Google has relied for years on ad revenue from its Search results, but the wave of artificial intelligence models has threatened to challenge that in recent years. In response, Google also upgraded its search experience by adding many AI features, like AI Overviews and the AI Mode.
Meanwhile, the company also runs the Gemini AI chatbot that is capable of searching the web, while the chatbot is also making its presence felt across a variety of Google software, from smartwatches to TVs.
So far, there has been uncertainty over how the new technology would be monetized except through subscriptions, but a Google executive has confirmed that the company is looking to bring ads to different AI experiences by the company, including AI Mode.
Robbie Stein, VP of Product at Google, while speaking on the "Silicon Valley Girl" podcast about the company's ad revenue, said, “Don’t see them going away.”
“I think that's an opportunity for in the future to be even more helpful for you, particularly in an advertising context. And so we started some experiments on ads within AI mode and within Google AI experiences,” Stein said.
“We've been really focused on building great consumer products first and foremost. But I think users are starting to see some ads experiments there too,” he added.
Stein also noted that there could be “new and novel ad formats” and “it's early days in finalizing kind of how ads might appear in these systems.”
Google not alone in milking AI for Ad revenue
Notably, Google isn't the only company looking at AI chatbots or other AI experiences in order to drive advertising revenue. OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT and the leading AI player out there, is also reportedly working heavily on bringing ads to its chatbot.
A recent report by The Information stated that OpenAI is considering showing ads to users based on ChatGPT's memory, which is information that the chatbot remembers about them. The memory feature helps personalize the chatbot for users, and imposing ads via it could lead users to make a call between losing out on a more tailored experience or continuing the chatbot as it is, but with ads.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has also said that he likes Instagram's implementation of ads. He said in an interaction earlier in the year, “I'm not totally against it. I can point to areas where I like ads. I think ads on Instagram, are kinda cool. I bought a bunch of stuff from them. But I think it'd be very hard to—I mean, it'd take a lot of care to get right.”