In this SEO FOMO video, the host reviews the latest SEO and AI search developments as of July 7 2025. The episode begins with the June 2025 Google core update, noting its three‑week rollout and early volatility in rankings. It then dives into the leaked ChatGPT 4o system prompt, highlighting strict conditions under which the model may invoke live web search (real‑time, location‑specific, niche, or potentially harmful outdated info) and the prohibition against searching for content already in the model’s internal knowledge unless the user explicitly requests public sources. The host explains that ChatGPT generates up to five distinct searches per request, marks relevant terms with a plus sign, and does not store URLs or maintain a persistent index, meaning links appear only when live search is triggered. Next, SimilarWeb data is presented, showing a rise in zero‑click SERP results from 56 % to 69 % since AI overviews launched, and a stark click‑through disparity: 24 % of traditional Google Search sessions result in a click versus only 4.5 % for Google AI Mode. The video references analyses by Hans Cronenberg, Barry Schwartz, Garrett Sussman, Dan Taylor, and John Iwuzor, each offering insights into the “great decoupling” and how SEO must adapt. Dan Taylor’s piece provides C‑level‑friendly actions such as strengthening brand, publishing AI‑resistant content, focusing on topics over keywords, and turning product pages into resources. John Iwuzor advises structuring content for AI retrieval, becoming a primary source with original research, designing for multimodal consumption, and nurturing direct audience relationships. The host wraps up by promoting a new SimilarWeb report that tracks AI chatbot traffic, encouraging viewers to use SEO FOMO tools, subscribe, and stay updated on SEO trends.
Chapters
Let's go through the latest in SEO and AI search from the last edition of the SEO FOMO newsletter. Today's edition is sponsored by Similarweb. Thank you very much for your sponsorship. The top news is the announcement of the June 2025 core update, which was announced on June 30th. And Google has mentioned how this rollout might take up to 3 weeks to complete. So it's bit longer than usual. There have been already a few SEOs sharing quite a bit of volatility in the rankings, but it's still too soon to say which are the winners, losers. We will need to still wait for a couple of more weeks in order to see the final outcome. The next top news is the ChatGPT system prompt leak and its impact towards SEO, which was analyzed by Hans Cronenberg, who's a German SEO, and he did an amazing job to identify the implication towards our job. In particular, when web search is activated, and it was interesting to see how the system defines strictly and narrow conditions under which it will be allowed to use the web tool. Web search is only permitted for real-time or current information, location-specific information, hard-to-find niche topics not covered in the model training data, and situations where outdated information could be harmful. Also, search is prohibited for information known to be available on the model internal knowledge unless the user explicitly indicates preference for public sources. ChatGPT has as well its own Query found out, generating up to 5 distinct searches per request. Relevant terms are marked with a plus to improve search results. And even more interesting, the system prompts contains no indication that ChatGPT stores URLs or maintains a persistent web index. Instead, links in responses only appear if surfaced through live search. And given how rarely search is activated, this means links in ChatGPT answers are the exception, not the rule. There is no crawling or storage of web pages comparable to search engines like Google. So this gives even more reason to stop thinking about ChatGPT as just an extrapolation of what you already do or tend to work for Google. We can see the weight of the own ChatGPT model knowledge data on one hand, and how strict are the rules to constrain the integration with web search as well. The next top news is the coverage by Barry Swartz of SimilarWeb data on how no clicks from Google grew from 56% to 69% since the release of AI overviews last year. This is unfortunately not really surprising given so many SEOs sharing screenshots showing the evolution of the great decoupling from their Google Search Console with a very high increase of impressions and unfortunate decrease of clicks. Also, Garrett Sussman at the same time shared additional insights from SimilarWeb regarding Google AI Mode, showcasing how it has grown since its release. And in particular, it was quite interesting to see the percentage of searches resulting in clicks to external sites of AI Mode compared to the ones that are traditionally seen in Google Search. 24% of Google Search sessions result in a click, while only 4.5% of AI mode sessions actually result in a click. So there's a very important disparity here, as we can see as well. So it's not only the impact of AI overviews anymore. The reality is that those that actually go there will tend to click far less on links. And how do you explain all of this? Dan Taylor published an amazing piece about explaining the great decoupling and the increase of zero-click searches to to the C-level, providing easy-to-understand actionable steps and insights to share with decision makers who are not technical. Why is this happening? How to assess better the behavior using analytics and how to move forward strengthening your brand, publishing content that AI can't copy, building around topics, not keywords, turning product pages into useful resources, and why SEO still matters. Despite a lot of people saying out there that SEO is dead. Another very insightful piece that ties with this very well is John Iwuzor's piece about how to adjust your content strategy for Google's AI mode, covering the full intent space, not just the main query, which you should have been doing already in SEO, by the way, but just in case now there is a bigger need for it, structuring your content for for easy AI retrieval. Remember that LLMs like ChatGPT don't render JavaScript like Google, for example. Becoming a primary source, not a second interpreter. So original research, industry benchmark, proprietary frameworks, surveys, etc., etc., becomes even more fundamental. Designing for multimodal consumption from the start is now a need. Creating content for direct audience relationship is also important, nurturing your email list, building community on platforms you actually control, optimizing for AI citation and verification, and start thinking about search becoming an AI-first experience, not entirely changing, but shifting what we do towards this new reality. To wrap up today's edition, I want to thank again Similarweb, our today's sponsor, who actually has a very useful new report to track AI chatbot traffic, allowing us to better understand which are the top pages of any sites getting AI traffic and the top prompts triggering this traffic to better identify patterns, understand LLMs users, and enhance our content strategy accordingly. And remember, if you want to keep up with the latest SEO news, if you don't want to wait until the next edition of the SEO FOMO newsletter or the SEO FOMO Tool on Demand Read videos, Go and take a look at the SEO FOMO News to monitor the top SEO trends in real time. Thank you very much again. And remember to like the video if you like it, subscribe to the channel to not miss out. Until the next edition. Bye-bye.
