Perhaps during basketball games in elementary school, our teacher told us that being part of the team is all that matters. But once they became digital marketing experts, those of us who were bothered by that statement even back then could finally focus on what they wanted to know all along: their search engine ranking.
Now, whether you’re a blog post writer, a CMO or a startup founder, at some point, you’ll have read or heard that large language models, chatbots and artificial intelligence are forever reshaping how we discover relevant content. And maybe, you’ve had that brief moment where the brain short-circuits and it only seems logical that “traditional search engine optimization,” (SEO) from landing pages to blog posts, is dead.
But before you toss your Yoast SEO plugin and Google Search Console in the digital wastepaper basket, we should look at this in-depth. Because the truth is that, in many ways, old-school content optimization is still one of the leading strategies to get eyeballs on your brand, whether users are typing a question into Google or ChatGPT. Let’s discuss what the new but somewhat vague goal of blog SEO means for brands and how the new players should be changing SEO efforts.
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Why Does Search Engine Optimization (Still) Matter in the Age of AI?
These days, it can feel as if regularly monitoring the latest headlines from Silicon Valley is part of good business practice, simply so that the CEO knows what world-changing innovation he needs to prepare for the day after tomorrow. And you can’t really blame anyone following that logic, considering the language founders in the tech industry are using. From “Search is broken” and AI making browsers autonomous to the end of search as we know it — it seems like industry leaders are permanently at the brink of a revolution.
But even when it seems as though LLMs were magically creating responses from nothing when we ask for a poem about potatoes in the voice of Julius Cesar, their sources are strangely familiar. And that’s no surprise when you consider the economics behind it. Both OpenAI and Google have licensing deals in place to train their models on Reddit’s data, and as a result, it’s often one of the most cited domains.
Of course it’s more nuanced, but AI models are still trained on the same sources we used to search for by hand, from public-domain books and Wikipedia articles to GitHub archives or your brand’s SEO-friendly blog post. And sure, a Perplexity prompt will give you a different weighted average of sources than Gemini, but that’s been true for different search engines, as well.
What does that mean for your brand? Well, if you trust somewhat simplistic one-stop answers, you should go all in on the sources these LLMs pull from to reach more readers. But if you account for the fact that, at this point, AI models are sending 1% of traffic, you realize that a lot of things may be changing, but a lot are staying the same.
You may see different percentages in conversions or dropping site visits, because AI is changing the user experience, but an optimized blog post still serves the same purpose. It’s helpful content built around search intent, keywords and user value, no matter what crawler analyzes your title tag. AI models rely on the same type of formatted and easy-to-read content search engines need.
And that’s why blog posts still help your brand build topical authority and address complex questions. So the core goal in SEO blog writing hasn’t changed. You’re still answering user questions, educating buyers and supporting buying decisions. What changed is how much of the user experience your brand controls or even sees. Because your blog content will very much remain a core building block of visibility, but now that visibility is spread across Featured Snippets, AI model responses, People Also Ask sections and audio assistants.
We already know that traditional keyword research, slightly tweaked to account for chatbots’ needs, is still the best strategy to boost your brand’s visibility. The question is, how does that tweak change your goals, steps involved and timelines?
How To Plan Blog Posts That Rank — From Keyword Research to the Meta Description
Basically, we just established that “ranking” in the traditional sense is slowly dying, simply because at least for a while, Google Analytics will struggle to attribute traffic from AI models. But those kids won’t let their elementary school trauma go, so we’ll keep using the term to represent share of voice — how often your brand name pops up compared to competitors’, no matter where.
It may seem counterintuitive at first, but the first step should still be to clarify your SEO blog content goals and target audience. Five years from now, AI traffic might account for 50% or more, but if you haven’t clarified whether your content creation is supposed to serve search traffic, lead generation, product education or thought leadership, the AI model’s crawler won’t have a sense of what you’re on about. Translation: It won’t name your brand in responses, and neither will Google or any social media platform.
Ideally, you’ll want to define personas and think of questions these people might ask. You might even consider the different shapes these questions take when they’re asked on Google compared to YouTube comments, forums or AI chat interfaces.
This is also the point where your team should start using AI themselves, if they’re not already doing it. For one, pairing traditional search analytics with LLMs can make it easier to explore related queries, synonyms or angle variations. But an LLM-supported marketing platform like contentmarketing.ai can also help to brainstorm topic clusters and FAQs around a seed keyword.
Once you have that list, it’s only a matter of evaluating how difficult it is to “rank” or be mentioned by an LLM and whether search volume and business fit make it worth picking certain target keywords.
Most likely, your team’s research will tell you more than you’d like to know, but that’s actually good for your brand. Think of it this way: When someone asks, “What’s the best way to exercise?”, they’re not looking for a universal truth; they need an answer shaped by their fitness level, old injuries, available time and whether they’re training for a marathon or just trying to feel less winded on stairs.
The same goes for your content strategy: Your share-of-voice research might show dozens of keywords and topics where competitors, even those with the same offer, are mentioned, but your editorial plan needs to reflect your specific brand values, audience pain points and content goals. A generic listicle that works for your competitor won’t work for you if your brand voice is irreverent, your audience skews technical or your business model depends on educating users before they’re ready to buy.
For that reason, you’ll want to:
- Build topic clusters and pillars informing future articles that clearly signal topical authority to both search engines and LLMs.
- Map blog ideas to funnel stages and internal link opportunities to drive visitors further down the funnel.
- Use AI tools like contentmarketing.ai for ideation while keeping your core strategy human-led. Think: Title variations, outlines, FAQ sections, content format changes for repurposing.
Whether you’re trying to rank on Google or improve your share of voice across AI models, the rules and stats may change, but the core work is still very similar. So, let’s develop a strategy that reflects today’s media landscape, shall we?
How To Structure and Run an SEO Strategy With AI as Your Assistant, Not Your Author
One of the problems behind organizations getting bad press for their AI use is not that AI is inherently bad or “dumb.” Usually, it comes down to someone using it for a task at which it doesn’t excel without proper guidance or control processes in place. But if you know the components of a future-proof SEO strategy, you can make informed decisions about which AI tools will serve your brand’s needs, because you’ll be less dependent on the “recipes” one tool hands you. So, what do you need in today’s world?
The Key Components of an SEO Blog Post
Boring as they may be, we still rely on similar ingredients here, although AI actually gives you some creative freedom, because crawlers are less dependent on mechanical-sounding keyword stuffing. That said, you still need:
- Keyword-aligned H1 titles, subheadings and meta descriptions — though as AI gets better at understanding semantic relationships, expect this to matter less over time.
- Clear, skimmable hierarchies of H2s and H3s that mirror real user questions — likewise important now, but increasingly flexible as crawlers learn to parse conversational content structures.
- Catchy intros and hooks that address the main question early on — this will always matter, because both humans and AI models reward content that signals relevance immediately.
- Strong conclusions that recap value and point to next steps and resources — ditto. Satisfying answers get cited; rambling ones don’t.
Structure Content for Readability (for Humans, Bots and LLMs)
It’s never easy to please many gods all at once, especially when their preferences keep changing — whether due to a fashion trend affecting buying decisions or a software update changing how chatbots respond. We can make a few educated guesses, though:
- Short paragraphs and bullet point lists: No, we’re not suggesting this because that’s how ChatGPT responds. It has simply been good practice for decades before the advent of AI. Don’t write a short story when a quick list will do.
- Descriptive subheadings: They serve a similar purpose for crawlers, but for humans, they also save time, because they spare prospects from having to read pages when they’re just looking for one simple answer.
- Meaningful anchor and alt texts: These don’t just reflect the values of an honest brand that doesn’t depend on trickery to get visitors to click; they also make your website more accessible and easier to navigate.
We’ve all found ourselves in an epic battle with a hidden Homeric poet disguised as a content writer. No, just me? Let me describe what that looks like; I’m sure you’ll recognize it.
You, the prospective buyer or searcher, arrive on a landing page, hoping to answer a simple question — say, which project management tool integrates best with your existing tech stack.
Alas, the content writer had on odyssey in mind, a bodacious, nay meretricious, journey taking you both through subordinate clauses and qualifiers (not to mention the tangential divagations, where the author, channeling their inner fictioneer, felt compelled to contextualize their point within the broader paradigm, or realm, of enterprise-grade SaaS solutions).
Either that paragraph brought back the trauma you felt back then, or it gave you a taste. In any case, you now know why readability optimization matters, and why tools like Grammarly or LLM-based platforms such as contentmarketing.ai have become essential for content teams who understand their duty toward the reader.
These tools help your team:
- Spot overly complex sentences and jargon.
- Adjust tone and clarity for your target audience.
- Surface suggestions for breaking up dense sections into more scannable chunks.
Don’t Just “Write an SEO Blog.” Start With an Outline.
One way to avoid these issues from the start is to use an outline-based content production process. It’s a simple way to ensure you’re answering the core questions and mirroring the core intent before adding storytelling and brand flavor.
If your team prefers a more hands-on approach (maybe because you’re still experimenting with different styles), they can also use AI to:
- Draft alternative intros and section transitions.
- Generate example lists, FAQs or scenario-based explanations.
- Translate or localize content if needed.
- Optimize URLs, anchor texts and inline CTAs without keyword stuffing.
But Is AI Content SEO-Friendly?
Here’s the problem with that question, understandable as it is. Because of generative AI’s nature, there’s no one form of “AI content.” You could ask a model to draft a sonnet about manufacturing in the voice of Albert Einstein. Is it AI content? Sure. Does it make sense? Not really. (And we’re saying that on a blog that has certainly gone through more than one format transition.)
AI can speed up ideation, drafting processes and, to a degree, editing. It can also help your team maintain consistency and readability. But purely AI-generated copy can be just as bad as those weird generated AI haikus no human would ever bother to write. They look polished, and they’ll follow the prompt, but they’ll often lack the necessary depth and unique POV that make content convincing.
So ideally, you’ll want your team to treat AI as a writing copilot, with humans in charge of strategy, fact-checking and final edits.
On-Page and Technical SEO Essentials for Content Marketing in an AI World
I know, I know. The technical side of SEO isn’t sexy, but it matters more than ever, because if crawlers — whether it’s Google’s or OpenAI’s — can’t parse your blog content cleanly, you’re invisible. Here’s what needs to work:
Technical Foundations
- Mobile-friendly layout and fast load times.
- Secure HTTPS.
- Clean HTML structure with logical heading hierarchies.
On-Page Optimization
- Unique, descriptive title tags and meta descriptions for each post.
- Optimized images: descriptive file names, alt text, compression.
- Strategic internal linking that clarifies your content hierarchy and topic clusters.
- Schema markup (Article, FAQ) for rich results and structured data AI can read.
Final Pre-Publish Pass
- Keywords, headings, internal links and alt text in place.
- Use tools like contentmarketing.ai to scan for missing subtopics or user questions.
- Run a readability check to ensure the post is skimmable on desktop and mobile.
If your site loads slowly or your heading structure is a mess, no amount of clever writing will save you. Fix the plumbing first.
The AI Blogger Checklist (and AI-Era Mistakes To Avoid)
You’ve done the research, written the post and optimized the technical bits. Now comes the part where most teams trip: actually publishing something that holds up under scrutiny — from both humans and machines.
SEO Blog Checklist (Pre-Publish)
- Target keyword and user intent defined and validated.
- Outline aligned with SERP results and AI-suggested questions.
- Title, H1, URL and meta description optimized.
- Readable format verified (headings, bullets, visuals) with Grammarly or an LLM editor.
- Internal and external links added with clear anchor text.
- Technical basics confirmed: mobile-friendly, fast load times, indexability, schema where relevant.
- Human review for accuracy, originality, brand voice and compliance.
What Not To Do When Writing for SEO
Don’t keyword-stuff or write purely to “please the algorithm.” It reads badly, and LLMs are getting better at ignoring it. Don’t publish generic AI text with minimal editing — no expertise, no POV, no unique value means no citations. And don’t ignore E-E-A-T: if there’s no author info, no sources and no proof of experience, both Google and AI models will skip right past you.
Most importantly, don’t treat AI as a replacement for strategy. It’s a support tool, not the brain of the operation. And don’t “publish and pray” — SEO and share of voice require ongoing maintenance as search results and AI features evolve.
How To Keep Posts Performing Over Time
Use Search Console and analytics to see which posts get impressions or appear in AI features, then expand and refresh them with new data, examples and FAQs surfaced by LLMs. Build a repeatable workflow where AI accelerates production but humans own direction, quality and differentiation.
Don’t expect perfection on Day One. Your goal is to create content that’s strong enough to earn visibility today and flexible enough to update as the landscape shifts tomorrow. Do that, and no revolutionary change can hurt your brand.
