The SEO in 2025 is a landscape unrecognisable in some ways – yet in others, it remains stubbornly familiar. Long-term market trends appear to vindicate Warren Buffett’s sit-tight-on-quality strategy, and over the years, the gains for Alphabet – Google’s parent company – have been huge. But on May 7, 2025, Alphabet lost 7.5% of its market value in a single day. That is enormous – over $150Bn in company value vanished in a twenty-four-hour period.
That’s a whole Warren Buffett! … or about two-thirds of a National Health Service (January to August perhaps?)
And those year-to-date figures looks pretty sticky too!
Table of Contents
Something is afoot in the world of Search
Check out the recent stock market performance of Alphabet – Google’s parent company.
Alphabet has steady advertising revenues and it’s substantial AI investment is bearing fruit with the competitive Gemini App. But still, investor confidence is wavering. Interestingly, the sell-off came even as Apple indicated it would not immediately end its partnership with Google as the default search engine on Safari.
That detail is telling. Google is not failing yet. It suggests the traditional search model remains commercially viable for now, but its long-term dominance is no longer taken for granted. The site’s use has declined in recent months for the first time ever.
Why is Google Usage Declining?
Well, let’s start by pointing out, that these trends are not irreversible. Successful companies can and do change but some factors are obvious.
Enshittification
In general, neologisms make me barf. But this one appeals so it’s going in an H2 – take that Google search bots.
Frankly, Googling just isn’t what it used to be. Remember those free newspapers where you needed to wade through pages of adverts to find the articles and the difference between adverts and content is hard to discern?
… well, take a good, hard look at your search results – it might seem depressingly familiar:
Add to this the fact that a good few hundred pixels is now made up of Google’s Search Generative Experience (SGE) (described memorably by our pals at KDA Web Services as “AI hallucinations”) and really you are wading through a lot of crap and expending significant mental energy to get what you want.
It may not cost money, but there is little sense that performing a Google search is free.
The New Search Experience
You may spot changes in your own behaviour before it is identified as a trend.
Bored with typing in numerous searches into Google to build sufficient knowledge to form a conclusion?
Ask ChatGPT (or whatever).
AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude provide quick, consolidated answers. Google is increasingly providing useful answers to “long-tail” searches but modern tools bypass the traditional search interface altogether. LLM AI tools serve up responses that summarise (and can often replace) the content provided by search results.
The content still comes from the Internet, from content which has been spidered and indexed it has then been re-interpreted and reconstituted as ‘generative’ AI content.
Of course, reports are legion that AI just “invents” content to fulfil the brief. But that never stopped you recounting your friend’s anecdote from down the pub. Caveat lector.
Farewell Google?
Everyone talks about ‘hoovering’ the carpet, but how many of you have a Hoover badge on the front of your vacuum cleaner? Will “googling” suffer the same fate?
The battleground is shifting from first-page results to being included in AI-generated summaries, citations and conversational answers.
… and no adverts (for now). But if you’re already paying for the use of an AI assistant for another business-related reason, this blesséd relief may continue.
It seems that brands will no longer be able to rely solely on search engine rankings rankings for visibility.
Given that spot 1 in the organic search results might well be at inch 27 on a 28″ monitor one has to start wondering what that visibility really represents.
What the Alphabet Sell-Off Signals
The drop in Alphabet’s share price isn’t just about quarterly earnings. It reflects a deeper uncertainty: can Google maintain its dominance in an era where the search itself is being redefined?
Yes, advertising revenue is still flowing and yes, Google remains the default on Apple devices – but that status feels more like a stay of execution than a vote of long-term confidence. If and when Apple rethinks its search alliance, it could reshape the entire market, especially if it leans more heavily into AI-native search experiences.
So SEO in 2025 … What’s Changed?
- AI is now a discovery interface: Content must now appeal to large language models and answer engines, not just search crawlers.
- Search monopolies are weakening: Even Apple is quietly considering alternatives to Google, signalling future fragmentation.
- Traffic is being intermediated: Users often get answers without ever reaching your site. That means SEO must adapt to indirect attribution and summarised content formats.
What Hasn’t Changed
- Good content still wins: Whether surfaced by Google, ChatGPT or another tool, accurate, trustworthy content is still the currency of visibility.
- Technical SEO is essential: Structured data, semantic markup and crawlable architecture are more important than ever — not just for Google, but for any AI parsing your site.
- Cross-platform presence matters: With attention fractured across apps, platforms and assistants, visibility means showing up everywhere — not just in one search index.
A Strategy for SEO in 2025
SEO in 2025 is less about climbing a single SERP and more about becoming part of the AI-powered knowledge graph that surrounds your audience. That means:
- Structuring content so that AI models can understand and cite it.
- Building domain authority to increase trustworthiness in AI responses.
- Diversifying content delivery across channels, from traditional websites to answer engines and voice assistants.
Gaining Visibility in an AI World
Make no mistake, traditional Search Engine rankings will important to your SEO. In 2025, though, gaining recognition through AI will be key to getting seen.
To gain visibility in an AI-based search market, brands must shift their focus from traditional keyword rankings to creating content that is structurally clear, contextually rich, and semantically precise. AI models, unlike classic search engines, prioritise understanding over indexing. This means content should be optimised for comprehension by machines as well as humans.
This is technical stuff and includes using structured data (schema markup), concise and well-formatted answers to common queries and authoritative sources that AI is likely to reference or summarise. More than ever, SEO in 2025 is going to need som expertise.
You need to look towards building a strong, multi-platform presence: including FAQs, knowledge panels, and citations across credible domains. This increases the likelihood of being surfaced by large language models (LLMs) in conversational responses. Visibility in this new paradigm isn’t just about ranking; it’s about being trusted, cited, and contextually relevant in a search environment increasingly driven by machine reasoning.
Final Thought
As Mark Twain had it:
“The report of my death was an exaggeration.”
Alphabet is a mammoth company with enormous resources and great companies adapt – but this is a warning shot.
The dominance of traditional search is being tested not just by competition, but by a change in how humans access and trust information. The future of SEO in 2025 and beyond isn’t about pleasing Google alone; it’s about getting seen (that means getting cited) and trusted in a world where machines are the new intermediaries.
If the changes to SEO in 2025 sound like a lot to take in (it is) – talk to people who know. At Little Fire, we understand what’s needed. We understand the jargon, so you don’t have to. We invest continuously in the tools required to drive people to your site and the expertise to ensure that once they’re there, they stay there.