The resounding answer? No.

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is far from dead.

But it is changing. Constantly.

Algorithm updates, shifts in user expectations, the rise of AI, video, user-generated content, and more are all impacting a new search landscape with changes and challenges that you need to be ready for.

In this blog post, we’ll be sharing:

  • A brief history of SEO and what we’re expecting in the coming year
  • How SEO supports your growth goals
  • A few tips you can start implementing today!

Why People Think SEO Is Dead

Every few years the rumor starts up again that SEO is dead. This rumor is likely fueled by the ongoing popularity of social media, a focus on paid advertising, SERP features such as featured snippets, and now AI overviews. 

But the fact of the matter is those “SEO killers” only increase the need for comprehensive SEO strategies that work in tandem with your other digital marketing channels.

Where SEO Has Been and Where It’s Going

Before we dive into how you can make SEO work for you today, let’s take a look at the SEO of the past to understand where we’ve come from and why we’re here

A Brief History of SEO

In the early days of SEO, the industry’s focus was primarily on developing website content loaded with keywords and linked to from any imaginable web source (ie backlinks). Let’s first discuss keywords:

The popular theory was that the more times you used a keyword, the more likely it was to rank. And it worked. For a time. Today, we call that keyword stuffing. As search engines became more sophisticated, they weeded out these spammy practices to promote a more user-first approach to content. Keyword stuffing will now only get your site penalized and demoted in the rankings. 

Backlinks, or links to your site from another website, are a key part of even today’s SEO strategy. They signal to search engines your expertise on a topic. The more relevant backlinks you have, the more authority you must have in that area.  But in the past, sites would use black hat tactics to gain a high number of backlinks – from paying for backlinks to creating sites used as backlink farms. In response, search engine algorithms adapted. 

Today, we understand the goal isn’t just the number of backlinks but the quality of those backlinks and the relevance they have to your site.

Nowadays, search engines continue to evolve to the point where it’s no longer simple tactics like keyword and backlink count that get sites to rank. It’s a combination of having a technically sound, well-structured site focused on the user experience and providing quality content that most completely answers the searcher’s query and the intent behind that query.

What To Watch Out For In 2025

2025 is nearly here and with it comes a whole new world of search. Here’s what you should keep an eye on.

  1. AI in Search: It seems you can’t throw a stone without hitting AI as a trending topic, but that’s for good reason. The rise of AI in search results (those brief answers at the top of your search results ) help give searchers what they are looking for in record time. They are the next evolution of the “featured snippets” and something you’ll want to include in your site’s SEO strategy.
  2. Press Play on Video Content: Video is no longer a nice-to-have, it’s a core element of any content strategy. And that means it needs to be SEO-optimized. Optimizing video titles, descriptions, thumbnails, and proper schema markups is crucial for improved rankings. Make sure every video on your site is set up correctly for search.
  3. Site Speed and Core Web Vitals: Ensuring your site’s load time stays below 2.5 seconds and passing Google’s Core Web Vitals is critical for search rankings. Slow sites provide a lousy user experience and will quickly lose ranking and traffic.
  4. E-E-A-T Signals: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness is the cornerstone of Google’s search algorithm framework. Google uses these signals to determine the quality of a website and decide where it should rank in search results based on the value and credibility of its content. Keep these in mind as you develop content. Always have the searcher’s intent squarely in the center of your content strategy. 
  5. Local SEO and Near Me Searches: If you have physical locations, you need a local SEO strategy. Location-specific search results are dominated by map listings. Proper local citations, schema, and on-page geo focus are critical for local rankings.
  6. Cross-Channel Collaboration: No marketing channel should exist in a silo! Make sure you’re integrating strategies and collaborating on content across SEO, social media, paid advertising, media relations, and email. Consistency in messages across these channels helps build your brand and ensures people remember you.

How SEO Supports Your Growth Goals

Every business has growth goals and search engine optimization is a key part of that growth strategy.

Boost Organic Traffic

PPC and paid advertising is an important part of any marketing strategy, but that isn’t the only way to gain leads. While paid advertising stops delivering traffic when the money runs out, organic search continues to grow long term. Optimizing your website for organic search gets you in front of prospects actively searching for what you have to offer. Developing and optimizing quality content across the entire buyer’s journey allows you to draw in leads and promote your services.

Deliver Answers and Drive Conversions

By focusing on the user intent of a search query, and providing content that supports that intent, you can reach the people who are ready to engage. Quality content and a seamless user experience help build trust and credibility in your brand and services. Using clear calls to action that help guide visitors through their experience on your site helps deliver leads.

3 Easy Things To Do To Help Your SEO Today

There are so many things that go into doing SEO correctly, but here are three you can do today to gain traction.

Research and Build a Target Keyword List

Before you even start creating content, identify the target keywords you should include based on the terms people are using to search for what you offer. You’d be surprised how often we find a difference between how businesses describe their services and the terms their audience uses to search for those same services. If they don’t match, you won’t show up on searches.  There are lots of tools for any budget out there to support your keyword research, including Semrush and Ahrefs. 

Update Existing Content

Once you have your target keywords, focus on your existing content and optimize it for those keywords. The most important keywords (often those with the highest search volume) should be included in headlines as they make sense. Include internal links to other content pieces on your site that might be relevant to the topic at hand. And most importantly, make sure your content answers the searcher’s intent as completely as possible. 

Broken links happen, but you need to take steps to fix them as they contribute to a poor user experience. There are a number of free tools that crawl your site and identify these 404 errors, including Google Search Console and Screaming Frog. Once you find them, redirect these URLs to the right pages. Or, if needed, link to the most relevant alternative content.

Search engine optimization is a core part of any marketing strategy, but we know SEO is often one of those channels that can quickly become overwhelming for internal teams. While it’s empowering to handle a few SEO tasks in-house, in order to get the real results from your website, you need experts. Get in touch with us so we can discuss your goals and how a comprehensive SEO program can help.