Are SEO Tools Ready For The AI Search Era?

We called it back in July 2024 — AI chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Perplexity wouldn’t just assist with search anymore; they would replace it. They would have their own browsers, challenging Google and striking a searchscape seismic shift nobody was ready for.

Fast forward, and aftershocks are everywhere.  AI has disrupted the search landscape in ways that are surprising, overwhelming, and anything but boring. Marketing leaders are now scrambling to adapt, trying to strategize and reallocate budgets for SEO. Questions loom large: 

• Should we reassess our SEO technology?
• Do we pivot to paid ads? 
• What content strategies will sustain our search visibility?

And the biggest one of all — how do we justify the budget amidst traffic drops and fluctuations?

To decode these questions, and the industry’s future, we’ve united with the best minds in SEO. Eleven themes emerged, topped with a heavy drizzle of unique G2 data insights. Dive in for unbiased opinions, expert advice, and exclusive predictions from our pundits.

Dissecting the disruption: the current state of search 

Disrupted is an understatement. With AI overviews (AIOs), generative search optimization (GSO), and other emerging trends reshaping the industry, SEO is evolving faster than ever. As conversations flood LinkedIn and beyond, one thing is clear — we’re all working to make sense of this shift. From new challenges to the changing role of SEO data and technology, there’s a lot to unpack.

Let’s get into it.

1. Semantic search has overpowered lexical search 

Keyword strategies aren’t cutting it anymore. The rise of AI-powered answers is shifting the focus from lexical (keyword-based) to semantic (context-aware prompts), with brand mentions now acting as a key factor in visibility.

“Traditional keyword strategies are becoming outdated as users embrace more conversational and detailed queries. This shift is leading to a decline in the dominance of broad keywords, as longer, more specific phrases drive richer, more relevant insights.” — Ross Briggs, VP of buyer experience at G2

“The game has shifted from link-building to voice-building, from keyword optimization to contextual relevance. It’s pushing us towards authentic, valuable content that genuinely serves user needs.”

Britney Muller,
AI consultant and SEO expert

2. Traffic loss has highlighted the measurement gap

Publishers may have been the most vocal about traffic loss, but the reality is that it’s happening across the board.

“Search has become increasingly devalued. The web is at the beginning of a period of constriction. As people rely more on AI for answers, the value of traffic and content creation itself decreases.”

Mordy Oberstein
 Founder of Unify Brand Marketing

If zero-click search was a challenge back in 2020, AI overviews and AI chatbot responses have magnified the measurement problem in the industry. 

“This means less organic traffic to websites and higher competition (and cost per click) in paid ads.”

Anastasia Kotsiubynska
SEO team lead at SE Ranking

3. Higher competition for ad dollars as consumers aren’t leaving query windows

People aren’t leaving the query box and clicking out as much as they did. AI search curates and streamlines results, offering more direct answers.

“The switch from lists to deep answers is in full force, as Google shows a big LLM answer at the top of the search results. That shift shakes up the traditional value ecosystem in Search, where sites provide their content to search engines in return for traffic and search engines show ads at the top.” — Kevin Indig, growth advisor

4. The elephant in the room has been called out

AI chatbots delivering specific answers have basically made thin, inauthentic content invisible. LLMs have achieved something Google has tried to achieve for years through its search engine algorithm updates. If it’s not useful, it’s not visible.

“Brands need to rethink their approach to what traffic they try to bring (top-of-the-funnel content might lose its importance if it can be answered by AI) with putting more focus on bottom-of-the-funnel content that answers specific questions and goes in-depth.” — Anastasia Kotsiubynska, SEO team lead at SE Ranking

“While these tools allow mass content production, they often sacrifice quality. Ironically, in a world where everyone can produce thin content at scale, quality and curation become even more critical.” — Shaun Hinklein, head of SEO at Apollo.io

5. Reddit, Substack, Slack, and Medium E-E-A-T the SERPS

Communities, forums, and sites are winning in SERPs. And why wouldn’t they? After all, user-generated content (UGC) outweighs mass-produced content.

Not disregarding the fact that Reddit and Google do have a strategic partnership that plays into Reddit’s enhanced visibility, it has filled a market gap and cannibalized traffic. 

These sites are rich with authentic human responses from vetted sources that can get as granular in topic as the user wants.

According to Kevin Indig, Reddit grew significantly due to Google’s Hidden Gem algorithm update, which boosted Reddit’s rankings.

“They are filling a crucial gap that AI systems can’t replicate: real-world human experiences and unique, unfiltered perspectives. AI/LLMs surface the most average, generic, sanitized responses, so where do people turn to get real-world insights?” — Britney Muller, AI consultant and SEO expert

“Instead of trying to mature the ecosystem so that the content users really want can be created, Google went to the immediate fix. It pulled in “firsthand knowledge” via the Reddit firehose.  — Mordy Oberstein, founder of Unify Brand Marketing

6. SEO success metrics are getting a facelift

SEO has always been a numbers game — rankings, traffic, backlinks, and conversions. But AI-driven search is challenging traditional measurement and forcing us to evolve our perspective of success. 

New benchmarks focus on brand visibility, sentiment, and engagement beyond Google. There’s a consensus to consider intent signals, content engagement, revenue attribution, and the broader digital ecosystem’s intent-matching capabilities.

7. (Quantitative) traffic is dethroned, and here’s why

Traffic is no longer a North Star metric for SEO and businesses, and the reasons are layered, complex, and timely for an AI-driven search era. Here’s what our experts are saying about the shift from sheer volume to high-intent, high-value traffic:

“Traffic is a terrible metric! We need to shift our focus to qualitative traffic metrics. Are you attracting the right visitors who are actually likely to convert, download your guide, or engage meaningfully with your content?” — Britney Muller, AI consultant and SEO expert

“Traffic will likely get a better signal/noise ratio because when users click out from LLMs, they have strong intent.”

Kevin Indig
Growth advisor

“You should paint a broader picture beyond traffic to understand where the brand is and where it can go.” — Mordy Oberstein, founder of Unify Brand Marketing

Conversion and high-quality lead generation will connect SEO success in the business context.

8. SEO data is having a strategic shift

G2 Icons, who are our most prolific contributors and power users of the G2 platform, mentioned that tools like GA4 and advanced SEO platforms help them connect SEO efforts to actual revenue impact, further justifying investment in organic search strategies. 

However, nuanced metrics like customer feedback, user intent match, assisted conversations, and content engagement time are going to be actively used while SEO tools evolve to track AI search events.

9. Missing measurement 

Measurement is broken” is the default, raving opinion of marketers, but SEO tools have for long been reliable enough to track performance, visibility, events, and conversions — until now.

The integration of large language models (LLMs) has redefined user queries, moving away from static, keyword-focused strategies to more conversational and context-rich interactions. As a result, many existing SEO tools are struggling to provide the granular insights needed to navigate this new landscape effectively. 

“The problem is that AI chatbots don’t give us analytics data that can be a substitute for or an equivalent to search volume.” — Kevin Indig, growth advisor

“Existing tools like Ahrefs and Semrush weren’t built for AI-driven search dynamics. While new tools are emerging, there’s still a gap in effectively quantifying AI search visibility.” — Shaun Hinklein, head of SEO at Apollo.io

According to SE Ranking’s SEO team lead, Anastasia Kotsiubynska, these are some metrics that are becoming important:

• Segmented (valuable) traffic (Bottom of the funnel, commercial traffic, etc.)
• Conversions and leads (evergreen business metrics to understand the quality of the traffic)
• Brand mentions (it will become more and more important in these days of AI engine growth)
• Revenue from organic traffic sources

10. The industry lacks standardized benchmarks for the AI search era

AI search is still budding and has loose nomenclature for the new optimization practices (AIO, GAIO, GEO, and LLMO!) This means we simply can’t measure what we don’t know — yet.

“The real challenge isn’t the tools themselves — it’s establishing the right benchmarks and data models to measure AI search impact accurately.”

Shaun Hinklein
Head of SEO at Apollo.io

According to Semrush’s Marcus Tober, SEO is already adapting to the changing landscape and is starting to measure brand visibility in LLMs.

“While AI search is nascent and there is no standard metric, understanding brand visibility and potential to get referral traffic from LLMs will become the new reality for SEO professionals.” — Marcus Tober, SVP of enterprise solutions at Semrush

11. Search is a surprising slice of the valuation pie

While investors typically look at traditional parameters like revenue growth, cash flow, and price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio during the evaluation process, recent valuations of companies like OpenAI and Hubspot have brought attention to how tech investors also consider search data as a signal for potential market demand — though with a pinch of salt.

“Demand metrics have been important signals for investors for a long time. We know that Semrush is used by many investors for exactly these reasons.”

Marcus Tober,
SVP of enterprise solutions at Semrush

According to G2 Icon and Dreamcast’s digital marketing specialist, Kishan Soni, “Tools like Google Trends and enterprise SEO platforms are becoming part of the due diligence toolkit for tech investors.”

“I’ve observed investors increasingly using search volume data, keyword trends, and brand mention analysis to gauge market sentiment and product demand.”

Kishan Soni,
G2 Icon and digital marketing specialist at Dreamcast

Shaun Hinklein, head of SEO at Apollo.io, explained that investors are analyzing AI search visibility, social media presence, and sentiment to gauge brand value.

Ross Briggs, G2’s VP of buyer experience, warns that search volume alone can be misleading. He adds, “It’s important to use search volume alongside other signals to confirm that the searcher interest is materializing into value for the company. For instance, users refer to G2 data for siphoning “shoppers only” from these searchers.”

These indicators show SEO’s maturity as an integral business function that looks at the big picture.

As AI reshapes SEO, tools and strategies face challenges and opportunities, warranting a closer look at how they adapt.

The current state of SEO tools in an evolving AI search environment

Our community of internal and external experts is polarized about how SEO tools fare in the search playing field. Here’s a look at the mixed views.

The good

According to G2 Icons, who extensively use and review SEO tools, modern SEO tools are helping professionals understand user journey patterns, identify high-value keyword opportunities, and measure ROI more accurately.

“Google Analytics (GA4) uses AI to draw up quick insights at the click of a button.”

Callum Brown
G2 Icon and digital marketing & website executive at Frontline Safety UK Ltd 

Meanwhile, AI search visibility tracking also has some green shoots in tracking brand mentions.

“SEO tools are already evolving to measure AI visibility through mentions and citations (links). Tools like Profound or Scrunch can measure citations and mentions, allowing you to spot content and optimization gaps on your site.” — Kevin Indig, growth advisor

The bad

The Google-centric nature of SEO tools has been challenged, especially on the technical front. Performance metrics have fallen through the cracks on AI responses. But what do SEO tool developers need to ensure this crack doesn’t grow into a crater?

“Recent shifts in Google’s requirements, like the need to render JavaScript for full SERP tracking, and especially AIOs, have significantly raised the bar for keyword tracking tools. This change not only complicates the technical landscape but also reflects a broader strategic move by Google to protect its AI-driven insights from other LLMs.” — Ross Briggs, VP of buyer experience at G2

Ross further highlights a broader trend of technological evolution that will intensify the competition as AI continues to grow and become more sophisticated.

Britney Muller, an AI consultant and SEO expert, remarked on the obsession with “showing up in ChatGPT” and noted how current SEO tools fall short.

“Even clickstream partnerships that capture LLM prompts can’t capture AI outputs, which is where brands and websites are actually being mentioned. It’s essentially having the questions, but not the answers.”

Britney Muller, 
AI consultant and SEO expert

Britney emphasizes that SEO tools must advance beyond traditional metrics to identify content gaps specific to various niches and determine the most significant platforms where target audiences engage. She highlights, “Currently, SparkToro is notably effective in acknowledging that discovery happens everywhere, not just on Google.”

“I think the age of the straight-up SEO tool is dead (outside of technical SEO). The traditional rank tracker just doesn’t align with this era”. — Mordy Oberstein, founder of Unify Brand Marketing

Mordy’s bold critique of traditional rank-tracking tools becoming obsolete stresses the need for a broader alignment with contemporary digital strategies. He further commented, “While some tools might be ahead of the game due to their wider marketing metric data, they still need to find ways to show a more complete picture of the digital landscape.”

The hopeful

Ross and Apollo.io’s Shaun Hinklein point out specific changes in the diversity of user behaviors and the lack of established industry metrics that point out data deficiency.

“We’re seeing a split in user behavior: practical tasks like shopping and everyday information remain with search engines, while more complex, academic, or technical queries are shifting to LLMs.”

Ross Briggs
VP of buyer experience at G2

Ross recommends SEO tools to broaden scope to help businesses stay connected with their audiences across various platforms.

“The next generation of SEO tools will remain in development until we as an industry don’t standardize data models and benchmark metrics” — Shaun Hinklein, head of SEO at Apollo.io

Amid these varied perspectives, G2’s review data clarifies key trends and sentiments shaping SEO technology adoption.

The G2 take

Our sentiment analysis of 500 reviews for SEO Tools shows that 83% of users had positive things to say about this category, while only 19.4% of dislikes were truly negative. This suggests that while improvements are needed, overall satisfaction is strong.

Source: Exclusive G2 Data

On one hand, users enjoy the ease of use, competitor analysis, and automation features. On the other, they critiqued current SEO tools for having complex user interfaces (UI), pricing, data accuracy, and lack of speed during heavy data processing.

“This drift between user likes and dislikes might increase as AI chatbots and LLMs become increasingly dominant in search.”

Yukta Rustagi
Market Research Analyst at G2

Let’s examine the specific findings from G2’s data.

Lesser time to ROI

Businesses are now seeing returns ~34% faster than they did in 2023, as the overall time to ROI for SEO tools dropped from 11.4 months to 7.6 months. This suggests higher efficiency, better tool adoption, and faster impact realization across industries.

Comparing 2023 and 2024’s data, small businesses’ time to ROI improved from 10.3 months in 2023 to 7.5 months in 2024, a 27% improvement. Meanwhile, enterprises’ time to ROI shrunk from 18.9 months in 2023 to 7.4 months in 2024.

Source: Exclusive G2 Data

Accelerated enterprise adoption signals SEO’s embrace as a wider business function

The 61% improvement in enterprises’ time to ROI window indicates that these businesses are investing more in SEO to integrate it into broader digital strategies.

“Despite the typically longer decision cycles, this sharp improvement suggests that enterprises are seeing immediate, tangible benefits from SEO investments.”

Yukta Rustagi
Market Research Analyst at G2

Four key industry trends uncovered from G2 review analysis

As AI continues to reshape the search landscape, G2’s review data reveals four major trends shaping the future of SEO tools and their adoption:

• Many businesses migrated from legacy SEO tools to newer, AI-powered platforms
• AI-driven suggestions for SEO improvements are becoming a standard feature
• Integration with Google Search Console and other platforms is a key factor in tool selection
• Mobile-first SEO is a growing concern, with some tools addressing it better than others

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New SEO powers are on the horizon: tools and AI agents

Given the launch of new AI-powered browsers, it is safe to expect AI agents that will specialize in carrying out SEO tasks and tracking. The next curveball will be ensuring ethical tracking and data usage for such agentic AI usage.

“First-hand observations of the G2 SEO tools category show that several SEO tools have been integrating advanced AI features to help businesses adapt and thrive in the evolving landscape of AI-driven search.”  — Yukta Rustagi, market research analyst at G2

Leading SEO platforms are developing solutions to cater to intent-based search and tracking AI visibility, mentions, and citations in an attempt to bridge the gap between traditional search metrics and the evolving needs of AI-optimized SEO strategies.

“Ahrefs and GA4 are evolving to help search marketers adapt to AI-driven search by offering deeper insights into intent-based search, SERP feature tracking, and predictive analytics.”

Callum Brown
G2 Icon and digital marketing & website executive at Frontline Safety UK Ltd 

“They now focus on measuring content effectiveness, monitoring zero-click trends, and attributing organic search to business outcomes”, Callum adds.

Noting that SearchGPT is now accessible to users without requiring a login, Marcus highlights that SEO tools are expected to embrace this emerging trend.

“Currently, we are implementing lots of new data points to our traditional products to help users keep up with changes in search through dedicated AIO analysis.”

Marcus Tober,
SVP of enterprise solutions at Semrush

Marcus further adds that, “Additionally, we have developed multiple products and features for brands to measure their visibility and conduct competitive analysis in all important LLMs.”

The future of SEO and technology innovation

With AI driving change, the future is full of bold shifts. Here’s a look at our prediction of trends, tools, and tactics that will redefine success in digital marketing.

New metrics will emerge

SEO success will focus on conversions and leads more than just traffic volume to gauge value-driven outcomes.

“Future SEO strategies will be guided by sentiment analysis, social signals, and reputation management.” — Shaun Hinklein, head of SEO at Apollo.io

Automation will become important

“AI will take over the mundane parts of SEO — reporting, data analysis — freeing SEO teams to focus on strategy and creativity.” — Britney Muller, AI consultant and SEO expert

Micro-conversion will become valuable

Companies will prioritize targeted traffic, leading to high-quality leads and deeper conversions for greater business impact.

Authenticity and community building

Curated content that is specific and drawn from actual human experiences will have greater value and searchability.

“The future belongs to authentic voices. Companies and marketers who are willing to step outside their comfort zone, take stands, and show their true personality will win the hearts and minds of their audiences.”

Britney Muller,
AI consultant and SEO expert

Relationship builders will be revenue winners

Building genuine brand relationships will drive revenue through deeper engagements rather than just maximizing traffic.

Bing optimization will matter

Businesses must leverage Bing’s growing influence, driven by AI adoption, to expand reach and visibility across websites.

Brand will be king

Elevating brand authority in AI contexts will prioritize recognition over traditional keyword dominance. SEO will have a strong scope to be included in brand strategies.

User experience (UX) will need attention

Similar to UX being considered a key arm of SEO strategies, it will continue to be essential for getting indexed by AI search chatbots. After all, search is moving toward how users feel about the site, content, value, and its reputation signals — all of which intersect with user experience.

“The focus is now on user experience and value rather than just rankings.”

Kishan Soni,
G2 Icon and digital marketing specialist at Dreamcast

SEO tools will potentially get more expensive

The need to render JavaScript for SERPs will raise costs as SEO tools innovate for new benchmarks.

SEO tools will see consolidation and cross-pollination

As brand, reputation management, community platforms, and supplementary metrics rise to the fore, stand-alone SEO tools might become history.

“We’ll see a fusion of SEO and CRO tools, enhanced by AI and LLM insights.”

Shaun Hinklein
Head of SEO at Apollo.io

Mordy Oberstein too foresees this, “I would like to see social listening tools and performance-based platforms sync up to produce a more holistic analysis.”

Purpose meets personalization

Honing in on your customer’s journey to understand them better will be key to creating content that meets them at the right place at the right time. 

Think of long tail keywords but experiment with adding a spin of specific intent-driven prompts that will help satisfy search queries.

“Personalized content and brand authority will have to be intentional.”

Callum Brown
G2 Icon and digital marketing & website executive at Frontline Safety UK Ltd

Satisfying intent will be imperative to success

Engaging in relevant discussions will help enhance your brand’s industry influence. The chances are high that this is where their purchasing decisions will be informed and reinstated.

“The more your brand appears in meaningful discussions, the more likely you are to be referenced when someone asks an AI about your industry.” — Britney Muller, AI consultant and SEO expert

Technical SEO, structured data, and multimodal will become essentials for strong performance

Success will rely on integrating new modalities like voice search with structured data and robust technical foundations.

SEO isn’t dead; we’re just experiencing its rebirth

Embracing automation, targeting high-intent audiences, and fostering brand authenticity will be game-changing strategies that will set the industry leaders apart. 

The shift toward AI-driven insights and advanced SEO tools also underscores the need for business leaders to integrate SEO into wider brand, product, and marketing strategies.

Play the long game, but stay agile and observant. If your products and strategies aren’t being revisited every 3 months, you might fall behind in the AI race. Now, this is not an understatement.

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Edited by Supanna Das