Google’s transformation into an AI-driven search platform represents more than just a technological advancement. It’s a fundamental shift in how the search giant views itself as a company and the value it provides to users.
Cindy Krum has spoken at several events this year about her theory that Google might merge AI Overviews, Discover, and international results to build the next-gen search engine.
The overview of Cindy’s thoughts is that Google is not only internationalizing its platform, but is also converging AI Overview, Google Discover, and AI Mode into a unified, hyper-personalized search experience.
This evolution aligns with Google’s broader push toward understanding search as “journeys” rather than static queries, underlined by MUM.
My theory is that the move into heavily personalized search journeys builds on the past 20 years that Google has been striving to be a personal assistant. AI has made that possible.
Cindy is the founder of MobileMoxie and is described as being “years ahead of the pack.” I spoke to her about the implications for SEO and what part of this shift to AI-organized search and journeys SEO professionals are underestimating right now.
You can watch the full interview with Cindy on IMHO below, or continue reading the article summary.
Predictive, Conversational, And Personalized
Cindy believes that, currently, there is a bigger shift than what some SEO professionals have been talking about: A fundamental shift in the way Google sees itself as a company and the way that it sees the value that it provides.
The real shift was in 2018, just after Google launched mobile-first indexing, when Google began organizing search results around entities. It said it wanted to be more predictive, more conversational, and more personalized.
According to Cindy, Google’s current AI initiatives aren’t new developments but rather the culmination of a strategy.
“Everything they’ve been doing since 2018 has been feeding this goal of getting us into this AI search reality,” she explains.
The AI Overviews, Google Discover expansion, and AI Mode we see today are direct results of this seven-year journey.
The Hidden Strategy Behind Google’s International Push
One of the most overlooked aspects of Google’s current transformation is its renewed attempt to consolidate international domains.
Google previously tried to eliminate country-specific versions (CCTLDs) before mobile-first indexing but had to roll back the initiative. Now, it is trying again, and the timing is significant.
“If you separate everything by country and language, you’re limiting your learning pipeline. You have smaller, fragmented datasets.” Cindy explains.
When you consolidate and abstract at the entity level, you can disambiguate meaning and link keywords to entity ideas across all languages. That speeds up the learning process.
Google can then apply what it learns in one language to another; we’re already seeing this with AI Overviews.
When it can’t find the right answer in a local language, it translates English content because it knows the English answer is probably also correct in other languages. This saves time and money on crawling, indexing, and ranking.
AI Mode Isn’t The Product. You Are
I asked Cindy if she thought Google might try to monetize AI Mode, but she believes Google’s strategy is more sophisticated.
“We can’t forget how Google makes money, it’s ads,” Cindy emphasizes. The real value lies in building comprehensive user profiles that enable precision ad targeting.
Google’s goal is to present ads only to users likely to convert, making its advertising platform more attractive to businesses while creating a seamless experience for users.
“They’re not monetizing AI Mode directly. They’re using it to collect data that allows them to monetize ads more effectively.”
This strategy extends to Performance Max campaigns on the paid search side, where Google controls optimization based on metrics it doesn’t trust advertisers to manage effectively.
Discovery Is Moving To TikTok, Reddit & Social
Despite Google’s technological advances, some users are losing trust in the quality of search results.
However, the solution isn’t abandoning Google but rather understanding how different platforms serve different purposes in the modern search ecosystem.
Cindy’s opinion is that Google is no longer the place where discovery happens.
Users increasingly conduct research across multiple platforms. TikTok for discovery, Reddit for authentic opinions, and eventually Google for final purchase decisions.
This multi-platform journey reflects a more sophisticated approach to information gathering and decision-making.
Cindy stresses the need to understand real branding, not just SEO branding or digital PR.
“To be able to influence the narrative in any kind of AI search result, you have to be actively influencing all those things,” she notes. “SEOs for years have been so focused on their website to the detriment of every other branding opportunity out there.”
Understanding Search Journeys
For SEO professionals looking to optimize for journeys rather than just keywords, Cindy recommends studying Google’s own navigation suggestions.
When performing searches, Google often displays additional navigation layers that reveal its understanding of user intent and likely next steps.
“This is where Google is kind of showing their cards and saying these are the queries that we expect you’re going to narrow down this query,” she explains.
By mapping these suggested pathways, SEO professionals can identify where their content fits into the user journey and where Google needs education about additional aspects of that journey.
If She Were Starting Today? TikTok
I asked Cindy if she were starting from the beginning now, what she would do and where she would invest, her immediate answer was TikTok.
She explains, “It’s where young audiences are, the algorithm promotes discovery, and content is repurposed across all other platforms. Importantly, it’s not just a fad; businesses are being built and scaled directly on TikTok.”
And while influencer saturation is real, Cindy sees TikTok as a smart, scrappy way to build awareness with a small budget and scale fast.
Preparing For The Future
The shift toward AI-organized search results and journey-based optimization requires a fundamental rethinking of digital marketing approaches.
Success in this new era of AI search demands understanding the complete customer journey, from initial discovery through final purchase, and ensuring brand presence at every touchpoint.
This includes active participation in the broader digital conversation about your industry, products, and services.
The future of search isn’t just about ranking higher; it’s about being present wherever your audience might encounter your brand throughout their decision-making journey.
“The future of search is understanding the entire journey, not just the keyword or the query.”
Thank you to Cindy Krum for offering her insights and being my guest on IMHO.
More Resources:
- Google Discover, AI Mode, And What It Means For Publishers: Interview With John Shehata
- The Truth About LLM Hallucinations With Barry Adams
- SEO In The Age Of AI
Featured Image: Shelley Walsh/Search Engine Journal
