SEO is forever-changed by the AI revolution, and your SEO strategy should pivot accordingly.

Instead of only focusing on ranking in the standard Google search results, your business should also focus on getting mentioned in Google’s AI answers and other AI tools like ChatGPT.

Here’s a comprehensive list of actions that you should take to get your business discovered by searchers in 2025:

1. Don’t Bother Targeting Top-of-Funnel Keywords (AI Has Taken These Over)

Targeting top-of-funnel keywords like “what is CNC machining” or “how to reduce business taxes” where the content is educational and not conversion-driven used to be a worthwhile strategy.

Doing this would allow businesses to consistently create blog content to target more and more keywords, and many of these keywords would have low competition.

Although most of these users wouldn’t be in a position to convert, it would still raise brand awareness and the occasional user would eventually convert.

However, in 2025, these types of search queries have been swallowed up by AI responses and they don’t drive much traffic to websites anymore. Most users read the AI response and don’t visit any website.

Here’s the catch: Although it’s almost useless to rank for these keywords on search engines, it’s still helpful to have a handful of high-quality blog posts to increase “topical relevance” – which improves search rankings across your entire site, including bottom-of-funnel keywords.

Search algorithms tend to reward websites that have helpful, content-rich pages for their industry – but you don’t need many. For example, if you’re a commercial construction company in Denver and you have a few blog posts for top-of-funnel topics like “stages of a commercial construction project”, this might improve your search rankings for bottom-of-funnel keywords like “commercial construction companies denver”.

Having some high-quality blog posts will also build trust with many users and enhance your credibility. You can also refer your leads to blog posts on your site to answer their questions. This will improve your conversion rate and increase the amount of time that users spend on your website, which is another positive SEO signal (helping you rank higher for all keywords).

2. Do Extensive Keyword Research on Bottom-of-Funnel Keywords

First, think about your products/services and what search queries you’d like to pop up for. For example, if you’re a plumber in Boston, you’d want to rank for keywords like “plumbers boston”, “toilet repairs boston”, “sump pump replacements boston”, etc.

From there, take your list of keywords and run them through an SEO tool like Ahrefs, SEMrush or Ubersuggest. These tools will show you the search volume, competition level as well as similar keywords that you could consider targeting. This information will allow you to determine what keywords to prioritize in your SEO strategy.

3. Analyze Your Competition

Another tactic for keyword research is to run your competitors’ websites through an SEO tool to see what keywords they’re ranking for. This will give you some inspiration for what keywords you should target.

SEO tools will also show you the other websites that are linking to your competitors’ sites, which is helpful when generating backlinks to your site (see more details on that in step #11).

Beyond SEO tools, you should also analyze competitor websites manually to get a sense of what kind of content they have and what their user experience is like – in order to ensure that your website is superior in every aspect.

4. Create an SEO-Focused Sitemap and Site Architecture

Each of your target keywords should have a dedicated page. You won’t rank highly for a keyword if you’re adding the content to a broader page mixed with other topics and keywords. Your target keyword needs to be the primary focus of the page and stated in the key areas of the page (title tag, H1, etc).

Your website should also have clear and intuitive navigation. It’s helpful to group products, services and other information into categories so that users and search algorithms can make sense of your site structure. It’s also essential to make any SEO-focused page reachable in no more than 3 clicks from your homepage.

Lastly, be sure to generate an XML sitemap and submit it to Google Search Console.

5. Enhance Your Metadata for the SERPs

The search engine results page (SERP) features your title tag, meta description and schema markup (rich snippets that display things like reviews, addresses, products, extra sitelinks and more).

Make sure your title tag and meta description contain your target keyword (as close to the front as possible). Bonus points for making your title tag and meta description compelling, as it’ll improve your click-through rate and increase your rankings further (Google likes to see high CTRs).

It’s also helpful to check the title tags, meta descriptions and schema markup that your competitors are displaying in the SERPs. This will give you inspiration for what to copy and what to do differently in order to stand out in the right ways.

Keep in mind: the max length for a title tag is 60 characters or 575 pixels, and the max length for a meta description is 155 characters or 920 pixels. Going above these limits will truncate your content and likely decrease your rankings.

Next, add the appropriate schema markup on each page to improve your rankings and make your website stand out in the SERPs. We recommend following this guide to effectively implement schema markup on WordPress.

6. Optimize Your On-Page Content

Your target keyword (or similar variations) should be stated in the H1 tag, the first 200 words of body content, at least one subheading (H2, H3, etc), and ideally the alt text of an image as well.

The keyword should also appear a few more times throughout the content of the page. You should aim for 1-2% keyword density, while making sure your content reads naturally.

Your page also needs to have an appropriate word count. Check the other websites that are ranking on page 1 for your target keyword to get a sense of the average word count. We recommend aiming for a similar or slightly longer word count to be on the safe side. However, it’s likely okay to make your content a bit shorter or much longer if you think it’ll improve the user experience and value of your content.

7. Use Internal Links to Improve Page Authority and Crawlability

Adding internal links throughout the body content of pages (not just the header and footer menus) is a great way to help Google, ChatGPT and other search engines crawl your website more efficiently and understand what your company does.

Using this tactic will pass authority from page to page. For example, if you have a high-authority page and a low-authority page, adding an internal link from the high-authority page to the low-authority page will increase the authority and rankings of the low-authority page.

Don’t abuse this strategy though – adding too many unhelpful internal links will be flagged by Google. Aim for about 2-5 relevant internal links per 1,000 words of content, and bonus points for making the anchor text keyword-rich (ie. we offer custom web design services) as long as the anchor text reads naturally. For any page that matters for SEO, be sure to have at least 1-2 relevant internal links going to it (outside the header and footer).

8. Refine Your Site for the Technical Aspects of SEO

Here’s a technical SEO checklist:

• Maximize your site speed (check out our site speed guide)

• Ensure that there’s a single H1 on each page (there can’t be more than one H1)

• Use logical heading hierarchy (ie. if there’s a “product features” section on your homepage, the main heading of the section should be an H2 and the heading for each feature should be an H3)

• Make sure your website is perfectly responsive across all devices, browsers and screen sizes (use a tool like LambdaTest or BrowserStack to test this)

• Optimize your URLs (make your page URLs as clear and short as possible while including target keywords, and add redirects for any URLs that have changed)

• Configure your robots.txt file to guide bots on which pages to crawl and index.

• Identify and fix any crawl errors using tools like Google Search Console (and submit your XML sitemap to Google Search Console)

• Add an SSL certificate to secure your site with HTTPS

• Use canonical tags to prevent duplicate content issues and ensure that search engines understand which version of a page is preferred.

• Optimize your title tags, meta descriptions and schema markup

• Add alt text for all images

• Make your website accessible for people with disabilities (check out our accessibility guide)

• Use Hreflang attributes to specify language and regional versions of your website.

9. Enhance the User Experience of Your Website

One of the key ranking factors is based on how users interact with your site (ie. clicks, time spent, form submissions, etc). If Google sees that people are engaging with your site in a positive way, it’ll help your rankings. This means that the design, layout, user experience and conversion rate of your site has a direct impact on SEO results.

For most industries, a website doesn’t need to be visually gorgeous to have a strong user experience and conversion rate – it just needs to be engaging, intuitive and helpful. Your web designer should prioritize the layout and user journey more than the “WOW factor”.

10. Optimize Your Google Business Profile for Local SEO

If your business relies on local searches, follow this checklist to optimize your Google Business Profile for Google Maps:

• Select the most relevant and accurate primary and secondary categories for your business.

• Display an address publicly (hidden addresses and “service area” businesses don’t perform as well in Google Maps)

• Add a detailed business description with target keywords

• Don’t stuff keywords into your business name (doing this can get your GBP removed)

• Fill out all sections of your GBP (ie. photos, business hours, attributes, contact info, website URL, etc)

• Publish a Google Post at least once a month (Google likes to see activity on your GBP)

• Use a consistent NAP (name, address, phone number) across all other online directories

• Maintain a high overall review rating (aim for 4.5 or higher)

• Increase your volume of reviews (this surprisingly isn’t an important ranking factor once you’re above 10 reviews, but it significantly improves your click-through rate)

• Respond to all reviews

11. Build Backlinks to Boost Your Domain Authority

In addition to having a high-quality website, search engines also want to see that your company is trusted by other sources. That’s where backlinks come into play. A backlink is when another website links to yours.

When search engines see that more websites link to yours compared to your competitors, you’re more likely to rank above them for your target keywords – especially when your backlinks are coming from relevant, high-authority websites.

Check out Backlinko’s guide on how to get high-quality backlinks (yes, this backlink will improve Backlinko’s SEO!)

12. Add Your Business to Directory Sites and Listicles that Rank Highly for Target Keywords

Adding your website to as many directory sites as possible (like Yelp) will not only help you get discovered on those platforms, but it’ll slightly improve the SEO results of your own website as well. When a link is coming from a directory site, it’s called a citation – not a backlink. Citations have less of an impact on your SEO, but they still help.

Pro tip: leveraging the SEO results of someone else’s website is one of the most effective SEO strategies. If you search your target keyword in Google or ChatGPT, there’s a good chance that a directory site or a list-based blog post is ranking highly or mentioned by the AI. If you get your business featured near the top of the directory or list, it’ll be a great source of leads. Some sites require you to create an account and generate enough reviews while others take payment in exchange for placing you near the top – and it’s often worth the investment!

Bonus Tip: Maximize the Percentage of SEO Traffic that Converts

If you’re generating tons of organic traffic but nobody’s submitting lead forms, purchasing products, subscribing to newsletters, etc, then what’s the point?

That’s why SEO is only one piece of the lead generation puzzle. You also need to understand and apply the best practices for conversion rate optimization (CRO). Check out our CRO Guide for actionable insights.

Final Thoughts

Following this guide will set your business up for success when it comes to ranking in traditional search engines as well as AI-based search engines.

Want help implementing these strategies? At Azuro Digital, our web design and development services incorporate SEO tactics at every stage. Let’s discuss your traffic goals and a game plan to achieve them!