Move Over Google, Chat-Based Systems Are Taking Over: Here's Why

Everything You Need to Know about the new release from OpenAI

Yesterday, OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT unveiled an extension to the product called plugins. Under this very technical term lies a new era for technology and how we use the Internet. I can’t emphasize enough how much of a dramatic shift this will bring upon us.

Let’s try and unbundle some of the implications one by one:

Access to the latest information
One of the major shortcomings of ChatGPT was the fact that the all-knowing bot was trained just on data up to September 2021. If you asked him simple questions about the current economy or the war in Ukraine, he wouldn’t know how to answer (or worse - answer with wrong information).
Plugins allow ChatGPT to learn new information from any company that utilizes them.
On top of that, OpenAI also released its own plugin that allows the bot to go and search the web in real-time, analyze information, and find you the answer you want.
Just look at this example of how ChatGPT goes out and finds information about the Oscars winners of 2023.

Google's dominance in the tech world
Since the day Google launched to the world, no company has managed to put out a real fight for search dominance. Microsoft poured billions into Bing just to win a 2.8% market share.
CahtGPT is the first real existential threat to Google.
Why would you go out to search for something through tens of search results when you can simply ask a bot to do it for you? Why would you try to piece together data from multiple sites or compare prices from multiple sources when a bot can do it for you in seconds? And at least for now - with no annoying ads?
Changing people's habits is very hard, and it will take time to move people away from search, but for the first time, we can see a real alternative - a truly better user experience than the one Google is providing.

SEO? BEO!
A huge industry is dedicated to SEO (search engine optimization) and helping websites rank higher in Google’s search results. Many companies are winning just because they are very good at optimizing their data for that.
But in a world where people get their information using a bot, all this is suddenly much less relevant. We might see a new field emerging: BEO - bot engine optimization. How to make sure bots think your information is the most accurate and relevant for every question.

The Star Trek era is (almost) here
Anyone who ever watched Star Trek knows the experience of the all-powerful Enterprise computer. You can ask it anything and he will give you the answer. You tell him what you want to do and he will do it for you. It can research stuff for you, it can call people, it can operate the spaceship.
Sounds familiar?
Plugins allow ChatGPT to become exactly that. They allow the bot to interact with and operate other systems (websites).
It can easily talk with multiple websites, takes information from one, and pass it to the other. It truly becomes the ai-assistant we have all seen in science fiction movies.
Just look at the basic demo here in which ChatGPT find you a restaurant, gathers recipes personalized to you, and then goes and orders them from a grocery shop.
Plugins are available for just a few sites, but in a year or two, I suspect they will be everywhere, allowing ChatGPT to automate almost any task.

A new world of opportunities
This massive shift in how we will consume and use the internet opens up a world of new opportunities for entrepreneurs. It’s not just Google that is in danger. Every business that is built on top of its massive advantage in search might be in danger.
How do you optimize your site for bot access?
How do you optimize your API for bot access?
How do you make sure that a bot can chain the data/acions you provide with other businesses out there?
What businesses can be hugely optimized when moving to be operated by voice?
How do you monetize voice/chat based search?

No doubt the next few years will be super interesting to watch…