You Need to STOP Doing SEO Now! Here’s Why…

Trying to think about all my SEO referral partners right now.

I'm gonna make so many enemies, but it's the truth.

It's how I feel.

I am assuming that Google is, going to deprioritize AI content.

And I have two very strong, , categories of belief here.

The first one is Google saying themselves.

, AI content is spam.

We're deprioritizing AI content.

Like they've come out and said that period, full stop.

I think we should stop doing seo.

, period.

Full stop.

I know that's an unpopular opinion, especially for SEOs.

, and I was wrong.

It's so much fun to be so wrong, and I also didn't know what implicit meant, so.

I think we should stop doing seo, , period.

Full stop.

I know that's an unpopular opinion, especially for SEOs.

, I'm a huge believer in organic optimization.

By the way.

I realize I own a Google Ads agency, but I actually think on a long enough timeline.

SEO helps you more than, , your Google ad campaign for a myriad of reasons.

It's not an or ever, it's always an, and so you always need Google ads and

seo, but if I were to attribute value to a tenured business, , I'd probably be

attributing 60% of, , , the value to SEO versus 40% to Google ads in a microcosm.

Where those are the two that we're comparing.

I realize that there are other channels.

here's why I preface with all of this.

There's no way.

, there's no way we don't see the biggest algorithm change we've

ever seen in the history of Google.

, on the heels of what's happening with chat G p T, you already kind of know

this because all we see are, you know, all these educators and influencers

coming up being like, look at this power page I wrote with AI and, , the way

that Google's been optimizing up until this point has been very content heavy.

And I realize that, know, link building, onset optimization, , usage,

like all those things factor into it.

But I know for a fact because we were the number one rank Google Ads agency on

the planet for a long, long, long time.

I got knocked off.

By the way, in the last, last algo update, I think I'm like on the

bottom half of the first page.

Now I still say we're number one though cause we're the best.

I know how to do seo.

Like I've done it for a long time.

We've done it really well.

We've done it in really competitive niches.

Google Ads included, and I have on a multiple occasions hit the top half of the

first page based solely on my Power pages.

The power page, the pillar post was the most important tool we

had from an SEO perspective.

And , not only is.

Going to have to change.

, I think that Google's gonna need to retool the way they think

about how they optimize content.

As a matter of fact, the search engine in general is now

going to shift thematically.

You know, Bing is already gonna roll chat g p t into being search.

And , what's interesting about that to me is I think from , paradigm

perspective, I question whether or not I question whether or not people's

comfort level with a single answer is.

I don't think we're there yet.

And, and this might be a, this might be a generational thing too.

We might find people that are like 35 years and over.

We're so used to seeing options, even if we get the quote unquote right answer.

, I think temperamentally speaking, I think that search results are still

gonna be really important to us.

I add myself in that number, by the way.

Cause I'm old, as evidenced by the gray in my beard, which was really devastating

when I started growing this out.

, people 35 and under might just be like, yeah.

Gotcha.

Thanks Chad.

G p t, who knows?

, all that to say, I think that search is going to be retooled entirely.

, and that might be on a longer timeline.

As Google rolls out Lambda and how it rolls out, Lambda has yet to be seen.

, , we can guess and I, I promise you I will.

, cuz there's no harm in guessing.

but Google's gonna have to retool the way that it optimizes con or

optimizes for content, ranks content.

, and you know, for the longest time you needed to do technical optimization, which

I think was kind of a foundational task.

I didn't think it required the monthly updates that most SEO agencies sold,

and I have reasons to believe that too.

Michael Cotham, who's the World Authority and seo, if you search

for the terms SEO consultant, he's generally speaking the number one

person who ranks for those search terms.

He trained directly under Raden Fishkin.

Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant seo.

, he's coached me for years and his very strong and Bulls opinion is, you know, we

do technical SEO once, and then you update it as the site changes or, , there's

algorithm shifts, but it's not this ongoing, , tweak , the nozzles thing.

So you do technical seo and then you build high value content and high

value links, and that's it, right?

Like high value content and high value links.

Now they lead to usage time on site, pages per visit.

Those types of things that we know are.

I can't say the words that we know because Google keeps trying to throw us off the

set, but that we believe very strongly are, , at least lag indicators of ranking,

potentially lead indicators of ranking.

The content is shot and because the content is shot, and you think

to yourself, well, I'm just gonna go do a bunch of link building.

No, no.

Now you can't, that, that's not gonna work for you either because

the, links that you are building are also predicated upon content and

the content generation is now gonna.

Heavily AI driven as we're seeing huge content, houses

are leaning on these AI tools.

, and I think have been for some time, but I think the proliferation

is , about to reach critical mass point that Google just can't ignore.

And so if I were Google man, I, I you'd have to flip the entire game board.

And my opinion is if I can't rely on content because it's AI generated and

I can't rely on the links because the.

Or live on top of a foundational ecosystem that is also AI generated.

, , , , and let me actually go all the way back to , the presupposition

here, which is important, right?

We need to define our terms.

I am assuming that Google is, going to deprioritize AI content.

And I have, I have two very strong, , categories of belief here.

The first one is Google saying themselves, , AI content is spam.

We're deprioritizing AI content.

Like they've come out and said that period full.

Category one, category two.

So that would, what would you call that?

That's the explicit, understanding, like Google has explicitly

said, and then there's the, what's the opposite of explicit?

Is it intrinsic?

I'm googling it.

I didn't go to college.

All.

What's the opposite of explicit

implicit costing.

You sil.

I'm not gonna have my editor edit this out.

I want everybody to say how stupid.

The implicit category of understanding would be Google

can't lean in to the tool that.

That would be its death rattle, right?

Like this is counter to everything that Google does.

Now, Google had its own tool, Lambda, then it could lean into

that, and it probably will.

, so my explicit category of understanding is Google's own statement saying,

Hey, we're gonna deprioritize, , AI driven content for a number of reasons.

To be honest with you, I don't disagree with yet, and that's

probably because I'm old.

It's the reason that like your grandma just refused to order anything on eBay.

She's like, I'm not sending my money to, you know what I mean?

Like, and, and she was.

She was right because like that was supposed to be a scam.

I've heard Jordan Peterson say this, he's like, eBay was a miracle

because the person, , who sent the money should have sent a bounce

check and the person who sent the product never should have sent it.

And yet we all kind of complied in this really amazing, truly beautiful way.

, that gives me hope for humanity.

But in the meantime, we're in this new leveling up, this new phase.

The trust for AI-driven content, , needs to be built and

it needs to be built over time.

And so the rate limiting step here isn't ai, it's humanity, and it's human

humanity's, a willingness and ability to adopt AI-driven content as something

that we think is truly of value.

and that's two tiered, right?

So you'd want to adopt it as a value, just in general.

Like, I'm actually willing to read this article knowing that a human

didn't create it, but believing that it still could teach me something.

And I think that that's gonna take some time.

How much time is, , variable.

We're getting so good at just adoption.

Maybe too good actually, maybe we move too quick.

And so, and but then number two is I'm also going to trust not just

that AI-driven content can be.

Generically, generally speaking, but also that the answer AI gives me is the answer.

And so it's, a dual access question.

It's, you know, the x axis is, is AI content of value?

Yes.

And then the y axis , is AI decision making of value as

it pertains to that content?

And those are the questions that need to be answered in order

to have a search engine, right?

So like Google needs to kind of figure out how this is gonna be

navigated and it's gonna change over time and it's gonna evolve.

And y'all, if, if Google got you surfed, I've always said this, I've said this from

the very beginning, , and I was wrong.

This is so much fun to be so wrong and I also didn't know what implicit meant.

So this is just a whole video of how costume stupid.

I always said that Google will.

Maintain dominance as long as we don't have a context change.

And I thought a context change.

And, and what, what I meant that by, that by the way, is like, like, you know, AR

or vr, uh, or, or a different device type even like Google is, is screen predicated.

And maybe there were, you know, who knows?

Like , there were the abilities to connect information in ways that weren't

necessarily built off of the same infrastructure that we currently have.

So I thought, Maintains preeminence for as long as we

exist within the current context.

That is the internet.

And the internet right now kind of exists.

It's, a separate world.

So you have like the world, the physical, tangible world, and then

you have like this, , the binary code that lives on top of it and

Google sort of owns that upper world.

Well as those worlds meld and we end up, and I always thought that AR was way

more of a threat than vr, cuz VR requires too much of a disassociation ar, meaning

virtual reality and augmented reality.

AR to me was really exciting because if you could.

Melt those worlds into each other.

, that's when you really had an integrated universe.

And, and that's where I thought Google was gonna get in trouble because they

didn't have the system that would be necessary to, you know, to operate

within the confines of three dimensions.

They have billions of dollars, they could build it out.

But I thought Google lost, , with a change of context and that's not what happened.

Google now is being threatened with a change, with a change in.

, what would you call it?

Is it just computing power depth?

So I thought that Google loses on the horizontal plane.

Like, oh, we moved from here to here and, I just was so, so convinced

that there's no way Google loses on the vertical plane cuz there's so

heavily ingrained and entrenched.

But we just didn't know how deep this damn thing could go.

I also thought Google would be the very first one to roll at.

Which don't write 'em off yet, by the way, like Lambda, I only know this from

YouTube videos that I've watched, but everybody who's played deeply with Lambda

and chat, g p t has said that Lambda's better and Google's just not rolling

it out because they have more to lose.

, as a matter of fact, I say this all the time, , I don't know why other

than this saying, I wish I knew so I could properly attribute it to them.

, pioneers get shot, settlers prosper.

It's not good to be.

is an almost ubiquitous truth.

And so it would make a lot of sense to me.

Google did this to Facebook with interest based segmentation.

, it would make a lot of sense to me if Google hangs back, sees what happens

with at G B T and then rolls out, even loses a little bit of market share.

They have the market share to give up and they can regain it instantly,

, and then rolls out Lambda based off of whatever mistakes they see

inside of the chat G P T ecosystem.

, what am I saying All this to?

Search engine optimization as we know it has to change, right?

Like, here's what I'd really love is I'd love for you to challenge me if you're

an SEO or if you invest in SEO heavily.

, I'm trying to think about all my SEO referral partners right now.

I'm gonna make so many enemies, but it's the truth.

It's how I feel.

, I don't see how right now we're all climbing a ladder that's

propped up against a wall and that wall's about to vapor.

And you, you'd have a hard time convincing me otherwise.

That's what I want.

Hit me in the comments if you think I'm wrong, if you disagree, if you

have a compelling argument against this, , I'd love to just have a chat.

We could have you on the channel, we could have a conversation back

and forth as to why you think SEO is still a viable approach.

, because right now where I sit, it's not at all and, and all the pillars of SEO

have actually been something nullified.

Technical SEOs going away just As CMS applications become better and

better and better, , you know, I mean, Shopify, when you roll it out

is basically already optimized, right?

All you need is a really strong feed.

And so optimization used to actually be at the code level and out to the

content level, and sooner or later AI's gonna take, and when I say

sooner or later, I mean basically right now AI's gonna take care of

that because technical optimization, , is content driven, which means.

Could very easily and probably already does a little bit, if I did a quick

little search, you could use AI for SEO friendly title tags, metatags

meta descriptions, , URLs, et cetera.

So technical seo, take it, put it in the camp of.

ai, commoditizes, technical seo, ai, commoditizes content creation, obviously.

And then AI Commoditizes link building, maybe least among those

three because link building still requires, link building is peer review.

It's a vote, it's a popularity contest.

You know, it's like, oh, home Depot thinks that I'm relevant and I'm a builder

of something and, and that's relevant.

And so, I'm relevant cause Home Depot is super relevant.

So link building I think is still important.

And, and really this, this peer review system, that page rank, , which is a

pun for Larry Page, , was built off of, , where every other search engine used

content on page Google used peer review.

It was brilliant.

It's brilliant, but it's still Gameable and because of the content that you're

using to link within is AI generated.

It's, it's questionable.

The degree to which I think.

Is yet to be determined, but some percentage greater than

zero, less than a hundred, right?

So you might say it's 10, I might say it's 50.

Somebody else might say it's 90.

It's fine.

We know that the efficacy has been diluted.

So I think the only thing Google has left now, it's user engagement.

User engagement.

Let me enunciate user engagement.

So Google can rank pages off of user engagement.

So that's time on site pages, procession, , within the page,

the, the type of engagement, , the quality of that engagement.

Now we think that Google has an inability to spot bat traffic, but I don't know

if that's, did I say bat traffic?

I meant bot traffic.

Am I having a hard time today?

Today's a hard day, y'all.

I need some grace.

, and Google has an inability to spot bot traffic.

instead of Google Ads.

, and we know that because it keeps selling us all as bot traffic inside

of display and Performance Max.

, so then the question becomes does it have that same inability to spot bot

traffic inside of the organic algorithm?

And it wouldn't surprise me at all to find out that they actually

have the tools to filter out bot traffic when it matters for them.

, but if they do, then , user engagement becomes the most

important ranking factor period.

Full stop.

If they don't, and AI can game that.

We're now entering a realm where, AI is doing to Google what we

were afraid quantum computing would do to cryptocurrencies.

, , you have this really sound, very structurally integrous

mechanism that's just.

, it's just getting outrun it.

It's getting picked apart by things that are smaller and faster than

we ever thought things could get, smaller, faster, and stronger.

So this is really interesting and y'all, for advertisers, it's so exciting.

This is the most excited you like, boom.

When you have a shake up like this that we know is.

Google's already been losing market share year over year as

far as like global medium mix.

Forcing them to get more competitive is gonna be better for all of us.

Me too, by the way.

Like as a Google Ads agency, you might think like, I want

Google to, maintain preeminence.

That's not true because.

When Google becomes the only kid on the block, everybody rushes to Google, which

instantly commoditizes every industry.

And now we're left in this situation where there's actually

really no ability to compete.

It's just the people who can spend the most win.

And, , , there's this squeeze that happens to all the SMBs, which are my clients.

So, , this is gonna be really cool if Google gets, , shook up.

I don't think this is, . I don't think this is Google Geden.

I I think Google not only survives this, but I, and again, because I

did drink the Kool-Aid and I do, , man, I'm just full indoctrinated.

I actually think Google turns this around and ends up and ends up with

a better product than chat G B T.

, but there's actually something here that can draw blood and draw so

much blood that I'm telling you the, the, the single most important thing

inside of the Google sphere is the Google organic ranking algorithm.

I mean, so much.

So I think it's more protected than every national secret in

the United States or something.

I, I don't know who told me that.

Don't cite me there.

I might have just made that up, but it wouldn't surprise me.

Right.

Like you, it, it's definitely under locking key.

, and they're gonna have to change it.

All of it.

They're gonna have to change all of it and prove me wrong.

Like, challenge me.

My assumption here, there's no way that's not the case.

There's no way they can't just have this, little.

AI driven marketing mechanism, running around billions of 'em now it feels like,

, fully equipped to game their system and not change the rules of the game.

So to parrot the original, , topic of this video, stop doing seo.

Full stop.

I am, , I'm, I'm still gonna create quality content, obviously.

, But it's gonna be this, like, this is where I think if you really don't know

where to go, go here, go to where.

And I know that there's deep fakes and all the, and I've seen actually some really

compelling deep fakes, but people can tell, you know, up until this point, at

least I think they can, I hope they can.

And if they can't, how do we know?

, I like creating content that people know is actually really human for as long

as people actually want human content.

And so, you know, start a YouTube channel.

,, I did this test on Twitter where I posted a, an AI.

Thread and instantly got called out by a Twitter follower.

, and so I think that, you know, within the, the, the confines of, uh, social channels

and, , especially where video and other media's involved, I think you still have

the opportunity to, , take the beach head to like, , carve out a little bit of space

for yourself just by being willing to, you know, I just spent 20 minutes telling

you why I don't think you should do seo.

Most organizations, entities don't necessarily have the time to do

that, especially the big ones.

So if you're small, like we're small, I have a hundred

employees, you know, we're small.

I know that's bigger than a lot of small businesses, but that's small as

far as organizations are concerned.

, this is where, in the meantime, I think

to spend money on content creation.

Anyway, I'm drone on there a little.

Mispronounce some words.

Um, what do y'all think of my background?

Yvonne made me do this.

He's my cto.

I'm going full on influencer.

, he actually came to my home.

It was very kind of, and he bought lights and I've got little background

lights and they changed colors.

, and I've got a real camera now.

So, , trying to take this as seriously as I can.

Uh, cause I wanna be nerd famous.

Appreciate y'all watching.