Welcome to Search With Sean: Weekly News - your concise roundup of the key stories shaping SEO, AI, search, digital PR, paid media, and digital strategy this week.

Co-Hosts:

Nicola Agius – https://www.linkedin.com/in/nicola-agius-8b330956/

Amanda Walls – https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandajwalls/

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

This week, we covered a wide range of hot topics in SEO, AI, and digital strategy.

First, we tackled the ongoing debate: Is SEO Dead? New data from Graphite and SimilarWeb showed that organic traffic is only down by 2.5% year-on-year, with certain sectors like shopping portals seeing growth. The presence of AI overviews, while reducing click-through rates by 35%, is still only visible in about 30% of search results. This highlights the ongoing importance of SEO, even with the rise of AI-driven search tools.

We also discussed OpenAI’s shift towards impression-based advertising within ChatGPT, which introduces a pay-per-view model that could reshape PPC strategies, especially in lead generation.

Meanwhile, Google’s Gemini platform has confirmed it won’t be introducing ads for now, presenting an interesting contrast to OpenAI’s approach, though this could change in the future as Google adapts its strategies.

On the jobs front, we highlighted the growing demand for AI-related roles, particularly in London, where positions like "Head of AI" and "AI Engineer" are becoming some of the fastest-growing opportunities in the job market. This shift is indicative of how deeply AI expertise is being integrated into various industries.

Top Videos 🎥

In this week’s video discussions, we reviewed Edward Sturm’s video challenging the efficacy of schema for SEO, questioning its value as a ranking factor for most sites. While schema is useful in specific cases like top stories carousels or large marketplaces, it’s not a game-changer for SEO on its own. We also explored how SEO KPIs are shifting, with a growing focus on intent-driven outcomes rather than simply traffic volume. This reflects a broader industry trend towards optimizing for high-quality traffic and engagement rather than just clicks.

We also covered a video on AI’s role in online shopping, examining how Google's new Universal Commerce Protocol could transform e-commerce by embedding AI agents directly in search results, bypassing the need for websites altogether.

Top Social Posts 📲

On social, Bernard Huang’s LinkedIn post made waves, declaring that the blue link era is officially over. With AI-driven responses becoming the focal point, brands must rethink how they appear in search results - it’s no longer just about ranking number one. He emphasized the need for brands to focus on AI visibility as we approach 2026 and beyond. Additionally, Glenn Gabe shared insights about GPT for Doctors, an AI platform increasingly used by U.S. doctors for medical guidance, showing how AI is being adopted in crucial sectors like healthcare.

View all stories + more here - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/e/2PACX-1vRgApI9fMAMVswEIcS8iz2HXYpWXPlA2hjHZs8B9stlS6s8mvX-cAkHydCWW2yvca6Jv2sn0xu6w4Eg/pubhtml

Welcome to Search With Sean: Weekly News - your concise roundup of the key stories shaping SEO, AI, search, digital PR, paid media, and digital strategy this week.

Co Hosts:

Amanda Walls https://www.linkedin.com/in/amandajwalls/

We covered the following + more:

Top Stories

We unpacked the December Google Core Update, including volatility, stronger signals around real expertise + intent matching, and why E-E-A-T now matters beyond classic YMYL.

We also discussed fresh research showing AI search usage is accelerating, with Google not losing users so much as losing clicks — as more journeys stay inside AI answers.B

uilding on that, we explored Grounding + citations research, including Dan Petrovic’s “grounding chunks” analysis — and what it suggests about ranking position, chunk size, and how sources are selected.

Finally, we covered the growing impact on publishers, with major reports suggesting news sites expect significant traffic drops as AI summaries replace click-through behaviour.

Top Videos

We reviewed key videos on:

Digital PR + journalism — what actually makes a story newsworthy today, and why survey-led campaigns are becoming essential

Local SEO + AI visibility — how LLMs cite and surface local businesses, and what drives mentions

Humanoid robotics progress — showing how quickly AI is moving from “software” into real-world capability (warehouses, factories, automation)

Top Social Posts

This week’s standout posts included:

Ads inside AI Overviews — why PPC is shifting toward intent + trust, not just auction mechanics (and why brand signals now matter more)

Google Merchant Center “AI business agent” — retailers training a virtual assistant in their brand voice to answer product questions and support conversion

January 2026 marks one of the biggest months yet for SEO, AI, and digital platforms. This episode breaks down how search, visibility, and trust are shifting as AI moves from an experiment to core infrastructure across search, shopping, health, and everyday technology.

🎬 Top Videos & Talks

This month’s videos focus on the rapid acceleration of AI and robotics, with humanoid robots learning tasks independently, predicting outcomes, and interacting with people in increasingly realistic ways. Several experiments explore what happens when large language models are embedded directly into robots, raising serious questions about autonomy, safety, and control. Alongside this, leading search and SEO voices explain how AI answers are reshaping discovery, why brand mentions often matter more than links, and how users are finding information without clicking through to websites.

📰 Top Stories

The biggest stories confirm that AI is no longer supporting search and commerce but actively replacing parts of them. Apple deepens its partnership with Google Gemini for Siri, while Google rolls out AI-powered shopping, virtual try-ons, and direct checkout directly in search. New data shows AI Overviews dominating medical queries, driving down organic click-through rates and raising concerns about misinformation and lost nuance. Google also introduces meaningful Search Console updates, including improved query grouping, Discover insights, and clearer reporting.

🌍 Other News

Beyond search, AI continues to reshape healthcare, work, and regulation. New tools analyse medical records, automation plans point to large-scale job losses, and AI hallucinations are appearing in courts and academic research. At the same time, global investment in AI infrastructure accelerates, while governments begin responding to safety concerns around children, surveillance, and AI-powered consumer products.

💬 Social & Industry Highlights

Across the industry, practitioners note that AI visibility no longer follows traditional ranking rules. Attention is spread across more sources, shorter and clearer content is often cited, informational blog content outperforms comparison pages, and social content from platforms like Reddit and X is appearing more frequently in search results.

Explore the majority of the stories covered here - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/u/1/d/e/2PACX-1vRgApI9fMAMVswEIcS8iz2HXYpWXPlA2hjHZs8B9stlS6s8mvX-cAkHydCWW2yvca6Jv2sn0xu6w4Eg/pubhtml