Is it worth investing in SEO in 2025?

The incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) into search engines, as well as the proliferation of AI-generated content, have substantially altered search engine optimisation (SEO) as we know it.

This integration presents unique challenges for achieving high rankings, increasing page visits, and maintaining content quality. Brands that aim to maintain a strong online presence in 2025 must understand these challenges and implement effective strategies to stay relevant.

Let's talk about the challenges and the solutions you should be implementing next year.

CHALLENGES IN SEO WITH AI INTEGRATION

1. Dominance of AI Overviews in Search Results:

AI-generated summaries, known as AI overviews, now frequently appear at the top of search engine results pages (SERPs). These concise answers—often fetched from different websites and summarised into a robust overview—provide users with immediate information, reducing the likelihood of clicks through to the original content.

This shift diminishes organic traffic to websites, posing a significant challenge for SEO professionals. Now there's hours upon hours of work with yet fewer results to show for it.

2. Quality Concerns with AI-Generated Content:

While AI can streamline content creation, it often results in material that lacks depth and originality. Think about it: AI doesn't create; it generates from a data pool that others have created.

When the same AI is generating content from the same data pool for different brands in the same field, then branding is lost. Your customers can't tell what your unique edge is anymore. If they can't tell, they might as well buy whichever they find first. Better pray that's you.

Search engines prioritise high-quality, trustworthy content, and the prevalence of AI-generated material can lead to a decline in content standards, adversely affecting SEO performance.

3. Increased Competition and Content Saturation:

The ease of producing AI-generated content has led to an influx of material on the internet. Even a trained monkey can generate pages of content at a go. This saturation makes it more challenging for individual brands to stand out and achieve high rankings.

4. Manipulation of AI Models:

There is a growing concern about the manipulation of large language models to enhance product visibility. Strategically crafted text sequences can artificially boost a product's ranking in AI-generated recommendations, potentially disrupting fair market competition and complicating SEO efforts.

WHAT SHOULD YOU DO?

1. Emphasize High-Quality, Original Content:

You should focus on creating content that offers unique insights and value to users. Right below the AI overview section is a featured section. High-quality, original material is more likely to get featured by search engine algorithms, above the rest of the SERPs.

💡 You Should Invest in Brand Authority and Trust: Establishing a reputation as a reliable source of information will help you stand out in an AI-dominated search environment. This involves consistently producing high-quality content and engaging with audiences authentically.

If you are a writer or an SEO professional, don't rely on an AI to write your content. It will just come out as another piece in the flock.

I asked an AI to give a solution to the problems mentioned above, and here's one of the things it wrote:

Stay Informed on AI and SEO Developments: The digital landscape is rapidly evolving with AI advancements. Brands must stay updated on the latest trends and algorithm changes to adapt their strategies effectively and maintain a competitive edge.

Honestly, this is just riddled with jargon—absolutely nothing with fancy vocabulary.

Sadly, that's what many brands today are feeding their audience with, and you wonder why your bounce rates are high. People CANNOT relate to your content. Content should be simple and direct.

To get real results from your SEO efforts, you must be special, not generic. Cutting costs by replacing real, human-relatable content with AI jargon isn't taking you anywhere in the long run. You'll only have loads of content no one takes up to a minute to read, and by implication, no one gets to the part where you linked to your product or service, which further implies zero sales from your content marketing. Good things don't often come cheap.

As a writer, to get real results for your clients in 2025, you will have to do better than write a generic prompt and hope for the best. You can't be mediocre. You must train your mind to find what works for the right audience and create more of it. A mind gets sharper with use and dumber with laziness.

What am I saying? Should you throw out the AI and work totally without it? No, AI is a tool; like every tool, it enhances work. A tool is only as good as the mind behind it. A painting brush in the hands of a toddler creates a disastrous blend of colours. That same brush in the hands of a skilled craftsman creates art.

Who are you, the toddler or the craftsman? Even the craftsman who doesn't challenge his mind to create continually can easily forget his skills.

This holiday season, take a break, reflect, draw an action plan and Do it Better.

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I am Sam Olasoji, I create sustainable, scalable website solutions for businesses. Connect with me for content on improving online conversions and transitioning into a sustainable, scalable website infrastructure.