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There’s no denying that Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) has long been the cornerstone of digital marketing strategies, helping businesses enhance their visibility, attract the right audience, and drive sustainable growth. But as artificial intelligence (AI) continues to evolve and disrupt traditional marketing practices, many are beginning to ask: is SEO still relevant in the age of AI
The quick answer? Absolutely—but with a caveat. While the principles of SEO are still essential, the tactics and technology we employ to search engine optimise are evolving at an incredible pace. The advent of AI being added to search algorithms, predicting user behaviour, and creating content is changing how SEO functions (and how companies must go about it in order to remain relevant).
Whether you’re a small business owner, digital marketer, or an SEO agency in Melbourne, understanding the intersection of AI and SEO is key to navigating the digital landscape moving forward.
To understand how SEO is changing, first consider how the search engines themselves have evolved. There was a time when ranking on Google came down to just keyword density and backlinks. Now, search engines use AI to analyze search queries and rank web content.
Google's RankBrain, an AI-driven algorithm, changed the game. It employs machine learning to understand search queries' intent more accurately, instead of just keyword matching. BERT and MUM extend this functionality further, enabling search engines to understand context, subtlety, and even emotions behind content.
This development is such that SEO is no longer about tricking the system with technical gimmicks… it's about building helpful, meaningful, and user-focused content that responds to genuine queries.
One of the biggest shifts in recent years has been the emergence of AI-generated content. Tools like ChatGPT, Jasper, and Copy.ai can now generate human-like content in seconds. It’s led some to wonder: if AI can write content, is there even a need for traditional SEO?
The reality is more nuanced though. AI can assist in content creation, but it doesn’t replace strategy, originality, or human insight. Search engines still prioritise high-quality, authoritative, and trustworthy content – especially content that demonstrates real-world experience, expertise, and relevance. Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness) are more important than ever.
AI can certainly help streamline workflows, speed up research, and assist with content drafts – but successful SEO still depends on a thoughtful human touch. AI might be the tool, but people remain the strategists.
Another area where AI has made a significant impact is in how users search. Voice assistants like Siri, Alexa, and Google Assistant have popularised voice search, which now accounts for a sizeable chunk of all search queries. These queries tend to be longer, more conversational, and focused on immediate answers.
This shift requires a change in how businesses think about and optimise their content for natural language, long-tail keywords, and direct answers all within an effective SEO framework. Structured data, FAQ sections, and locally relevant content have a more significant role to play in meeting these evolving demands.
Similarly, visual search (where users upload images to search for similar products or information) is growing in relevance. Platforms like Pinterest Lens and Google Lens highlight the need for optimised images, metadata, and alt text (all traditional elements of SEO that are now more valuable than ever).
AI has allowed search engines to optimise the results specific to a user's search history, location, and behaviour. In fact, two users searching for the same phrase could have a completely different outcome. This leads to a more relevant interaction for the user, but it complicates the marketer's ability to consistently achieve visibility!
To adapt, SEO strategies must become more granular and data-driven. This might mean focusing on niche audiences, creating hyper-local content, or using first-party data to better understand customer journeys. Broad-stroke approaches are giving way to personalised, targeted strategies, which require even greater SEO expertise.
As AI processes increasingly complex tasks in crawling and indexing, technical SEO is now more important than ever. A slow site with poorly made pages, broken links, or bad mobile usability will be penalised—regardless of how great the content is. The basic attributes, including page speed, mobile usability, structured data, and tidy URL structures,, are not negotiable. AI infers, thankfully, increased intelligence to search engines, but it has made the technical excellence of websites even higher. You will require structural audits, schema markup, and server-side optimizations so your website conforms not only to current standards but also complies with how AI-driven bots parse and rank content.
Local search results have been enhanced by AI and have resulted in improved precision in enabling users to locate local businesses. A local search will return Google's Local Pack or Maps, irrespective of the type of search. Both Google’s Local Pack and Maps rely heavily on real-time data, user reviews, and proximity for local search. This makes local SEO particularly important for businesses.
Committing to optimizing your Google Business Profile, collecting legitimate reviews, and adding location-based keywords can dramatically affect your position in local search, traditional SEO practices that strictly follow the new visibility rules set by AI.
So, how do you future-proof your SEO strategy in the age of AI? Here are a few takeaways:
Prioritise high-quality, original content that demonstrates real expertise and solves user problems.
Use AI as a tool, not a replacement. It’s great for ideation and optimisation, but real insight still comes from humans.
Focus on user intent over keywords. AI algorithms care more about relevance than repetition.
Optimise for voice and conversational search, using natural language and answering common questions.
Double down on technical SEO. Your website must perform smoothly to even be considered for ranking.
Embrace data. Personalisation means you need a deeper understanding of your audience’s needs and behaviours.
In fact, it is evolving with AI in a way that is more dynamic and complex than ever before, and even more important! The solution is to adapt your strategy, accept the technologies available to you, and keep your focus on the value that you are providing to the user. AI is changing the game, but SEO still plays an important role in the playbook.
