AI Max: Now Google Picks Your Landing Page | Lisa Raehsler

Google's AI Max does not just pick your keywords anymore - it picks the landing page it sends paid traffic to, off your own site. Lisa Raehsler, founder and principal SEM strategist at Big Click Co, has the spreadsheet of what you can still opt out of and what turns mandatory in February. Her verdict on the rollout: another Tuesday of Google taking control away from advertisers.

Lisa has spent her career in paid search and paid social, contributes to Search Engine Journal, and writes The Paid Media Mix. She came back on Unscripted SEO the same day a batch of AI Max features flipped live in her own accounts, and what she describes is the shift SEO is already living through, arriving on the paid side. Nobody types "project management software" anymore. They type what kind of project management software works with Slack for a small team working internationally. Keywords cannot hold that. Intent can. The full written recap of the conversation is here.

In this episode

• Keywords triggering ads gives way to intent triggering ads - and the old ad-group buckets are what breaks first.
• AI Max reads the intent, writes the ad, and picks the page on your site to answer the query. That third step is the one nobody budgeted for.
• Site quality just became a paid media problem. If Google chooses the page, thin and generic pages spend your ad budget, which is exactly when the paid team and an SEO advisory conversation stop being separate meetings.
• It works beautifully for e-commerce, movies and theaters. It falls apart for B2B, for thin sites, and for anyone running priced landing-page variants.
• Third-party landing page tools now need an explicit opt-out if you do not want Google routing around them.
• The window is shorter than it looks - some features already flipped and can still be opted out of, a bigger batch goes mandatory in February.
• Local Service Ads are migrating into Google Ads, and Google Guaranteed still means background checks plus industry-specific licensure.
• ChatGPT ads are low converting and only loosely matched, served against the whole topic rather than the actual question.
• The automation is really imperfect, which is where humans stay in the loop - the exclusions, the ad copy and the page all still need human-certified, expert-sourced content behind them.

Chapters

• (00:00) Keywords stop triggering ads, intent starts
• (01:36) The query that broke the keyword bucket
• (03:12) What AI Max actually does on your behalf
• (04:30) Google's motivation, and the February deadline
• (06:24) Another Tuesday of taking control from advertisers
• (08:25) When automatic landing pages help, and when they hurt
• (10:42) Local Service Ads move into Google Ads
• (13:45) What Google Guaranteed vetting actually requires
• (15:56) Are ads coming inside AI Overviews?
• (18:07) ChatGPT ads: low converting, loosely matched
• (19:45) What happens to third-party landing pages
• (20:18) Build the six-month plan before February
• (24:18) Why SEO and PPC should pool the budget
• (25:52) What clients are actually asking about
• (28:18) Where to find Lisa

Notable quotes

"I think it's another Tuesday of them making decisions and trying to take control away from advertisers."
— Lisa Raehsler

"They're able to then create an ad to match the intent, and then they're able to locate a landing page on your website to answer the question. That's what the whole AI Max thing is."
— Lisa Raehsler

"You definitely don't want to do nothing."
— Lisa Raehsler

Lisa posts as @lisarocksSEM and takes transition-planning work through Big Click Co.

Unscripted SEO is hosted by Jeremy Rivera. Every episode lives at unscriptedseo.com.