So you’re asking yourself, “What even is SEO anymore?” Here’s your answer.
Let’s be honest: SEO doesn’t mean what it used to — “Search Engine Optimization.” And if your team is still treating it like a Google-only game, you’re probably missing some of your best opportunities to be found by the right people.
That doesn’t mean SEO is dead — far from it. But it has matured. Expanded. Outgrown its name, in a way that still works.
In his recent post, Rand Fishkin, the king of SEO, put it best: SEO still stands for SEO, but the “E” is no longer just about Engines. It’s about Everything. Because people are searching everywhere now — and your content needs to meet them there.
And we’d be remiss not to credit Ashley Liddell, who helped spark this line of thinking. In her excellent LinkedIn post, she explains what many marketers feel intuitively but don’t always articulate: your brand is being discovered in the wild, far beyond your website. That’s not a fluke. That’s search behavior in 2025.
So no, SEO isn’t dead. But its definition has officially evolved into Search Everything Optimization — and your digital strategy needs an evolution as well.
Search used to be about optimizing for Google. Now it’s about optimizing for people — wherever they’re searching.
That could mean:
This is still SEO. But your content needs to both be where your audience is and be findable within that platform. Do your homework and make adjustments, asap.
The rise of AI search doesn’t mean SEO disappears — it means your work needs to be structured and surfaced in new ways.
Think:
If your content is helpful, accurate, and well-formatted, Large Language Models (LLMs) will serve it up to users without needing a traditional search. We predict this will be the future of search.
Here’s the kicker: your future clients might encounter your brand before they even realize they’re looking for you.
That could be:
Modern SEO isn’t just about ranking for keywords. It’s about building trust through visibility — then creating a seamless user experience where transactions, downloads, or applications take place: on your website.
You might not see a spike in organic traffic right away — and that doesn’t mean your content isn’t working. Zero-click marketing is here, and the way we measure content effectiveness is shifting fast.
It might mean:
That’s working. Even if Google Analytics doesn’t tell the whole story.
You have more surface area than ever to be discovered.
That means:
It’s a little more work — but it’s a lot more opportunity.
Pick one piece of content your team has already created — something solid but underutilized.
Then do one of these:
You don’t need to rewrite your whole content strategy. You just need to treat your existing content like it deserves to travel.
If you’re already seeing signs that your old SEO playbook isn’t delivering — but you’re not quite sure what to replace it with — that’s where we come in.
At Hard Refresh, we build digital systems that scale your impact. We help mission-driven teams show up where it matters — not just in search results, but in conversations, citations, and decisions.
This shift is big. But it’s also energizing. You don’t have to chase the algorithm — you just need to focus on being helpful, strategic, and easy to find.
And that? That’s still SEO.