major changes coming to Google to search engines. Everything in the digital marketing space is going to be disrupted significantly from the SGE experience that's going to be coming out. What is SGE? It is search generative experience, which is Google's AI. We have Bing AI. I'm sure Apple's going to have an AI product. And it is going to change the way that everything takes place on the internet. Uh, I've been thinking a lot about this.

Brandon (00:02:01) - I've been looking and researching into the new ad placements that are coming out. Google search is just this. I mean, this is the first time in 25 years that there's a major change to Google Now. And the way that people are googling things, there's been algorithm changes and updates, but nothing like this. And if you think about it to the way that people are going to be using search engines is going to dramatically change because it's talking back and it's conversational, it's going to be conversational. I think what you need to consider is that a lot of the marketing tactics and strategies that used to work are not going to work. And so two things that you absolutely need to make your focus when it comes to marketing. In my opinion, if you want to be successful because the world is changing, if you don't want to get left behind, it's these two things. Number one is data. Number two is audience. If you can master those things, you're going to be so much further ahead than all of your competition.

Brandon (00:03:02) - Doesn't matter if it's corporate or private, you will dominate the market. And here's what I mean by that. Number one data. You need to be able to report conversion data and understand where your clients are coming from, what it costs to acquire sources, all of that, the way that this is working and it's going to continue in this direction is Google or these platforms need data to go out and find more of your audience. And so you need to be able to generate leads and customers and clients. And then at the same time, you need to have accurate reporting data in place. And we're definitely going to be doing deep dives on the best reporting tools and reporting methods, because this is just it's going to be important. And I'm going to give you a specific example. So with the SGE that's coming out, the generative experience is going to be at the top. The placement that is going to be in that generative experience is performance max campaigns. That might sound like I'm speaking Spanish to you or a different language, foreign language here.

Brandon (00:04:04) - I also speak Spanish, so that's why I referenced that. Um. It might sound like I'm speaking a foreign language to you. And if that's the case, that's okay. We're going to go through all of the different placements that are available, but this is just a major change. There are far fewer inputs that you can put in. And so it's really giving these platforms the freedom to go out and identify segments of customers and try to acquire more. But the way that it works is it relies on data and quality of data. The better data you can put in, the better results you're going to get out. Incredibly important. Can't overstate that. And these SGEs are going to be coming out in Q2 or Q3 of 2024, and it's going to completely change the way that the search results look. So most practices and I'd say most are using Google My Business, you're using Google ads and possibly or organic, and it's going to completely change. So you have to be ready for it. Um, and data is the way to be ready for it.

Brandon (00:05:15) - The next thing I mentioned is audience. So let's say that Google is no longer a great way to get clients because it has AI in it. And it's, you know, maybe you didn't do everything that you need to do to figure out your, your ad placements or your Google My Business listing or whatever. And so. The alternative to using Google is building an audience, and that's targeting people on social channels or different networks where you can. Cultivate trust and an audience through content creation. So having those two things working together, data and your audience, and being able to grow your audience of ideal clients who know, like and trust you, who are looking forward to hearing from you. Those are going to be the things that you, in my opinion, need to focus on, and it will keep you far ahead in all of the changes that are going to be coming in this year. And this is going to probably be the biggest change that is felt in a long time. I think last year when ChatGPT was announced almost a year ago, that was.

Brandon (00:06:24) - A black swan event that nobody really saw coming. I mean, it's amazing, um, what's come out of that? But I don't think people are necessarily feeling the effects yet. And those effects are going to be implemented because people are starting to develop more solutions. Everybody's really starting to implement all of the cool things that are that are coming out of this. And so this will be the year that people feel it. Even though it was last year that that these things came out. So I would love to hear your feedback though. What do you think? I hope that you're heeding this warning. I keep saying we need to have conversion data. I would say less than 1% of practices have accurate conversion tracking in place, and as a result. You're far behind every other industry that's out there, and the few practices that just take the little bit of time that is necessary to set up conversion tracking, understand where your clients are coming from, how much it cost to acquire customers based on source. You're so far ahead.

Brandon (00:07:26) - So I hope that you take this and you do something about it. If you need help with it, head on over to Veterinary Marketing Podcast. Come send me a message. Always happy to help. Have a great day! And if you think somebody would benefit from this, please be sure to share it. I appreciate you have a wonderful day.