Google announced several new services yesterday, but really, they announced the end of SEO as it’s been known for the last several decades. The world’s most important search engine has (un)officially killed off the traditional search engine results page of a list of links.
What do several digital marketing experts at Arc Intermedia think of this? Let’s find out together.
May Rowland, Senior Organic Visibility Manager
AI Mode is mainstream now.
Google’s CEO saying “billions” use AI Mode means AI search behavior is already mass adoption. When you read that Google still owns most market share in online search, consider that still means AI visibility, not SEO. Think of Google search as now being just like ChatGPT, except much, much bigger.
YouTube SEO just got way more important.
“Ask YouTube” means Google can understand video content/timestamps conversationally. Transcripts and educational video content become huge. If you haven’t been already, please make videos!
Katie Schieder, Director of Content & Earned Media
I look at these I/O announcements and I can’t help but feel conflicted. On one hand, the technology is undeniably incredible. The idea of a 24/7 background agent handling the tedious, fragmented chores of life (tracking down apartments, making phone calls to confirm bookings, organizing our messy inboxes) sounds like the ultimate convenience. But when you step back and look at the bigger picture, it feels like the walls of the digital echo chamber are closing in faster than ever.
We are moving away from an internet where we explore, stumble across things, and weigh options, and moving into an era where we outsource the actual act of discovery to a highly polished algorithm.
When a model like Gemini Omni or Flash synthesizes the web to give us one definitive, conversational answer, it inevitably sanitizes the nuance. It strips away the weird perspectives, the edge cases, and the human biases that actually make up real decision-making. We risk falling into a trap of total homogenization, where everyone receives the same perfectly structured, middle-of-the-road reality. If the internet were an ice cream store, I’m a little afraid that we’re stripping away endless fun, interesting, exciting flavors and will be left with nothing but vanilla (no offense to vanilla).
Patrick Coyne, Director of Organic & AI Search
Echoing Katie’s sentiments, the premium on un-synthesized human experience is about to skyrocket. The more seamless and automated the AI ecosystem becomes (like what Google is doing), the more desperate we are going to be for something that feels provably human.
I envision a period where everything — ads, emails, the receptionist at the dentist — is AI, and we all start craving the beautiful lived-in messiness of Human Intelligence again. To me, that’ll start with platforms like Reddit and Quora. So long as they can keep AI slop at bay (the social networks have already failed us at this), they will become the last beacon of authentic opinion and conversation. If I’m looking for a place to live, an AI agent can pull the listings and cross-reference prices in seconds. But it can’t tell me if the landlord is a nightmare, if the neighborhood has a specific vibe on a Friday night, or if the walls are paper-thin. For that, I’m going straight to a local subreddit.
Meanwhile, for anyone trying to build a brand or communicate a message today, the playbook has to shift. It can’t only be about optimizing a website so an AI agent can read its data. We need to recognize that as the web becomes more synthetic, trust will migrate entirely to the community spaces. Therefore, despite what all the think pieces are saying right now, the future won’t just be about content written by machines for machines — we’ll need to be part of the actual, raw human conversations where real opinions are formed and debated. And yes, those emdashes were placed by me, not by a machine. I still love emdashes.
Chyenne Smith, Organic Visibility Manager
I’m hopeful that Google’s deeper Gemini integration directly into search will create a more level playing field for smaller local businesses competing against larger brands and chains. As Google places greater emphasis on review sentiment, responsiveness, expertise, and overall customer experience instead of simply the quantity of reviews and basic profile optimization, we’ll likely see more locally trusted businesses surface in search results. Google’s push toward AI-powered search experiences and AI agents that can make calls to businesses, check availability, and help users complete tasks could also place more value on businesses that provide accurate information, strong customer service, and clear expertise signals.
We’ve already started to see this shift with Google’s newer social media updates that surface content directly from businesses’ social profiles in search results, creating more opportunities for businesses to showcase authenticity, engagement, and real customer interactions beyond their website or Google Business Profile. Businesses that relied heavily on traditional SEO basics and directory-style visibility alone may not benefit as much from these changes, while companies with strong reputations and authentic customer relationships could gain more visibility. Moving forward, we may see businesses put more effort into reputation management, locally relevant content, social media activity, and demonstrating real expertise in order to remain competitive in an increasingly AI-driven search landscape.
