ai search

Strong final sentence from an SEO expert who knows Google search inside and out.

The time to pivot to a post-Google environment is now.

Barry doesn’t mince words in his LinkedIn post. He’s saying what we’ve all been thinking.

But the message is clear. Publishers need to focus on audience strategies that exclude Google as a reliable source. The emphasis needs to be on non-Google channels, multimedia content, and direct brand traffic.
In the next few years, many publishers will be unable to survive. The damage AI Mode will cause to the publishing industry will be felt for decades to come.

Also worth checking out: The Rebooting Show's Google Zero episode.

By now, you've heard of AI Mode, a ChatGPT-style feature inside Google search.

When Google released AI Overviews, just about everyone trying to funnel traffic from search engines noticed their site visits decline. Google’s official stance is fewer but "more qualified clicks." But the AI-generated results are all too convenient. Users get what they need and skip websites entirely. With AI Mode, users will have less reason than ever to exit Google’s interface. Rand Fishkin traced this evolution from search engine to walled garden in 2019.

One option is to play along—optimize for AI answers, match what the algorithm rewards, and wait for Google's next move.

The harsh alternative I’m considering is to rethink everything—from our reliance on (Google) search to business models built for what’s coming next.

I’m down every rabbit hole as I pack my week, telling clients about diversifying their traffic sources, reading up on AIO and AI Mode, parsing the whirlwind of updates about what all this means for digital media, installing MCP servers—you get the idea.

There’s no turning back from this. It’s not just another algorithm to adapt to. So whatever you do, don’t wait for Google.

Its CEO proposed a strategy many SEO teams would consider heresy: reduce reliance on search traffic.

He’s set up a membership program for instance, which currently has more than 2,000 paying subscribers. He’s thinking about other formats that should be resilient to AI, like book publishing and an app. And he’s not giving up hope.

All that makes sense. The path forward reminds me of AOP's Richard Reeves interview with The Drum.

Publisher independence begins with moving away from a single-source approach:

The ad market is simply too capricious to be relied upon as a sole source of funding. Display advertising may still be the largest revenue driver, but its total share has shrunk significantly, with subscriptions now nipping at its heels at nearly a third of premium publishers’ revenues.

What about subscriptions? This model will eventually reach saturation. For stability, look to diversified, complementary revenue streams:

With many publishers pursuing advertising and subscription models in tandem, we’re also seeing the ways the two complement one another. When you no longer have to extract maximum value from every fly-by-night visitor dropped by a search engine, you can take a quality-over-quantity approach. A core, loyal, cultivated audience is ideal for direct deals and private marketplaces, cutting out the programmatic bloat that can make many corners of the web unnavigable.

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What content works well in LLMs?

To answer the question, Kevin Indig analyzed 7,000+ citations across ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overviews. What's starting to emerge are patterns anyone wanting to remain visible online should take note:

• Traditional SEO signals like backlinks and domain authority barely register or even correlate negatively
• Content depth drives citation; comprehensive answers win
• Readable writing (measured by Flesch score) matters significantly
• Brand recognition heavily influences ChatGPT (.542 correlation) but less so for Perplexity (.196) or Google AIOs (.254)