• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer, July 25, 2025

Personalization took a sharp turn this week when Google introduced two features being tested in Labs. The question became whether these can help people discover something they didn't realize they wanted to know.

One feature, Web Guide, processes search queries and reorganizing traditional links — like pages related to specific aspects of queries — by sorting results and finding related questions using generative AI.

It’s not clear whether the technology will pull out specific weighted words with higher intent or importance — or how publishers ensure their websites are pulled in to include in the results.

We know a little less about Preferred Sources, another feature that allows those with access to click a star icon to designate specific publishers as their preferred news source.

Those designated sources will serve up in the results more often when searching for information about specific news. Sources that are not updated regularly may not be available.

These announcements come as Google faces heightened scrutiny about its impact on publishers.

Publishers and content creators must now consider how AI technology interprets content, structure and meaning when developing optimization strategies.

Structured data implementation gains increased importance in AI environments because it helps systems understand context and relationships within content.

Google’s Web Guide’s approach aims to provide a broader overview of a topic. It is helpful for multi-part questions and exploratory searches, such as how to take care of a certain type of tree under a particular weather condition.

Similar to AI Mode, Web Guide uses a query fan-out technique, concurrently issuing multiple related searches to identify the most relevant results.

I am curious about whether it understands when someone searching needs something before they know it’s needed based on word choice that determines intent.

How does anyone find anything new otherwise?

When I searched for “how to care for a Gala apple tree in subzero degree weather,” Google’s Web Guide surfaced several relevant web pages, followed by an AI-generated summary and links listed under different categories such as general tree care or general winter care.

Some results came from educational resources, and others from Reddit and Quora.

Those who are interested in trying it can opt in to the feature in Google Labs.