The Shifting Sands of SEO

AI, Google’s Zero Click Searches, and the Future of What “Organic” Means in Marketing

Over the past year or so, we’ve seen some fascinating trends in organic search, especially with the introduction of AI into commonly used tools. It’s affecting how we approach SEO and plan organic strategies for our clients. For decades, Google has had a virtual monopoly on the search engine market, defining the rules of SEO as we know it. When we talk about SEO and organic traffic, we’re really talking about following the guidelines that Google sets. Play by enough of their rules, and your site ranks higher, gets more visibility, and ultimately draws more traffic from organic search.

Now, Google’s rules aren’t necessarily bad. Their goal is to provide relevant, accurate, and useful links to their users (while also making money). That said, they’ve been the main authority dictating how we, as marketers, optimize websites. But today, for the first time in a long time, Google’s dominance is looking more vulnerable. We’re already seeing that about 50% of product searches globally begin on Amazon, not Google. In Europe, that number jumps to between 61% and 74%. And when we look at generational shifts, things are equally bleak for the Alphabet company; TikTok is now Gen Z’s favorite place to start a search, with nearly 40% of young people preferring the app over Google. And Alphabet Inc, Google’s parent company, trails behind Nvidia and Microsoft in terms of best AI stocks to buy right now.

Speaking of AI, let me put to bed the idea that AI is creating entirely new rules for organic traffic; it’s not —at least, not yet. AI, after all, is still an algorithm designed to provide the most statistically probable result to a query. It’s still a computer. It doesn’t actually “understand” the question, it’s just processing data. And this distinction is crucial. AI still operates on the foundational principles of SEO, like reading H1 tags to understand the subject of a webpage. AI is going to rely on those same technical elements—H1s, H2s, internal links—to determine what a page is about. When AI relies on human language and context… well, you get the title image for this blog post. One that kind of, sort of works, but don’t examine it too closely. That’s all to say that for now, AI is not reinventing the SEO wheel. It’s using the same, if not very similar, code-based signals that Google uses.

Now of course, as an avid Science Fiction reader, I have to entertain the idea that we may eventually enter an era where someone “teaches” AI how to interpret websites differently. But we’re not there yet (except maybe in Sci-Fi novels). We’re still in the discovery phase, figuring out how AI impacts organic search. One of the clearest examples of this is the rise of zero-click searches. A zero-click search means users got the answer they were looking for directly from the search results page, without ever clicking through to a website. 2019 was the first time a majority of browser-based searches on Google were zero-click searches, and that percentage continues to climb. In July of 2024, a study revealed that nearly 60% of Google searches in the U.S. resulted in zero clicks.

Google’s AI scrapes sites to provide these zero-click answers to users. For example, if the 2012 you searches “What caused the War of 1812?”, you’d get a results page filled with links to sites like Britannica, History.com, the Smithsonian, or other educational institutions. You’d have to click into each site to see what depth and breadth of information these pages had. For the 2024 you, Google scrapes content from these sites and presents the answer right on the results page (basically British impressment of American sailors, maritime disputes, and territorial control, in case you were wondering). Users no longer need to click through to the source to get the answer.

This is undoubtedly great for users, especially those trying to win trivia contests, but life is not a game of trivia, and it’s creating a new challenge for content creators. Websites like the Smithsonian Institution or the USS Constitution Museum are providing this content about this War, but they aren’t seeing any organic traffic because users don’t need to visit their pages. The content is there, but it’s effectively being scraped (or stolen) by Google and displayed without a visit to the author’s page. From a business perspective, this is obviously problematic. Institutions like the Smithsonian rely on traffic to generate revenue, Google itself uses traffic as a signal for how to rank websites, and if users are staying on Google’s results page, that revenue stream dries up and could be negatively affecting that institutions’ ranking.

It also raises interesting questions about copyright and intellectual property. AI flirts with copyright issues because, while facts can’t be copyrighted, the way they are presented can. This is why recipes, for example, are kept secret—because they can’t be copyrighted. Once KFC’s 11 secret spices recipe was out, that was it. There’s no getting that cat back in the bag. So, is it fair that AI generates revenue from stealing the content businesses and blogs put on their websites?

That was certainly the question on Genius’ mind, the song lyrics website that calls itself “the world’s biggest music encyclopedia;” they sued Google in 2019, arguing that Google was stealing content from their website without any link back or attribution to Genius. Disappointing spoiler, Genius lost the case. But any SEO worth their salt was keeping an eye on its developments and potential ramifications for Organic Search. And I personally predict this will not be the last content-related lawsuit Google sees.

Regardless of Google’s future, what we know now is that AI still depends on well-organized, high-quality content to function. It needs crawlable, accessible websites with clear internal linking and proper use of H1s and other technical SEO factors. While zero-click searches are on the rise, AI (whether its Google’s, Microsoft’s, or NVIDIA’s) still relies on good old-fashioned SEO practices to scrape websites and present information.

This leaves us, the lowly humans, in an interesting place. SEO isn’t disappearing or going away, per say, but it’s certainly evolving and will continue to do so. We’re entering a strange, new era where content creators may need to rethink how they optimize for search engines and AIs that are more focused on retaining users on their own platform. The challenge moving forward will be finding ways to adapt to these changes, while still driving qualified traffic to our sites. And as to what these changes will entail? If you’re still reading this post, your guess is probably as good as mine.

The future of digital marketing is definitely shifting, but there’s one thing I still feel confident writing and shouting at all of our clients: good content and solid technical SEO are still the foundation of organic success—whether for AI or traditional search engines.