Episode 103: The Convenient Suspect
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Episode 103: The Convenient Suspect
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Over the last twelve months, the sentence Jeff hears most from business owners is "AI killed our search traffic." Here's a second sentence from the same twelve months: Google's paid clicks grew 13%, and Google search advertising brought in $63 billion in one quarter. One of those sentences is the headline. The other is the explanation — and most companies have them backward.
In this episode, Jeff slows down the monthly review where "AI did it" shows up on a slide and nobody checks. A new three-year analysis of roughly 10,000 websites shows organic losses are concentrated in publishers and large sites; the typical small business site was roughly flat. Meanwhile, Google moved the goalposts: a sticky "Sponsored results" header, ad blocks roughly doubled in size, the first organic result below the fold, and aggressive algorithm updates. And the suspect everyone names — AI referral traffic — is about one visit in 200.
Three suspects. Two of them can be answered. The one you can't do much about is exactly why it's the convenient one to name.