Publishers give on-site search a long-needed upgrade in the form of AI chatbots

Publishers are testing generative AI technology to update a rather boring function on their sites that hasn’t been updated in a while: search.

Forbes and the Financial Times have debuted their own AI chatbot search products over the past few months. Snopes will launch an AI-powered on-site search product by the end of this month, and Trusted Media Brands plans to debut a similar product for its video licensing platform later this spring. Meanwhile, The Guardian, Business Insider and another news publisher — which asked to remain anonymous — are also looking into improving their on-site search functions with generative AI technology, though they are in the early days of testing. 

“AI site search is an easy way for us to test AI in a low risk, low impact environment,” said a spokesperson from the anonymous news publisher, especially since on-site search is “not a widely-used function.”

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