Survey: Google updates, self-preferencing, AI Overviews are top SEO threats

Google’s favoritism of certain types of websites – or itself, in the form of search features and AI Overviews – are the biggest threats facing SEO consultants, according to a new survey from Aleyda Solis.

SEO threats in 2024. Google updates that favor certain types of sites (e.g., user-generated content, big brands) in the search results is the biggest threat to SEO consulting efforts, according to 52% of survey respondents.

• Google favoring its own features/services over external sites was the second biggest threat (48%) while AI Overviews came in third (41%).
• Other real SEO threats are the adoption of LLMs to search instead of Google (37%); AI personalization of Google Search results (32%) and adoption of social platforms to search (28%).

Counter threats. So how are SEOs combating these threats? Based on responses Solis received, SEOs are focusing on:

• Improving content quality. High-quality, valuable, engaging, helpful and intent-based content. Which really is not new, per se.
• E-E-A-T. This is a concept that represents a collection of ranking signals related to content, links and user interactions.
• Traffic diversification. This is something Google’s Danny Sullivan discussed recently.
• Staying updated. Which you can do, in part, by signing up for Search Engine Land’s daily newsletter.

Why we care. SEO is more difficult than ever in 2024 – especially for smaller and mid-sized brands and websites. We’re already seeing many threats in 2024 (e.g., Google algorithm updates, more competition and complexity, less resources). But there continue to be many opportunities to reach and influence people during search journeys in today’s fragmented search landscape.

About the survey. The results are based on responses from 337 SEO consultants, collected between July 21 and Aug. 21.

The report. You can read it here: The SEOFOMO State of SEO Consulting – Survey 2024 Results.