If AI kills search – SEO will become gigantic

Key Takeaways

• If AI kills search, SEO will become gigantic because appearing in the answers is all that matters.
• AI is not getting deep enough data in the next 10 years to make this happen.
• A more likely future is that AI grows alongside Google – see my other article for the details.

Dear humans, this is my little opinion piece about the future of SEO and AI.

The current role of SEO in AI chats

AI chatbot usage has exploded in 2026. According to Eight Oh Two, 37% of consumers now start searches with AI tools instead of Google or Bing.

What role does SEO play in getting a piece of the AI chat traffic pie? SEO = AI answer optimization. Many SEOs are already playing this game and winning.

Reports show traditional search volume will drop as people move to AI assistants. The transformation is already happening and it is less dramatic than most people think.

Guess how AI “ranks” if you ask it for the best flower store in New York? It is very similar to Google.

Actually, in many cases, it is similar to Google in 2010. While Google has improved safeguards, quality content and source reliability are still the main drivers for AI overviews.

Google’s AI overviews are now central to search results. They provide concise, authoritative summaries that often stop users from clicking through to individual websites.

According to PR News Online, there is a 22% drop in search traffic for e-commerce sites due to AI-generated suggestions replacing traditional clicks.

So while a lot is being turned upside down, this new world is, at least so far, oddly familiar. One big change: providing shallow informational content will eventually become a bad investment.

AI will just use the content you worked hard on and display it so users don’t have to visit you. Luckily, AI search shows higher conversion rates for those who do click through.

To be fair, the tactic of providing generic information is often overrated. Commercial searches like “modern ties” where users want to buy are where the real money is.

If AI truly becomes all-knowing – this will happen:

But what happens if AI somehow gets so good and so popular that it totally removes the need for search?

If we reach a point where AI is the most trusted advisor in your life, then the most expensive “real estate” in the world will be to appear in the answer.

If you no longer ask friends or search for purchase recommendations, but instead you ask AI, then companies will throw all their efforts into appearing in AI answers.

If all utopian AI dreams come true, SEO will explode. Simply because there will be no other market out there than to appear in the AI results.

Why bother asking anyone but an AI, if the AI always knows best? The growing 200 billion SEO market will 10x very fast.

Or maybe it’s not called SEO anymore. You can call it AIO (AI Optimization) or whatever, but the skills needed for this game will be very similar to SEO.

So I believe this would be the natural next step for people in this industry.

But can this happen in the next 10 years?

I can’t see how AI will get good and deep enough data in the next 10 years for this to fully kick off though.

You would need an insane amount of, e.g., word-of-mouth and honest customer review data to make it accurate enough. The AI basically needs to know every little word on the street about what’s going on.

It needs to know which company is currently the best in their category. Or which unknown movies or songs are really perfect for your taste.

This would require an insane amount of data. Data which the world currently does not have. AI is already running out of high-quality public data as we speak.

But maybe Elon’s robots will run around and gather that for the AI? Then we have all the legal roadblocks.

Do we allow robots to go around scanning every little conversation everywhere? Unless we do, I don’t see how the above scenario can fully play out.

So what will happen instead?

I believe the scenario I outline in the other article is way more likely: Will AI grow bigger than Google search? 2020-2028 statistics and my predictions

Thanks for reading my opinion piece on AI and SEO. Always happy to discuss this and get new insights – hit me up on LinkedIn 👨‍🚀👍️