Google Will Kill Your Traffic - Here's How You Adapt | Kevin Indig (Growth Memo)
About this episode
AI Overviews are changing search — but not in the way Google wants you to think.
In this episode of the Ahrefs Podcast, Tim Soulo sits down with Kevin Indig to discuss the real impact of AI on search behavior, website traffic, and SEO strategy.
Kevin analyzed over 5 billion search visits and found that while people are searching more often, they’re spending less time per session — and zero-click searches are on the rise.
But this isn’t just about traffic.
Kevin argues that SEO isn’t dying — it’s just entering a new investment cycle. The smartest companies are already shifting resources toward AI visibility, building tools, and rethinking how they show up in ChatGPT and beyond.
In this episode:
(00:00) Intro
(02:39) How is search changing?
(06:20) Revenue vs traffic
(10:30) How AI Overviews are changing
(13:46) Join Kevin at Ahrefs Evolve
(14:23) How to show up in AI Overviews (and is it even useful?)
(20:10) AI Overview volatility
(26:02) Queries vs prompts
(31:11) External validation: the key to ranking on AI Overviews
(35:13) Is SEO dead?
(42:50) Ranking in AI Overviews vs ChatGPT
(49:18) What you should be optimizing with AI
(01:05:42) Vibe coding in action
(01:07:21) Outro
We hope you enjoyed this episode of the Ahrefs Podcast!
Be sure to like, subscribe — and tell a friend.
Where to find Kevin:
LinkedIn: Kevin Indig
X: @Kevin_Indig
Website: mkt1.co
Where to find Tim:
LinkedIn: Tim Soulo
X: @timsoulo
Website: timsoulo.com
Referenced in this episode
👤 People
Dmitry Gerasimenko
Ryan Law
Rand Fishkin
Eric Siu
🏢 Companies & Brands
Ahrefs
OpenAI
Similarweb
ChatGPT
Ramp
🛠️ Tools / Platforms
Claude
Humata AI
AirOps
v0 by Vercel
Cursor
Relevance AI
📚 Frameworks & Concepts
AI Overviews (Google SGE)
Vibe Coding
Zero-Click Searches
First Mover Advantage
Information Gain (SEO Strategy)
#SEO #GoogleAI #AIOverviews #AhrefsPodcast #KevinIndig #SearchMarketing #DigitalMarketing #AIContent #LLMSearch #ZeroClickSearches #ContentStrategy #AIinMarketing #VibeCoding #MarketingAutomation #aiseo
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