Zack says: “My additional insight is, in a world driven by AI overviews and crowded SERPs, to really prioritise human-centric content and the customer's voice in your content marketing strategy.”

Okay, lots to unpack there. How would you summarise the AI-driven and evolving SERP landscape at the moment?

“The SERPs are crowded. People are searching in a lot of different ways, not just on Google. They're going to AI search engines. They're going to other platforms.

The goal here is to really make sure, when you're creating content, that you use the customer's voice and do that research to figure out what your audience is really looking for to make sure that, in your content, you're answering those questions directly.”

Use the customer's voice. How do you know what the customer's voice sounds like?

“You might not know what it sounds like, but you know what they're searching for or what they care about.

The biggest way to do that is by doing keyword research. It's really the bread and butter of your strategy. There are obviously a lot of different platforms that you can do this research on, but I think one of the best ways to also do this is to start to go to other platforms and look at user-generated content to see what people are really talking about.

Then you can obviously see what these forums rank for and what your competitors rank for, to make sure you're prioritising the right things.”

Do you prioritise the right things based upon keyword volume or is there a more extensive approach that you have to use nowadays?

You talked about looking at different platforms to see what people were talking about. What happens if you look for phrases and discover phrases that people are talking about that don't have any obvious search volume?

“Yeah, and most of them won't. Obviously, demand is half the story. The bigger part of the story, in my opinion, is relevancy and that search/user intent. That's really why I'm going to these other platforms to analyse what people are saying.

Honestly, most of the time now, you're not really going to find relevant keywords with good demand. People type very conversationally, stream of consciousness, long term, and long tail. It's more important to just make sure that you're matching what your users care about and not always focusing on what keywords have the most attractive search volume.”

What does this mean for the content that you end up publishing on your website?

Do you have to be very focused, in terms of using very long tail keyword phrases that determine what a page is about? Is it necessary nowadays, for instance, to have less content on a page, and perhaps it's less successful having a piece of long-form content now?

“There's definitely a balance. It's also important to do that type of competitive/SERP analysis. Check what else is showing up out there.

There could be instances where short-form content is beneficial. There could be instances where having it all on one page is beneficial. I've seen instances where both kinds of content appear on the SERP for the same queries. I think the goal here is – Google's smart enough now to retrieve and generate the content that they want to show for the query.

It's more so making sure that what your user cares about is in the content, regardless of how long it is.”

It's interesting what you're saying about different forms of content appearing in the SERP for the same query.

A few years ago, Google delivered a very similar experience – as in, delivering a similar set of results on the same SERP – but, nowadays, is it actually testing itself to see what gets the biggest click-through rate?

“I feel like that's realistically what's happening: they want to better understand what people are going to click on based on what type of query. That's why there's constant volatility within the SERP nowadays, even in AI overviews.

Sometimes you'll have one little snippet show up from one part of the article, and it brings you directly there. Sometimes the entire article’s around that one topic. Sometimes you'll have videos in there from YouTube, where they're really just trying to test out what people want to click on and what people care about.

At the end of the day, they want people to stay on Google. They don't want to lose their market share. I know they obviously have the biggest market share out of all the search engines, but it is now dropping below 90% for the first time in the last decade.”

As a business, how do you actually make the decision in terms of what type of content to produce for a particular keyword phrase that you're targeting?

“That's definitely one of the harder questions, and that's where it's not just on the SEO team to really decide this. That's why you do need to break down the silos and work collaboratively with other departments to figure out what works best.

In some instances, I've had clients actually use different types of content across the board. They might create a video or a podcast and then repurpose that into an article. That way, no matter where people are searching/where people are finding you, you still have the same brand, you have the same tone of voice, and you're repurposing this content in different mediums.

All that could technically be shown based off of the query.”

Do you try to decide which stage in the buyer cycle people are on when you're actually producing a piece of content?

“Yeah. I think that's also one of the biggest stages. In the earlier stages, when you're doing that research, you want to understand the intent. That's going back to that SERP analysis. What other types of content are showing up? Take a step back and think, ‘If I was a user, if I was a consumer, what part of the journey would I be on? What kind of content does Google want to show for this type of query?’

That's definitely half the battle because, if we're not creating content the way that Google wants to show it for the query, you're not really going to show up.”

When you're talking about succeeding in an AI-driven and evolving SERP landscape, what does this mean for optimising for AI-type snippets in the SERP?

Are there different SEO activities that need to be done in order to do that?

“The first thing is you should still optimise the way you would for any type of page. Use the right keywords in your title and your header tags but I think that it's also being more concise and structured within your content: making sure that you have an ordered list and making sure that you're answering the question directly, typically higher up within the content.

Then there are also some technical things you could do. I know there's some debate around whether structured data and schema markup actually are being used by these LLMs, but I do think they are being used by AI overviews because it shows that you're more credible and you're feeding Google more data around what your page is about.

The first step is optimizing your content as you would normally, but then it's also making sure you're answering the right questions that Google wants to show. A big part of that is tracking the keywords you care about and seeing if AI overviews are generated. The first step is making sure: does this keyword even show up in that result type?”

Do you ever recommend using AI to produce content?

“I would recommend not fully using AI to generate all your content – that's obviously against Google's guidelines too. They have stated that using AI for content creation could be an effective way to help with your creativity.

What I really think AI is better used for is being smarter with your time. Instead of having to create an entire content outline right away, why don't we use AI to help generate some ideas on what we should write around? Then, you can hand that to your content writers who map your company's tone and your voice and produce that high-quality content.

I think there are a lot of ways to be more efficient with your time. Even generating certain paragraphs can be helpful. Then you rework it. You workshop it a little. But, instead of focusing all your tedious time on these activities, you can focus on larger strategic things and help AI take away some of the things that may have taken a long time beforehand.”

I guess one of the challenges with an AI-driven SERP in 2025 is that people are more likely to get the answer they're looking for directly on the SERP.

If they do that, and there are zero clicks through to your website, how do you measure success?

“It's tough. That's the biggest thing, where people are thinking, ‘Why am I spending time creating and optimizing content if no one's going to click on it?’

However, I would also pose back to you: if you're not creating content, you're definitely not going to be referenced in the AI overviews, and you're definitely not going to get any clicks. I do think traffic and clicks are going to decrease – and have decreased across the board because of what's happening.

However, I also think people will start to realise that, if you're showing up in these areas, you might get traffic from other channels. Maybe it's more direct traffic. Maybe, when people are in their early-stage informational journey, they're not intending to click and read your content but, down the road, you're still building that authority. You're still ranking for the true keywords you care about that will actually lead to conversion.

It's definitely a battle and it's something you have to talk to your team about – and explain to your executive teams as well. Traffic is not going to be the same as it once was, but we have to really focus more now on creating this content to build that authority, which will eventually lead to downstream funnel metrics like conversions, lead gen, and things like that.”

You talk about building your brand as an authority. What does creating authentic authoritative content, that addresses real user needs, actually look like in 2025? Do we have to make sure that the content is from a recognised expert in that particular industry?

“I would recommend including that type of authorship within your content. Google does want the content to be helpful, unique, and authoritative. One of the best ways to do that is to add authorship.

I don't necessarily think it always needs to be someone that's been in the industry for 10-15 years, but having that authorship at least helps Google better understand, ‘Okay, there's a real person behind this page and they are creating content for the user.’

In terms of creating authorship, it's not just having a byline. It's also then creating an authorship page, linking out to that, and showing them that you're creating content in this industry, even if you've only been in it for a few years. It's Google trying to confirm that there's a real person creating content around this, and they are talking about this topic for a reason.”

How does this measurably impact trust, user experience, and perhaps conversion rates as a result of doing this? Are we saying that the user enjoys the content and embraces what's being said because it's more relevant to their needs, and they are more likely to convert because of that?

“I think it's a mix. When users see that it's a real person writing the content, it could help in some instances in terms of social proof – ‘There's a real person here. They're actually giving me some insights that are beneficial.’

I have done studies with clients where we've created authorship content that, previously, there were no bylines and we didn't have authorship pages, and it led to measurable impacts. They saw an increase in traffic, an increase in rankings, and then an increase in conversions.

So, it does also seem that Google prefers this type of content that's written by real people and they can see who the person is. It's a balance. Users, one, will trust it more if they know who's writing the content and, two, Google will actually benefit you because of that. It’s definitely a mix there.”

When you bring in metrics like increasing conversions, it's not a very traditional SEO metric. How can you actually be comfortable that your SEO activities have resulted in improved conversions?

“You have to track everything. Obviously, not every page with authorship is going to instantly rank for the intended keywords, but I think it's tracking and adapting. You need to monitor before and after.

One thing you could do is set up pages that don't have authorship and other pages that do, track it and monitor it, and see if there is a measurable increase.

It gives you a better understanding. Are these pages that we're creating content around leading to general increases across the board, or are the other pages that we're supporting (the product pages, your service line pages – obviously, you should be creating content around the things you care about the most) also increasing in conversions and increasing in traffic?

You can try to better prove that we are becoming more authoritative because of all the things we've done here.”

You talked about the changing SERP. How do you keep track of the changing SERP, and how do you make the decision that your SEO strategy has to change based upon the SERP landscape changing so much?

“One of the things you do is you can use an SEO platform to track your keywords to better understand what's going on. That way, if you're tracking these keywords, you're collecting that historical data, and you're better understanding what the SERP looked like beforehand and what it looks like now.

Obviously, if you don't have an SEO platform, you could just go to Google and check it out that way. It will be a little bit more personalised, so try to do it in incognito mode, but it's checking and keeping track of what domains are appearing and what result types are appearing.

Google is constantly changing, so you need to really stay ahead of that.”

How often should your SEO strategy be tweaked/changed?

“I mean, it depends on what type of industry you're in. If you're in the e-com industry, the SERPs have drastically changed in the last year, where it's a shoppable experience now directly on Google. In retail, you have to really stay on top of that and try to focus more on improving different PDPs and PLPs.

It depends on the industry. You always have to keep monitoring this. It's ever-evolving but, if you're not tracking these keywords and keeping a finger on the pulse each month on what your SERP looks like, you're going to fall behind.”

It used to be that you could perhaps sit down at the beginning of the year and then produce a bit of a content and SEO strategy as a result of what the business was going to do and wanting to do and what SEO could achieve.

Are you saying that you have to be much nimble now and maybe sitting down once a year isn't as effective as it used to be?

“Definitely not. Things have changed just in the last few months. If you wait a year, you're definitely going to fall behind. Obviously, it's important to set an overall strategy maybe yearly, but I think you need to stay on top of things every single month and just see if you need to change certain aspects of your strategy based on what Google's doing.

Whether it's an algorithm update, a SERP change, or something your competitor's doing, if you're not constantly monitoring this, you're going to be left behind.”

If an SEO is struggling for time, what should they stop doing right now so they can spend more time doing what you suggest in 2025?

“Honestly, I would stop thinking so much about page speed and Core Web Vitals. Obviously, I think it's an important metric to just have as a baseline but stop spending so much time trying to get your score from 80 to 90.

Focus more on creating content that's relevant for your industry and your users.”

Do you have to publish content consistently or can you just research and determine the top keywords that you want to target in your particular niche/industry and, as long as you've got that covered, then it's not essential to keep on publishing new content?

“I wouldn't say you always have to create new content. I think there's a balance there, where you could also repurpose some of your existing content and make it a little bit better, whether it's optimising one page or consolidating it.

Obviously, you should always be creating content each year but, every week, you don't need to just create new pages because, usually, it's going to be thin content and it's not going to be that valuable.”

Zack Kadish is SEO Director at Conductor, and you can find him over on LinkedIn.