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Especially CMOs and those responsible for a company's marketing success. AI-generated answers appear like a direct hazard to the standard natural traffic websites used to get from online search engine. Before, you needed to click on a website to see the results. Today, LLMs simply rip the content on sites and people no longer need to visit a site any longer.
While I personally believe this danger is blown completely out of percentage (based on data from websites I have actually personally seen), I don't believe it's an excuse to overlook it completely. From my own experience growing both blog sites and YouTube channels, especially to offer something, I can inform you that video converts way more than composed material.
It's a lot much easier to inform if somebody is lying or full of it if you can see their facial expressions and their tone of voice. YouTube needs to definitely be in your SEO and material strategy.
And because you have constructed the trust with video, your traditional SEO efforts will convert better. There's even more to it. Previously this year, I had an inkling that if I turned a few of my finest ranking article into YouTube videos, and embedded them into my existing blog site posts, my article would rank even better.
I made a YouTube video about the topic, embedded it into that blog post, and I have actually been ranking # 1 given that.
In 2025, we saw everyone talking about how AI search was going to take over Google. Beyond simply SEO, the marketing neighborhood as an entire begun to get bombarded with influencers trying to ride the AI buzz train.
It became tough to find trusted sources that weren't biased or had a prejudice to sell us something. While I do believe there are benefits to utilizing LLMs in our workflows, I do think it has been overhyped. And in 2026, I anticipate numerous marketers will understand that ChatGPT and Perplexity are just a little part of the SEO market.
Why Topical Authority Matters More Than Hyperlinks for San AntonioGoogle still dominates 90% market share and with its AI Mode and AI Overviews, it's in the perfect position to win the AI online search engine race. Search behavior hasn't basically shifted far from Google. Beyond just that, there are a few things that have actually rubbed me the incorrect way about the AI SEO pattern.
Some claim ChatGPT has a 16% discussion rate and is much better by more than 2X compared to Google. What these online marketers don't realize is that Things like homepages, pricing pages, or bottom of funnel content, tends to be shown in ChatGPT. The informative top of funnel content is "consumed up" by LLMs and revealed to users without anywhere to click.
If you were to take that exact same idea over to Google, you would see the same conversion rates. Google's conversion rates reveal less since the traffic is higher due to it being watered down by all the top of funnel material that is in the equation. Other things like how ChatGPT can make stuff up, it never completely follows triggers properly (i.e.
I do still think that bigger business will set aside an experimental spending plan to check things like ChatGPT apps and other AI SEO tools. But in 2026, I forecast people will realize optimizing for Google will enable them to reveal up in ChatGPT and Perplexity as well. Simply look at ChatGPT Atlas or Perplexity's Comet web browsers.
Do not do it. These techniques might work now in ChatGPT and other LLMs, but they're short-term plays that will ultimately get punished. Concentrate on white hat methods that build genuine authority and trust gradually rather of chasing quick wins that will not last. The 2000s are back. Scammy keyword stuffing methods, spending for low-grade backlinks, shipping thousands of ineffective short articles all in the name of ranking high.
Now, the algorithm is mature enough to overlook all that rubbish. ChatGPT and other LLM algorithms are not as mature. I can't name this individual, but I fulfilled an SEO director at a big banking company. This person told me they (and all their rivals) are producing microsites (like little blog sites) on various domains.
And from there, they are using their main company domain, that has an incredibly strong brand authority, and sending backlinks to the microsite. And this has resulted in higher rankings for their brand in LLMs like ChatGPT.It blew my mind that substantial, respectable business are doing this. And I realized just how much black hat (or grey hat) methods are going on behind the scenes.
In 2026, I forecast these methods will continue to occur. Until ChatGPT's algorithm gets as smart as Google's search algorithm.
Concentrate on quality over quantity. Share genuine insights, use your own images and videos, and build topical authority in your specific niche. This is how solo developers and little teams can beat big brand names in 2026. Niche blogging is back baby. However with a twist. This is one of the most significant SEO trends for material marketing I'm seeing right now.
You need a real service, be it a newsletter company, a service-based business, SaaS company, or ecommerce shop. And then you include on this human-centered specific niche blogging to the site to naturally grow your core product/service offering. In 2026, I anticipate that Google's algorithm will continue to get smarter about which web pages contain AI material and which do not.
I understand tons of individuals quietly squashing it with AI created material (even going after top of funnel keywords). However what I am saying is that engaging, human content will outrank AI produced content with no initial insights. There are 2 paths I see with SEO's today: Produce thousands of AI-generated post and get them to rank in the middle/bottom of page 1.
Produce a hundred human blog site posts and get them to rank at the top of the very first page. And anybody who composes much better human content will rank higher in positions 1-3. The 2nd route is slower, however can yield greater ranking positions and more trust with readers.
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