In this month’s Round-Up episode, we cover the biggest developments across SEO, AI, search, paid media, and digital marketing.

Hosted by Sean, alongside co-hosts Amanda Walls (https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandajwalls/) and Laura Iancu (https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-iancu-seo/), we discuss Google's latest algorithm updates, AI search visibility, changing click-through rates, AI citations, reporting challenges, AI agents, and what these changes mean for marketers as search continues to evolve.

Key Themes:

Google Algorithm Updates & Search Manipulation

Google rolled out multiple updates including the May 2026 Core Update and June Spam Update. The team discusses the impact on paid links, mass AI content, and attempts to manipulate AI answers, while exploring why quality, usefulness, and genuine authority remain critical for long-term visibility.

AI Search Visibility & Reporting Challenges

Google has started providing more visibility into AI Overviews and AI Mode performance data within Search Console. The panel discusses what this means for SEOs, the limitations of current reporting, and why combining multiple data sources is essential when measuring performance.

SEO Tools, Data & Finding The Truth

The team explores the role of third-party SEO tools such as SEM Rush and Ahrefs, discussing why these platforms provide valuable insights but should not replace first-party data sources like Google Search Console and analytics platforms.

AI Citations, GEO & Multi-Channel Visibility

New research highlights the growing importance of building visibility beyond traditional rankings, with YouTube, Reddit, Wikipedia, and wider online mentions becoming increasingly important signals for AI systems. The discussion explores why brands need to build authority across multiple channels.

AI Overviews, Schema & Measuring Success

The panel discusses AI citations, schema markup, and the difficulty of measuring AI visibility as results continue to change rapidly. As AI Overviews evolve, marketers face new challenges around proving value and understanding success.

AI Agents, Commerce & The Future Of Search

ChatGPT and other AI platforms are moving beyond answering questions, with AI agents becoming increasingly involved in payments, shopping, and professional services. The team discusses the opportunities and risks of this shift.

AI Adoption, Security & Human Oversight

From AI helping with legal cases to concerns around security, autonomous systems, and AI development, the episode explores where AI can provide value while highlighting the importance of human judgement.

Technical SEO & Platform Changes

The discussion covers HTML vs Markdown for indexing, Google Business Profile data in GA4, AI traffic reporting, Lighthouse updates, and the growing need to prepare websites for an AI-driven ecosystem.

Paid Media & Changing Advertising Challenges

Amanda discusses the latest Google Ads updates, including advertiser verification, AI Max reporting improvements, and the ongoing challenges around transparency and attribution.

The Future Of Search & Changing Metrics

The episode closes with a discussion around declining organic click-through rates, changing client expectations, and why marketers need to rethink success beyond rankings and traffic as search becomes increasingly AI-driven.

Thank you to our partner, SEO Gets, the easy-to-use analytics and reporting tool for your GSC & GA4 data. Be sure to check out the tool and use code search10 for 10% off: https://seogets.com/

Welcome to Search With Sean: Weekly Digital Marketing News – your weekly breakdown of SEO, AI, digital marketing, and search trends shaping the industry right now.

Co-Hosts

Laura Iancu – https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-iancu-seo/

Stanislav Farkas – https://www.linkedin.com/in/stanislav-farkas-fastraveller/

Episode Overview

This episode covers major shifts across AI, search, media trust, and digital marketing - from AI-powered journalism workflows and regulatory pressure on Google, to declining trust in news and the growing use of AI in everyday decision-making like healthcare.

Key Topics Covered

- Announcement of Search With Sean Live 2, a charity-driven online event where speakers across SEO, AI, and digital marketing contribute talks, with applications closing mid-August and a planned September stream

- AI-powered journalism workflows around major events (e.g. World Cup coverage), where articles are pre-written using templates and rapidly edited when real-world events occur

- The role of speed vs human input in modern publishing, and concerns about whether AI reduces editorial quality or enhances efficiency

- UK CMA proposals around Google Search regulation, including transparency, ranking fairness, advance notice of core updates, and debate over whether implementation timelines are realistic

- Tension between increased transparency and the risk of enabling manipulation of search systems

- Record-low global trust in news media, with Reuters Institute data showing declining trust and increased reliance on social and video platforms

- Rising use of AI tools for health-related queries, including reported negative outcomes and particularly high-risk use in mental health contexts

- Why people are increasingly turning to AI for healthcare support due to limited access, delays, and pressure on traditional medical systemsThe growing trust gap between institutions (news, healthcare, media) and AI systems providing “synthetic reassurance”

- AI becoming embedded in cultural and marketing moments, including Messi x ChatGPT collaborations and large-scale World Cup advertising campaigns

- Critique of AI marketing claims and “AI visibility” reporting, particularly short-term growth narratives that may not reflect long-term outcomes

- SEO industry discussion around declining performance signals, CTR changes, and indexing behaviour that prioritises only high-value content

- GrowthX and “Mountain AI” style examples used to highlight volatility in AI-driven growth case studies

- Research showing differences in JavaScript rendering across AI assistants, impacting what content is actually visible when models ground responses

- Key finding that many AI systems used in Europe do not execute JavaScript, meaning rendered content may not exist to them

- llms.txt research showing adoption is increasing, but the vast majority of files are never actually requested

This episode is supported by SEO Gets – the easiest way to analyse and report on your Google Search Console & GA4 data.

Try it here: https://seogets.com/Use code search10 for 10% off

About Search With Sean Live 2 - https://www.searchwithsean.com/search-with-sean-live-2026

Welcome to Search With Sean: Weekly Digital Marketing News. Your weekly breakdown of SEO, AI, digital marketing, and search trends shaping the industry right now.

Co-Hosts

Laura Iancu – https://www.linkedin.com/in/laura-iancu-seo/

Christian Goodrich - https://www.linkedin.com/in/cargoodrich/

In this week’s episode, we look into some of the most important shifts happening across AI, search, and digital marketing – from model safety concerns and enterprise AI risks, to Google’s aggressive push to bring Gemini into mainstream culture, and what that means for the future of search behaviour.

We start with a deep discussion around Claude’s latest model developments, including the contrast between “safer” public-facing versions like Fable and more advanced internal systems like Mythos. The conversation explores the growing gap between AI capability and public release constraints, and what that means for security, governance, and business risk.

From there, we move into one of the biggest underlying themes of the episode – AI security and organisational readiness. We discuss how quickly companies are adopting AI tools without clear guardrails, and how “vibe coding” and rapid AI-assisted development could introduce hidden vulnerabilities into live environments, from small businesses to enterprise SaaS platforms.

We also explore how different AI models are being used interchangeably across teams (Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini), and why lack of structured policy is becoming a major risk factor for data exposure and compliance issues.

Next, we look at Google’s marketing strategy for Gemini, including its high-visibility World Cup advertising campaign. This sparks a wider discussion around platform dominance, consumer behaviour, and whether AI adoption is now being driven less by choice and more by exposure at scale.

We then move into Google Discover’s new “search profiles” update, which gives publishers and creators a more structured way to present content across Google surfaces. We explore whether this could meaningfully shift visibility dynamics or if it risks repeating past experiments that failed to gain traction.

In the hiring and skills space, we break down findings from Moz research into the AI search skills employers actually want. Despite the AI hype, the data shows that traditional SEO fundamentals, analytics, and measurement still dominate hiring requirements, with AI skills acting as a supplement rather than a replacement.

We also explore what this means for professionals trying to demonstrate AI capability on CVs, and how real-world application (automation, tooling, measurable outcomes) is becoming more valuable than surface-level buzzwords.

The episode then moves into a broader industry debate around publishers and AI training data, including the growing pushback against scraping via systems like Common Crawl. We discuss the tension between content creators, platforms, and AI systems, and whether new licensing or control frameworks are inevitable.

Finally, we reflect on the wider implications of AI adoption – including concerns around AI-generated content quality (“AI slop”), sustainability, carbon footprint, and whether the industry is moving faster than its ability to regulate, secure, and responsibly scale these systems.

This episode is supported by SEO Gets – the easiest way to analyse and report on your Google Search Console & GA4 data.Try it here: https://seogets.com/Use code search10 for 10% off.