Our Insights

Artificial intelligence might be taking over the world, or at least some space in your search results, but don't worry, SEO isn’t going extinct just yet. Think of AI as that overly efficient coworker who can help make your life easier by taking care of some ‘maintenance tasks,’ like summarizing content or helping you draft an email.

In search, AI-generated overviews have become the go-to for users looking for a quick answer, making them super popular for people who don’t want to spend a ton of time online. But despite the flashy AI advancements, SEO still plays a starring role in keeping your brand visible, credible, and successful online. In this blog, we’ll explore why SEO is far from doomed in the age of AI and how it’s actually the secret ingredient that keeps your digital presence thriving.

AI Overviews: Enhancing, Not Replacing Search

‍AI overviews provide answers by scanning large amounts of information online to generate quick, concise summaries to answer user queries. Think of them as the spark notes of the internet. These snippets are designed to provide quick, on-the-spot answers to common questions, making it easier for users to find information without having to click through multiple links. With Google’s AI Overviews, you have the option to dig deeper into an AI answer through the citations, which highlight authoritative pages that are relevant to the query. These citations, as of now, provide a unique SEO opportunity. Great content, with effective SEO, has the potential to rise above and earn a spot within AI Overviews, gaining web traffic as a result.

Everyone must prefer this easier route when searching, then, right? Actually, research shows that users are generally still a bit skeptical about trusting AI-generated content. According to an August 2024 SGE report by SERanking regarding the usage and trust of AI-powered search in 2024, 16% of users do not use or trust AI-generated content, and only 12% of users believe the results are trustworthy.

While many people do prefer the AI responses, there are still those of us clicking through to full articles or seeking more detailed information to get the complete picture. While AI-generated overviews are great for quick answers, like Taylor Swift’s birthday or a recipe for chocolate chip cookies, nothing beats a good old-fashioned deep dive to truly understand a topic.‍

The Human Touch: Why SEO Cannot Be Fully Automated‍

SEO is more than just dispersing keywords throughout a website's pages. It’s about truly understanding what users are looking for, creating unique and engaging content that resonates with a specific audience, and assessing and fine-tuning a site's technical performance to ensure a positive user experience.

AI is great at crunching data and generating quick answers. But it can't curate unique compelling content that’s nuanced, creative, empathetic, and authoritative in the same way living, breathing SEO experts do. People still rely on traditional search results to get in-depth insights. Users are still looking for amazing website experiences, including fast page loads and valuable content that aligns with their query. For this optimal experience, SEO continues to play a pivotal role. Optimized content, impeccable mobile performance, and technical improvements all matter and can’t be overlooked! The same goes for off-page SEO, which is all about building up your brand in Google’s eyes “off” of your website.‍

AI Can't Do It All: The Shortcomings of Automated Content

‍AI-generated content might be quick and efficient, but it's not without flaws. You can think of AI content as a fast-food drive-thru compared to a home-cooked meal. It’s good for quickly satisfying your hunger but often lacks the depth, context, and personalization of a meal from your mother’s kitchen.

Since AI relies on information that already exists online, it can churn out biased answers and misinformation, especially when it's not carefully monitored. These limitations highlight why SEO-driven, high-quality content remains necessary to build trust with consumers and gain authority on a topic. There have been some cases where AI-generated content has not met user expectations, providing outdated or incorrect information, as we see in this example below:

Such faults show that while AI has its place, it cannot fully replace the reliability and depth of well-researched and thoughtfully written content tailored to an audience’s needs. So, don’t think you can fire your content writers because you have ChatGPT.  The last thing you want for your blog is subpar, surface-level blogs generated by AI that lack that unique perspective that only you can provide!

Don’t forget, Google is one of the premier AI innovators and goes head-to-head with other heavyweights in the industry including OpenAI and Anthropic, but that doesn’t mean they want AI content to flood their search results. Google strives to surface the best sites and the best content to delight search users. Half-baked AI content won’t do that. And Google knows it.‍

Evolving with AI: How Lewis Media is Staying Ahead

‍At Lewis Media, we aren’t letting AI run us off with our tails between our legs. We know that we possess experience and skills that simply can’t be replicated with AI. Instead, we welcome AI into our work as another optimization tool. We can leverage it for daily projects like researching keyword topics, analyzing your website’s data, and even helping empower our partners. We provide focused outlines that can make our writers even better without giving them finished content.

With AI equally as big of a deal in digital marketing as it is in the tech world, our team must stay up-to-date on any updates and algorithm changes. We ensure that our client's websites provide positive user experiences, and that the quality of their content is trustworthy, containing industry expertise and authority.‍

SEO Lives to See Another Day‍

In a world where cars can drive themselves and a virtual teacher is at our fingertips, it’s easy to assume that SEO may be becoming a thing of the past. The reality is that SEO will continue evolving. That’s especially true when there is a monthly core update, or someone leaks some important ranking information from Google. Anyone who has delved into SEO before knows that there are always changes happening and evolution that needs to be done, so this is nothing new for our team.

While AI overviews and automated content have their benefits, they can't match the trust and depth of human-driven strategies. At LMP, our approach leverages AI as a helpful tool while continuing to prioritize high-quality, engaging, and personalized content. Instead of fearing a future where AI takes over, we embrace a future where AI and SEO work hand in hand to create the most effective and impactful online experiences for our clients.