Posts tagged “AI”

In Q1 2026 Google's three ad lines went in three directions: Search +19%, YouTube +11%, Google Network -4%. EMARKETER projects Meta will overtake Google on total ad revenue this year. Treating 'Google Ads' as one channel with one strategy is now a planning error.

A planner's field guide to ChatGPT Ads in May 2026: auction mechanics, targeting controls, the OAIQ pixel and Conversions API, robots.txt rules for OAI-AdsBot, eligibility, and where the channel actually fits in a media plan.

ChatGPT ads launched February 9, 2026 with sponsored placements below answers on Free and Go tiers. The targeting signal isn't a keyword; it's the entire reasoning context, and most agencies aren't built to use it.

Between 2025 and 2026 Google stopped shipping a toolkit and started shipping an operating system. The quiet commercial changes will hit Western Canadian SMBs before any AI-Overview headline does.

We monitor whether clients appear in responses from Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, Gemini, and five other AI platforms. The numbers are small but the baseline data matters.

A 10-person team managing 33 clients requires significant automation. We use n8n for workflow automation and MCP for AI-assisted operations, with 240+ tools across three servers.