Google ramped up the “personal branding” dial, and most SEOs are still trying to fight it with basic things like title tags and more internal links.
But, there’s a catch. If your organic “growth” is just your name going up, that is not SEO, that is demand capture.
- With branded queries, people already know who you are.
- Non-branded queries is where the exponential new growth volume is.
The marketers that are winning are identifying content that wins new visitors.
As I’ve always said, focus your content calendar on buyer-intent based topics instead of padding reports with branded clicks.
AI is still single digit percent search volume compared to traditional search. That will increase over time. But since most LLMs don’t cite you in the final response, that’s why ranking in traditional search is still the first priority.
Traditional search still has higher search volume, and higher buying intent, as most AI queries are “write/make me a thing.” (non-commercial)
Second priority is becoming “source worthy” enough that LLMs quote you when it matters.
Treat AI search like a distribution channel, not a threat.
*Hint* Do SEO.
If a drop in traffic has you thinking “SEO is dying” after the latest changes, you are looking at the wrong scoreboard.
The latest search and AI updates are saying the same thing in different ways. Post fewer, better pages that answer whole problems instead of spraying out mass produced AI slop.
Protect the RIGHT traffic, measure influence and revenue (not vanity statistics), and build a brand that both traditional and AI search cannot ignore. Everything else is just musical chairs.
