SEO Tools and Resources

In the early days of SEO, owning an exact match domain (EMD) was like holding a cheat code. If someone searched for “siamese kittens,” you could bet that siamesekittens.com would be sitting pretty at or near the top of the search results. The algorithm heavily weighted the presence of keywords in the domain, and for a while, that simple trick delivered serious ROI. But it’s 2025 now. AI has reshaped search, large language models (LLMs) are rewriting how answers are generated and delivered, and the rules of the game have changed. So, what role – if any – do exact match domains still play? The EMD of yesteryear: Keyword first, brand second In th…

If your website suddenly disappears from Google search results, it can be a stressful experience. A significant drop in traffic with no clear explanation and the absence of a penalty usually means your site, in the eyes of Google, has fallen out of favor and potentially below the quality threshold. This article explains why sites get deindexed, what to check first, and how to recover if it happens to you. What does ‘deindexed’ mean? When a page or a whole website is deindexed, it means Google has removed it from its search index. As a result, your site won’t appear in search results for any keywords, not even when you search your domain name. Somet…

AI search platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google’s AI Overviews are reshaping how people discover information. Digital marketing agencies feel the impact firsthand and must adapt quickly. They need to keep their services relevant, their processes outcome-driven, and their results easy to prove. This article explores how 10 agencies have updated their strategies, services, and client relationships to win in the AI search era. What AI search changes for digital marketing agencies Semrush predicted that AI search will surpass organic traffic in 2028. It’s easy to see why. A growing number of people now start their searches with AI inste…

To keep your Meta Ads performing at their best, it’s essential to regularly test new ad formats. This article explores the role of UGC and EGC ads – and how to effectively test them in your Meta campaigns. Understanding UGC and EGC ads User-generated content (UGC) refers to videos typically created by actual users of your product or service, often testimonials or a series of testimonials edited together. In some cases, UGC may even come from the company founder, recorded casually on a phone or using other non-professional methods. These videos are often recorded on a phone – or styled to look that way, even if professionally produced – to create an int…

AI is coming for your organic search traffic. More people are turning to ChatGPT for quick answers, and AI Overviews are rapidly improving at delivering the kind of fast, surface-level information your website used to provide. But as long as people are searching, there will be demand for content created by those with real-world experience. The SEOs who will continue to capture traffic are the ones focused on producing unmistakably human content – the kind AI simply can’t replicate. Right now, the industry is fixated on what AI can do, while largely ignoring what it can’t. Your edge over generative AI is clear: real-world experience that adds depth, nua…

Relying solely on Google for search visibility is no longer viable today. Search behavior is diversifying, particularly among younger demographics. Gen Z is increasingly turning to platforms like TikTok, Pinterest, and Reddit for information discovery. This shift highlights the need for brands to embrace a total search strategy – an approach that integrates multiple search and discovery channels to create a more holistic and resilient search presence. The risks of Google dependency Google’s algorithm changes frequently, and core updates can significantly impact website rankings overnight. Over-reliance on a single search engine makes brands vulner…

Google Ads quietly rolled out Tree Table Views within its reporting interface, offering advertisers a more structured way to analyze campaign performance data. The new view transforms traditional flat data tables into hierarchical layouts where dimensions are visually stacked and nested, creating clearer relationships between data points. The big picture. The Tree Table View offers several practical benefits: Organized hierarchy. Clearer visualization of multi-level dimensions Improved navigation. Faster insight discovery across nested segments Enhanced structure. Better organization for complex performance breakdowns For example, users can now easi…

Google Ads API v17 will officially sunset June 4. Any requests made to it after that date will fail. If you haven’t upgraded yet, now’s the time. What to do: Upgrade ASAP to the latest version of the Google Ads API. Check your usage: Head to the Google Cloud Console, open APIs & Services, and view your method calls under Metrics. Look for any v17 activity, e.g. google.ads.googleads.v17.services.GoogleAdsService.Mutate. Why we care. Businesses and developers relying on the v17 API must migrate to a newer version to keep campaigns running smoothly. Any delay risks outages in campaign management, reporting, and automation. Need help? The Google Ads…

In 2025, managing paid search isn’t just about adjusting bids or split testing ad copy. It’s about navigating a complex, data-rich environment where performance depends heavily on the supporting tools you use. Today, PPC professionals are expected to handle cross-channel attribution, rapidly test creative, track micro-conversions, and make sense of fragmented reporting dashboards. With Google constantly rolling out changes – like Performance Max, Consent Mode v2, and new AI-generated ad formats – staying ahead means building the right tool stack. These 10 tools give you the edge to move faster, think smarter, and drive better results. 1. Google Ads Ed…

A confirmed bug in Google Ads caused New Customer Acquisition (NCA) campaigns to stop spending budgets starting May 15. The issue has affected advertisers relying solely on this bidding strategy to reach new customers. The details: Google acknowledged the problem in an email shared by Google Ads consultant Benoit Legendre. “We are aware of an issue where the campaigns running on New Customer Acquisition only, have stopped spending starting May 15th,” Google said. The company added that its engineering team is actively working on a fix, but initially provided no specific timeline. Why we care. Advertisers using NCA-only bidding have seen campaign per…

AI has changed how people search – and what it means to be “visible” in results. Links and rankings still matter, but they’re no longer the full picture. Now, it’s about mentions, citations, and whether your brand even shows up in the conversation. Most SEO tools haven’t caught up. This makes tracking that kind of visibility hard – but not impossible. Here’s how to rethink visibility in the age of AI. Why tracking AI visibility is so tricky Remember when SEO was (relatively) simple? People typed in short phrases like: “Best project management tool or SEO tips 2020.” You knew how they searched, what they were probably looking for, …

Winning an industry award can seriously impact how customers, clients, and colleagues regard your brand. Showcase your achievements and celebrate your professional excellence by entering the Search Engine Land Awards – the highest honor in search marketing! For the past 10 years, the Search Engine Land Awards have honored some of the best in the search industry – including leading in-house teams at Wiley Education Services, T-Mobile, Penn Foster, Sprint, and HomeToGo – and exceptional agencies representing Samsung, Lands’ End, Stanley Steemer, and beyond. This year, it’s your turn. The 2025 entry period is now open! Here’s what you need to know: This is the 10th anni…

As we are approaching the halfway point in the year, you want to ensure your PPC campaigns are in the best shape possible going into peak season for many advertisers Whether you’re getting great results, struggling to perform, or somewhere in between, below is a checklist of 12 features to help set your campaigns up for success. 1. Align and reassess client objectives Campaign performance is only as good as its ultimate objective. Just because you see year-over-year (YoY) revenue growth or improved return on ad spend (ROAS) doesn’t mean you can get the party poppers out. What is the client’s priority objective? Has this changed? Is it still revenue growth…

Earlier this month, we reported that Google will be bringing Discover to the desktop version of Google’s home page. We don’t know exactly when that will roll out but Google has been testing it. Google Search Console has Discover performance reports that let you track how well your site is performing within Google Discover. And over the past day or so, there was a hack to see the Discover performance report broken out by desktop and mobile. But that hack was quietly disabled this morning. How it worked. Brodie Clark first spotted the hack and posted about it on LinkedIn, and then John Shehata shared some early data of mobile vs desktop Discover performance with t…

Search industry experts are sounding the alarm over a growing Google experiment that’s creating a kind of “SERP Inception” — search results inside search results, with increasingly prominent Sponsored labels that don’t appear to be paid ad placements in the traditional sense. Driving the news. SEO consultant Glenn Gabe posted a screenshot on X showing a People also consider box labeled Sponsored. The twist? Clicking a link launches a new Google results page – complete with ads and another Sponsored box, perpetuating the loop. “They lead to a fresh SERP with more ads and yet ANOTHER ‘People also consider’ block that’s SPONSORED,” Gabe wrote. The backstory. …

If you’re still chasing a flat 10% conversion rate across all campaigns, it’s time for a reset. According to Unbounce’s latest Conversion Benchmark Report , industry medians range from just 3.8% (SaaS) to 12.3% (Legal) — and that variance can reshape how you interpret your landing page performance. This free report doesn’t just give you numbers. It gives you context — by vertical, by strategy, and by conversion event — so you can benchmark smarter, optimize where it matters, and stop second-guessing your results. Download the full report to see where your landing pages really stand. View the full article

SEO is something of a nebulous concept. To some, SEO is technical; to others, it is creative. Neither of these is 100% right or wrong. SEO is all of this and more, depending entirely on the unique situation and goals of the business looking to use SEO. This loose definition leads to some common and fairly troublesome issues. One of these issues, which we see repeatedly and completely derails the success of projects – even by experienced agencies – is the misunderstanding between SEO strategy and SEO planning. This article defines these terms and shows a simple way to ensure both strategy and planning are tackled with the rigor that the modern, h…

Google Discover started rolling out on desktop to the Google homepage in New Zealand and Australia. And we’re getting our first look at it. We learned Google Discover is coming to desktop last month. Perhaps this will be among Google’s announcements at I/O, which takes place May 20-21? What it looks like. Here’s a screenshot of Google Discover from New Zealand that I am able to see: Why we care. This is potentially good news for publishers – especially those that have lost traffic due to AI Overviews and generative AI in the last year. Publishers that get their content into Discover can get massive amounts of traffic. The links. These were shared by Da…

Google Ads is upgrading Performance Max campaigns with new reporting tools that offer deeper visibility into channel performance, search terms, and creative assets. What’s new. Three new insight reports are coming soon: Channel-level reporting: This will give detailed breakdowns of how each Google platform (including Search, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail, Maps, and partners) contributes to campaign success. (Tests were spotted last month.) Full search terms reporting. This addition offers the same keyword-level visibility in Search and Shopping campaigns. Asset reporting. This expansion will include impressions, clicks, and cost data, so you can…

AI is changing how people find and engage with content – but the core signals that drive visibility haven’t changed. This article shows how search marketers can stay competitive by combining proven SEO and content strategies with AI-powered workflows to build authority, trust, and reach across platforms. Why authority still wins in the age of AI search If you work in marketing, you’ve probably heard the same questions repeated throughout the past year: “What’s AI’s impact on organic search?” “How can my brand appear in AI-driven search results?” “Is it safe to use AI in my content workflow?” While many agencies and experts are rushing to stak…

When we talk about search, we usually focus on what people are looking for – keywords, queries, and intent. But in 2025, there’s a more powerful question to ask: “Where are they searching – and why that platform, in that moment?” The search landscape is evolving fast. AI tools like ChatGPT are gaining traction. Social platforms like TikTok and Instagram are doubling as discovery engines. Yet, Google remains the top choice – the default, the go-to for most people right now. But platform preference isn’t just about functionality. It’s rooted in human behavior. How we think, feel, and choose depends on the journey we’re on. Behavior takes t…

SEO has always involved a lot of manual, repetitive work. Keyword research, writing title tags and meta descriptions, parsing GA4 exports, auditing massive content libraries – it’s all important, but it’s also time-consuming. Now, we have tools that can help lighten the load. From accelerating content ideation to pulling insights from performance data, AI can be a powerful (and efficient) part of your daily SEO workflow. The real question isn’t if you should use AI – it’s how to use it well. 1. Build a custom AI assistant A custom GPT is a tailored version of the AI language model that you can create to perform specific tasks or provide particula…

AI-powered search is changing fast. Are you ready? Join our expert panelists for The Impact of ChatGPT and Generative AI on Search: Insights from Industry Experts where they will dive deep into the evolving landscape of AI and search marketing. In this insightful session you’ll discover: How AI search is reshaping SEO and what it means for your strategy. Practical tips to optimize your content for AI tools Why brand awareness and authoritative content are crucial for success in AI-powered search. Whether you’re an SEO professional, marketer, or business leader, this webinar offers the strategic insights you need to stay competitive in an AI-driven digit…

Even the best content is useless if it can’t be found or reused. And for too many marketing teams, Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems have become more burden than benefit — bogged down by manual tagging, inconsistent metadata, and time-consuming workflows. In Unlock Your DAM: Fuel Your Creative Process with Generative AI, we’ll show how marketers are integrating Generative AI into DAM systems to break through these barriers — streamlining asset discovery, automating tagging, and enabling faster ideation. You’ll learn how forward-looking teams are reducing repetitive work while surfacing the right content at the right time. What You’ll Learn How GenAI can g…

Most advertisers spend hours managing keywords, bids, and targeting – but overlook the one thing searchers actually notice: the ad itself. If your ads aren’t strong, nothing else in your account can save you. Why ad copy is the heart of your PPC account When I look at how many Google and Microsoft Ads accounts are being managed, I see a lot of time devoted to: Search term management. Complex bid strategies. Keyword research. Inactionable data analysis. In many accounts, the ads are often neglected. However, your ads are the most crucial part of your PPC account. Your ads are the only aspect of your account that a searcher sees. …