For the past five years, I've written these annual State of SEO reports, and they've been pretty standard. Technical SEO tweaks, voice search predictions, user intent optimization, mobile-first indexing, schema markup importance... You know the drill.
But this year? This year, I'm actually excited to write this report.
For the first time in a decade, we're seeing something truly revolutionary happening in search. Everything we thought we knew about SEO is being rewritten by AI, and most businesses haven't caught up yet.
So let's cut through the noise and get straight to what matters. Here are the five major trends reshaping SEO in 2025 and what you need to do about them.
State of SEO in 2025: Top Trends and Action Items
1. AI Overviews Causing Zero-click Searches and Declining CTRs
The most immediate impact of AI on search is the dramatic rise in "zero-click search" results. This is when users get their answers directly on the search results page without ever visiting a website.
This shift is quantifiable and significant. Ahrefs analyzed 300,000 keywords and found that the presence of an AI Overview in search results correlated with a 34.5% lower average clickthrough rate (CTR) for the top-ranking page, compared to similar informational keywords without an AI Overview.
Bain's research confirms the widespread adoption of this behavior: about 80% of consumers now rely on zero-click results in at least 40% of their searches, reducing organic web traffic by an estimated 15%-25%. Even more concerning for marketers, about 60% of searches now end without the user progressing to any destination site.
But here's the fascinating paradox: declining traffic doesn't necessarily mean declining revenue.
Hubspot traffic decline has to be the hottest example of this paradox.
When Ryan Law, Director of Content Marketing at Ahrefs, posted about HubSpot's significant blog traffic decline, it became a hot topic in the SEO community. Many claimed it signaled the "death of SEO" or a major business crisis for HubSpot. But the reality was quite different.
As many discovered later, while HubSpot's blog traffic dropped dramatically (from 3.94M visits in January 2024 to 1.1M in December 2024), their revenue and stock price continued to climb.
The reason? As Rand Fishkin, Co-founder of Sparktoro, explains in his 5-Minute Whiteboard session - AI overviews and LLMs mention your brand as a trusted solution or recommendation, it creates powerful influence even without a click.
Later, when they're ready to make a purchase decision, they're more likely to go directly to your website or search specifically for your brand name.
What to Do:
Track brand mentions in AI results, not just traffic
Create exceptional landing pages for direct brand searchers
Focus on becoming the trusted source AI wants to cite
2. The Rise of LLMs and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)
Traditional search engines aren't the only players in the search game anymore. Large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity are rapidly capturing search market share by offering conversational answers to complex queries.
Research indicates that ChatGPT saw a 44% traffic boost in November 2024 alone, and Perplexity reached 15 million monthly users in late 2024.
This shift has given rise to a new discipline: Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). Think of it this way: SEO helps you rank on Google, while GEO helps you get mentioned by AI. It's about structuring your content so AI systems can easily understand it, cite it, and recommend it to users.
What's particularly notable is how LLMs are stealing high-value search use cases.
Bain found that roughly 40% to 70% of LLM users are already using these platforms to conduct research and summarize information (68%), understand the latest news and weather (48%), and ask for shopping recommendations (42%). These were traditionally the domain of Google and other search engines.
SparkToro's analysis of search behavior offers another fascinating insight: while LLMs haven't significantly reduced Google's 90%+ global search market share yet, they're changing how people use search across the board.
The data suggests people are using search engines primarily for navigational purposes (finding specific websites) and brand-related searches, while shifting informational queries to LLMs.
What to Do:
Develop content strategies for multiple platforms (not just Google)
Optimize social media profiles for discovery and engagement
Participate actively in relevant online communities (Reddit, Quora)
Create video content for YouTube and other video platforms
Maintain a consistent brand voice across all discovery channels
3. E-E-A-T is Non-negotiable
Search engines, especially with the increasing sophistication of their AI algorithms, are prioritizing content that originates from credible and authoritative sources.
This emphasis on E-E-A-T (Expertise, Experience, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) reflects a broader effort to combat misinformation and ensure that users are presented with reliable information.
Also as, the internet potentially becomes saturated with content produced by AI, which may sometimes lack depth, nuance, and personal experience, the demonstration of genuine expertise and experience serves as a critical differentiator for high-quality content.
Search Engine Journal's 2025 report reveals that "Better Aligning Content With E-E-A-T & Intent" is the top focus area for 21.6% of SEO professionals in the next 12 months, highlighting its continued importance in the industry.
What to Do:
Showcase author expertise through detailed bios and credentials
Incorporate real-world experience and case studies in content
Build authoritative backlink profiles from trusted sources
Display trust signals (certifications, testimonials, transparent contact info)
Create content that demonstrates deep subject matter expertise
4. SEO Is Evolving from a Mere Traffic Game
With zero-click searches disrupting traditional traffic patterns, SEO professionals are adapting how they measure success.
According to Search Engine Journal's report, "Traditional emphasis on website traffic volume as the primary KPI for SEO success is becoming increasingly outdated."
The focus is pivoting towards conversion optimization and the overall quality of traffic. In a landscape where organic traffic may decline due to zero-click searches, it becomes more critical to attract users who are genuinely interested in a brand's offerings and are further along in the conversion funnel.
Interestingly, research shows that keyword rankings (20%) and organic pageviews (11.7%) remain the top performance metrics used by SEO professionals, despite the growing recognition that these metrics may not directly translate to business success in today's environment.
Budget constraints are also driving this shift, with 41% of SEO service providers citing budget cuts as the primary cause of client turnover in 2024, up from 30% in 2023. This makes demonstrating ROI more crucial than ever.
What to Do:
Monitor brand-related searches and direct traffic
Connect SEO efforts directly to revenue in reporting
Focus on attracting high-intent users rather than maximum traffic
5. The New Content Imperative is Quality Over Quantity
According to SEJ’s State of SEO 2025 report, "Superior Content" ranks as the #1 most effective link building strategy for 18.1% of SEO professionals, highlighting the value of quality in attracting natural backlinks.
From LinkedIn • Tim Soulo, CMO of Ahrefs
Ahrefs' content strategy doesn't rely on funnel stages or personas. Instead, it uses a simple metric called"Business Potential":“Can this article persuade the reader to buy our product?”
Each content idea is scored from 0 to 3:
- 3– Product is essential to solving the problem
- 2– Product is very helpful
- 1– Product can be mentioned
- 0– No connection to the product
In the AI era, content tied directly to business value will matter most.
🔗 Read full post on LinkedInTim Soulo, CMO of Ahrefs, has come up with a framework to make this "quality" concept more concrete and business-focused. He calls it "Business Potential," and it's been the most important metric in Ahrefs' content marketing for the past decade – helping the bootstrapped company cross $100M in revenue with a team of only about 100 people.
The Business Potential framework offers a pragmatic alternative to traditional models like funnel stages (ToFu, MoFu, BoFu), awareness stages, search intent classifications, and customer personas. Instead, it asks one simple question: "Can I persuade the reader of this article to buy my product?"
This approach uses a 0-3 scale to evaluate content ideas:
(3) - Your product is an IRREPLACEABLE solution to a given problem.
(2) - Your product is very helpful, but not critical for solving the problem.
(1) - Your product can be mentioned, but it's not super helpful in solving the problem.
(0) - There's no way to mention your product while talking about this problem.
As AI siphons off generic informational traffic, the most valuable content will be that which directly connects to business outcomes.
What to Do:
Focus on topics where your product is an irreplaceable solution
Only pursue "thought leadership" (BP-0) content after dominating BP-3/2 topics
Create content that directly connects to conversion opportunities
Align your content production with business goals, not just search volume
Where Do We Go From Here?
Let's be real – SEO isn't dying, it's evolving. And that's good news if you're willing to adapt.
The winners in 2025 won't be the ones with the most traffic or the highest rankings. They'll be the brands that understand how search actually works now, as part of a connected ecosystem where influence happens in multiple places before a conversion.
Stop obsessing over traffic drops and start focusing on getting mentioned by AI, building genuine authority, and creating content that directly connects to your business goals. That's where the real results are happening.
And if you're looking for tools that are built for modern content marketing needs, Inblog has to top the list.
Inblog is a complete SEO-optimized blog platform that handles all the technical stuff automatically – we're talking Lighthouse scores of 90+, properly organized semantic tags, and mobile optimization that Google loves. But what really impressed me is how it's focused on converting readers into actual leads with built-in lead capture forms.
You can customize everything to match your brand and host it under your domain (either as a subdomain or subdirectory), which helps build domain authority. The analytics actually track what matters—not just traffic, but which content drives conversions.
The best part? You can try Inblog for 14 days completely free. Start your free trial now!
