Google just published its first official guide on AI search optimization (AEO/GEO).
TD;LR:
→ SEO is still the foundation - nothing changed
→ Write people-first content, not commodity filler
→ Skip the "GEO hacks" (chunking, llms.txt, etc.)
https://t.co/r6rKV9EIES
Nothing quite like the blank pages of a fresh notebook!
Notebooks are now rolling out in the @Geminiapp. Organize conversations, notes, and other sources related to a single project (and easily go back and forth between @NotebookLM to go deeper). Rolling out today, starting with Google AI Ultra, Pro + Plus subscribers on the web.
Today, we are excited to introduce a new feature in the Search Console Performance report: weekly and monthly views. https://t.co/eZCsIGWJbd
This new functionality allows you to adjust the time aggregation of any of the performance charts, helping you smooth out daily changes and focus on the overall trend of traffic to your website.
Catch up on last week with the SEO Video Recap covering the Google June 2025 core update, other search volatility, Search Console Insights report, ads, local and more https://t.co/DigFMIMobi
I almost chalked up my latest course pre-sale (CloudPanel Mastery) as a failure. I’m used to launch days being total bangers, especially with the email lists I build. But I kept pushing and it’s turned out great! The presale closes tonight, so it's last call if you want in
Making the switch to GenerateBlocks 2.0? Jonathan Jernigan has created a great video to help you get up to speed on some of the innovative changes. Whether you're new to GeneratePress or you've been using it for a while, this video is an exceptional overview. https://t.co/8NJ800aQVg
Agencies looking to attract new clients must demonstrate their expertise in creating performant websites, and their own websites are no exception. The GeneratePress Affinity starter site is perfectly suited for agencies and other service businesses.
https://t.co/6msZH9SKy4
*** THE TRUTH ABOUT SEO & WHY I STOPPED RELEASING SEO TRAININGS ***
If you spend long enough in SEO, you should come to the realization that the best SEO for legitimate, long-term businesses is just brand building. And brand building is driven primarily by every other tactic/technique not named SEO.
At the end of the day, “doing SEO” is the act of implementing specific techniques and tactics based on today’s best guesses of how an algorithm is operating, in an effort to circumvent the need for brand.
I don’t think this is really debatable. You have to “do SEO” if you don’t have the brand power to rank naturally. If you have a top brand in a market, you don’t have to “do SEO.” The proof for this statement is that top brands get away with all the technical SEO “mistakes” because search engines still know they’re of top relevance and will serve them as a result anyway.
Imagine you’re a local Italian restaurant. You can get to the #1 spot by:
1) Never “doing SEO” and instead focusing on all the things a best Italian restaurant would be, say, and do as a brand/business.
2) Doing a bunch of SEO tricks to rank for “Italian food near me” for however long you can last until Google realizes you’re not actually worthy of the top 3 spots. And if you are worthy, then you don’t need all the tricks/effort to rank in the first place.
Now, I'm not saying that $10,000 invested in SEO is $10,000 wasted. You can move pixels on analytics charts. You can potentially expedite a company’s success, provided they do everything else right. You can also expand a company's digital footprint, which has solid payoffs.
BUT, where that $10,000 used to pay off with 90% efficiency, it only pays off with 40% efficiency or less today. Organic SERP real estate is shrinking dramatically and will only continue to shrink and SERPs are only getting more and more competitive.
The conclusion is: It’s becoming a poorer and poorer choice for where to invest those dollars, especially when you understand that BRAND always wins over SEO tactics. Any examples of this not being the case are temporary outliers.
Now, here’s the kicker. What most “SEO experts” won’t admit or disclose to clients is that a business can get to the #1 spot without ever “doing SEO.”
In other words, the $10,000 that’s only used at 40% efficiency could be spent on other things that will pay off with much greater efficiency, and more exponentially.
This runs contrary to what most businesses think and are told. Companies are misled into believing that “doing SEO” is a requirement to rank well. It’s not. They can absolutely invest that money into other key areas of marketing and brand building and move the SEO needle in the absence of an SEO expert.
(And no, you don’t need an SEO expert to make your H1 say “Italian Restaurant in Fucksville, Utah” instead of “Welcome.” That’s not doing SEO, that’s checking a very low-hanging, no-skill-needed box. So don’t come back at me with, “Basic on-page is still important!”).
Again, this doesn’t mean SEO is useless or completely unproductive. But I’ve shifted my consulting recommendation away from SEO, to other means of marketing and brand building. And when I’m consulting agencies/freelancers on what to sell/focus on, I now recommend against SEO as primary offer.
Businesses should be interested in playing the real game of … BUSINESS … and stop dumping so much money into the side quest of feeding algorithms. Search engines want to serve the best result. So … get this … hear me out … just cut to the fucking chase and BE THE BEST RESULT.
Over the last few weeks, I put a lot of time into testing different #WordPress builders for accessibility so I can answer a question I get asked all the time - which page builder is the best for accessibility? This blog post answers that question. https://t.co/5Hz4UiDNCm #a11y
🎯 Today, we’re announcing updates for Search ads query matching and brand controls.
📈 *More search terms reported by aggregating misspellings* Misspelled queries are already matched to their correctly spelled keywords in your campaigns. But many of those misspellings don't meet the privacy thresholds to show in the search terms report. To help align with this existing matching behavior AND surface more search terms, misspelled search terms will be reported in aggregate with their correct spelling. With this update, on average, 9% more search terms that had been reported under “Other” are now visible.
💪 *Negative keywords now block misspellings* No more having to add all those misspellings to your negative keywords anymore either! Just add the correct spelling in your negative keywords and it will block all misspellings now, too. (Feel free to remove misspellings in your existing negatives to help streamline things in your account.)
✅ *Brand inclusions in broad match campaigns* This feature ensures your ads match only to queries related to your brand name in broad match campaigns (we’ve updated the name from brand restrictions based on helpful feedback that the old name was confusing 🙂). You may also now see recommendations to switch your brand-focused campaigns to broad match and apply brand inclusions.
⛔ *Brand exclusions across all match types + DSA* Already available in PMax, we’ll be rolling out brand exclusions in Search over the coming months. With brand exclusions, you can prevent your ads from showing on queries & misspellings for certain brand names you don’t want to match to – across all match types and Dynamic Search Ads.
Check out the blog post for examples of how each of these updates work: https://t.co/vUMCDXodtn