The Role of AI in SEO: Smarter Search, Faster Results

How is AI transforming SEO strategies in 2025? 

Here are some stats that show how AI is influencing SEO in 2025: 

1. More than 86.07% of SEO professionals had already incorporated AI into their strategies in 2023

In the same year, a Capgemini survey found that 31% of marketers used generative AI extensively for more than 50% of their initiatives, 25% used it for less than 50% of their initiatives, while 12% planned to use it. 

The report predicted that by 2025-2026, around 45% of marketers will use gen AI in SEO for more than 50% of their initiatives, 44% for less than 50% of their initiatives, while 11% will still be undecided. 

This suggests that the majority of marketers are incorporating AI strategies into their workflow. 

2. AI is automating routine SEO and content tasks 

66.85% of SEO leads and managers consider automating routing SEO tasks as one of the most significant achievements of generative AI. Executives can offload manual work to AI and free their time for higher-level strategy. 

Based on HubSpot research, when it comes to SEO content creation, 34% of marketers use AI to generate search/SEO content. Another report indicates that the most common use of AI is generating outlines (63%), followed by idea generation and keyword research (both at 60%). 

Most importantly, AI isn’t simply speeding up old processes; it’s enabling new SEO tactics. Marketers are using it for sophisticated data analysis, identifying content gaps, and predicting search trends. 

3. AI is changing search engine results pages (SERPs)

Google’s introduction of generative AI answers in the form of AI overviews in search shows the rise of chat-based search tools. This means it’s not just about optimizing for blue links; instead, SEOs need to drive visibility in AI-driven results and citations. 

In fact, AI overviews are appearing in approximately 15% of search results as of mid-2025. This is changing fast toward higher attendance of AI overviews on SERPs. 

With the changing search behavior, 37% of product discoveries now start in AI chat interfaces such as ChatGPT or Perplexity. 

4. AI-powered content creation and optimization

67% of marketers observed improvements in content quality when using AI assistance. 

AI writing tools assist with structure and consistency, ensuring that essential keywords and topics are thoroughly covered. They also analyze top-ranking pages to identify content gaps that need to be filled. The outcome is often more comprehensive content that aligns better with search intent. 

It’s no wonder that 84% of marketers believe the most effective use of AI in content marketing is to make sure your content truly answers what users are searching for.

Common ways AI is elevating content creation include:

• Draft writing and expansion: Generative AI models can produce first drafts or expand on sections of text. 25% of online retail businesses are using AI to generate product copy optimized for SEO. 
• On-page SEO optimization: Around 75% of marketers say AI helps generate meta tags and other on-page elements, cutting down manual optimization work.

Even with these advantages, human oversight remains essential. Savvy SEO professionals treat AI as an assistant, not a replacement. 93% of marketers always review and edit AI-generated content before publishing. 

5. AI-generated content can match human content in SEO performance 

What are some real examples of AI in SEO? (+ performance insights)

Based on the statistics above, it’s clear that AI in SEO isn’t just helpful in automating repetitive tasks, but it also adds strategic value as people’s search engine journeys evolve. Be it keyword research or optimizing for intent, AI is playing a significant role in all aspects. For example, 75% of businesses feel AI has cut down the time spent on tasks like keyword research and meta-tag optimization significantly. 

Here’s an overview of how marketers are making use of AI: 

Source: Survey Monkey

Beyond this generalized overview, there are real examples of AI usage by companies and agencies. 

Here are a few examples with the performance and ROI they’re driving with AI: 

Opening up a new traffic channel to contribute 5% of the total traffic

Xponent21, a digital agency, applied an AI-focused SEO strategy to its own website, aiming to dominate “AI SEO” queries. Within a year, they achieved competitive growth, with organic search visibility increasing by 4,162% year-over-year. 

This resulted in over 10.5 million impressions and 20,100 clicks from search engines within a 12-month period. Interestingly, about 5% of their total traffic now comes directly from AI-driven search agents. It’s a traffic source that was 0% a year before, driving net-new traffic to the website. 

Increasing AI-driven referral traffic 

An SEO agency reported a substantial gain in traffic, approximately a 2300% improvement, by helping their client in the manufacturing industry appear in AI overviews. Before, the company had no visibility in AIOs. 

However, after the optimizations, the client appeared in AI overviews for almost 90 keywords.

Source: Diggity Marketing

They made a few optimizations, for example, structuring content for AI readability and repositioning messaging to address the intent and answer any questions promptly. 

As of today, the impact of AI in SEO is highly optimistic. There’s a lot of evidence. Overall, McKinsey estimates that generative AI could drive a 5% to 15% increase in marketing productivity, which is worth about $463 billion annually across marketing sectors. 

What are the challenges of AI in SEO?

While the advantages of AI in SEO are clear, it’s essential to address the challenges and concerns associated with this technology. Below are a few statistics that reflect on the latter. 

• Content quality and accuracy. 30% of marketers worry that AI-generated content isn’t accurate and has the potential to mislead the audience while harming a brand’s credibility. Similarly, in a different research, 65.1% of professionals were concerned about content authenticity.
• Workforce impact. 33% of businesses fear that AI might alter the workforce, potentially leading to job losses in marketing or SEO teams.
• Ranking penalties. Websites using AI-generated content experienced a 5% faster growth in traffic. However, they are 4% more likely to incur Google penalties.
• Website traffic patterns. Some business owners have shown concern over the zero-click searches. One in four business owners is concerned that AI search features will reduce their website traffic.

Adapt intelligently 

There are a lot of good things about AI in SEO, and some undeniable concerns, especially when there isn’t a standardized way of using AI in SEO. Marketers are innovating and finding new ways to experiment. However, it depends on you, where you want to roll out the red carpet and where you want to draw the line. 

Seasoned SEOs are doing this intelligently to ensure they achieve efficiency gains without compromising their business’s privacy, authority, and authenticity. Those who strike this balance will outpace those who do everything manually and those who naively rely on AI alone (risking quality issues).

It’s best to view AI in SEO as a catalyst to accelerate long SEO processes and work more efficiently. There are many AI SEO software on the market to help you expedite things cautiously.