Is your website's content being used by Google for its artificial intelligence projects? You might have heard of Google Extended, which lets you control your content's usage.

However, Google Extended doesn't affect Google Search Generative Experience (SGE).

Here's why Google Extended falls short in this area and what you can do to fix it.

SGE And Google-Extended: What's The Disconnect?

Google Extended allows website administrators to specify how Google may use their content for projects like Bard and Vertex AI. By including directives in your robots.txt file, you can regulate content usage for specific AI purposes.

However, when it comes to SGE, Google Extended doesn't seem to have any impact.

SGE is part of Google Search and aligns with standard search directives, according to Google. You might still get your content used in SGE even if you block Google from using it for other AI projects.

In Google's own words, "SGE is a Search experiment, so website administrators should continue to use the Googlebot user agent through robots.txt and the NOINDEX meta tag to manage their content in search results, including experiments like Search Generative Experience."

The Challenge Of SGE AI-Answers

SGE generates AI-powered answers based on web content, including text and website cards....

...even from sites that have explicitly told Google not to use their content for AI.

Especially with AI-generated responses, this can be frustrating for website owners.

An Example Of The Disconnect

A screenshot posted by Glenn Gabe recently shows VentureBeat.com disallowing Google-Extended in its robots.txt file.

Yet, despite this clear directive, VentureBeat.com content was still used in SGE's AI-generated answer.

This example shows that Google Extended prevents your content from being included in SGE.

What Can You Do?

Your content might not be used in SGE if you've already implemented Google Extended for other AI projects. SGE only uses your content if you completely block Googlebot from accessing it.

This solution, however, may not be ideal for most website owners. If Googlebot is entirely blocked, organic search traffic could fall significantly, which many website owners prefer to avoid.

Conclusion

You can't stop Google Search Generative Experience from using your site's content with Google Extended. Instead, you should block SGE by blocking Googlebot completely.