Predictions for news SEO in 2025, part 1

We asked news SEO experts to pull out their crystal balls and predict what’s in store for 2025. Here’s what eight experts had to say

Dec 09, 2024

Learn how to understand key reports, find content ideas and glean actionable insights from Google Search Console data.

Hello, and welcome back. Jessie and Shelby here, back with our last two issues of 2024. Jessie returns from an extended long weekend (gotta use up the PTO!) spent throwing a few final pieces of pottery and watching the terrific A Real Pain. Shelby slept the equivalent of a hibernated bear and spent a ton of time watching her corgi enjoy his first snowfall. Joy is found in the eyes of a puppy discovering sticks in snow.

This week: News SEO predictions for 2025! It’s somehow time to anticipate what’s in store for next year for Google, news SEO and beyond. Here’s what eight experts had to say.

Next week, we’ll share what a few more experts think will happen. Be sure to refer back to 2024 and 2023 to judge the accuracy of our earlier guesses.

This is a *very* un-2025 way of consuming news. Photo by Roman Kraft on Unsplash

THE EXPERTS

Alexia LaFata

I think SERPs will continue seeing new features that will impact the visibility of publishers. This certainly includes AI Overviews, but it also includes new People Also Ask-type sections, social media carousels, discussions and forums and other Google-made products that'll come and go.

To me, this is a sign that Google is doing a lot of testing, which is very disruptive to publishers. The more understanding side of me sees this as a sign that people don't just want one thing when they search, and Google is trying to better serve its user base. It makes sense: If you're researching the best work tote, you may want to review what fashion experts think, but you also hear about the average person's experience taking the bag on the subway. Then, you might want to watch a video of someone packing it for a day in the office.

However, this creates a challenging landscape for publishers. Where do we fit in SERPs? We're supposed to be the experts, so we can't compete in spots reserved for "average person" perspectives. The balance in SERPs doesn't suggest that Google is prioritizing publishers as much as we'd want them to.

And adding AIO — which has neither expertise nor experience — to that mix feels counterintuitive to the last several years of Google’s recommendations for success.

As SEOs, we have to understand what we have control over and what we don't. Our biggest challenge for 2025 will be communicating to our newsrooms that there will always be ways we can improve our search standing and that the SERPs are going to fluctuate, without allowing the latter to discourage us from doing the former. Ultimately, publishers need to be nimble and adapt to the shifts in opportunity that will come with these changes.

Alexia is the Senior SEO Manager at Vox Media.

Caitlin Hathaway

2025 will be the year publishers massively invest in reducing their traffic dependence on Google, driven by the need to safeguard better against its algorithm updates. Publishers will actively explore ways to build a strong presence on new platforms, focusing on experimenting with new content that authentically connects with and engages audiences.

They'll make more intentional investments in emerging formats, with a particular emphasis on video and audio-based content to build presence on other platforms. This shift also opens up opportunities for experimentation with content repurposing. Publishers will test entirely new ways to present information, transforming existing content into more engaging formats that resonate with hard-to-reach audience segments.

Caitlin is the Senior SEO Strategist for Forbes Advisor.

Ella Jinadu

2024 continued to be a turbulent year for affiliate publishing. Many sites felt the wrath of Google’s new (and then updated) Site Reputation Abuse policy, numerous algorithm updates and huge visibility surges for forums like Reddit and Quora. I suspect Google isn’t done with cleaning up affiliate publishing just yet and we’re still waiting on the algorithmic portion of site reputation abuse to roll out — if it actually does.

As has been the case for a few years now, succeeding in search in 2025 will be about creating high-quality content your core audience engages with and being selective in the opportunities you pursue. Creating exceptional affiliate reviews takes time and effort, and sites that put in the legwork to showcase their expertise will fare best. Even so, as Google continues to redefine the rules around affiliate publishing, those in the strongest position will be the ones that have an offering that connects on multiple platforms, not just search.

I think the key in 2025 (and beyond) is going to be building your community — both on and off site.

Building a community means having a unique voice — as everything “generic” is going to continue getting eaten by AI — and engaging directly with your audience. Messaging needs to be tailored to resonate with specific audiences — make them feel seen, like you are talking specifically and directly to them, and they will choose to read your words over others'.

To do that successfully, having a deeper and more up-to-date understanding of the subjects you are writing on is more important than ever.

Ella is the Audience Editor for The Filter at The Guardian.

Jessie Willms

Publishers faced huge challenges in 2024: algorithm swings, Reddit surges, AI and diminishing spaces for publisher content on SERPs. While these are reasons for concern, they’re also motivation to double down on audience fundamentals. Building direct, strong relationships with readers around content written by experts on topics core to our editorial mission will be a winning strategy.

Real estate for publishers on search — the traditional blue links — is likely to shrink further as Google adds more content types (video, forums, etc.) to its results. Publishers should consider experimenting with new formats to surface in these positions, while creating an on-site experience that feels like a destination and keeps readers coming back.

To stand out, focus on what makes your journalism distinctive — the voices, experiences and authority of your coverage. Anyone can write about trending topics from TikTok and Google Trends. Publishers should prioritize what they can excel at. Where you are joining a chorus of coverage, find an angle that’s unique and reflects your strengths. Generative AI can only regurgitate what it already knows. To rise above the noise, provide real value and meaningful content for readers.

As people see more AI slop, publishers with a clear E.E.A.T strategy are more likely to succeed. To that end, communicate strong authorship on- and off-site for your writers, showcase your expertise and experience within articles and over-communicate why your organization is trustworthy. A holistic approach means considering all aspects of E.E.A.T in your content.

There were real cracks in Google’s brand this year — the antitrust case, the AIO rollout, a dip in EU market share, the ongoing fallout of the Helpful Content Update — and it’s clear the company needs to improve its product. In the year ahead, expect volatility to be the norm as search continues to rapidly evolve.

Jessie is the co-founder of WTF is SEO? and is the SEO editor at The Guardian.

Kevin Indig

Google will evolve the AI Overview format. Due to pressure on the AI topic — and to flex its muscles — I expect at least one big change to AI Overviews. It could be more personalization, video answers or an integration with NotebookLM. I don’t think what we’re seeing is the final form. The result is more fluctuation in traffic from SERPs that show AI Overviews.

Google will kill the shopping tab. The new AI-personalized experience in the shopping tab is a harbinger of what’s to come. Right now, Google shows a unique layout for shopping-related queries. So, why have the shopping tab at all? It’s a beta environment, hidden in plain sight. As soon as Google gains enough confidence that the new experience is superior — which I expect it will be — it will roll out to the default tab and the shopping tab goes away. The impact could be positive for publishers since links to editorial content often appear at the top of the new shopping experience.

Google will lose exclusive distribution agreements. With an expected ruling on remedies in the Department of Justice antitrust lawsuit against the company in August, chances are high that Google will not be the default search engine on Apple devices much longer. In the long term, I expect Apple to be forced to provide a choice screen like in the EU. In the short term, though, Apple will improve its own search capabilities with an AI-powered Siri that will reduce the number of searches on Google coming from Apple devices.

Kevin is an Organic Growth Advisor and author of the Growth Memo newsletter.

Matthew Bain

2025 will be a fork in the road for affiliate publishers. Some will adapt and survive, while others will continue to flounder. And it will boil down to Google Discover.

The group hit hardest by AI's takeover is, I believe, affiliates. These sites were already one of the most vulnerable to Helpful Content updates because — let's be real — they're pushing products on users. That is profit-motivated, not helpfulness-motivated. Now, AI's growing presence in Google puts them in an even worse position.

I was a content director for two years at one of the biggest U.S. online gambling affiliate networks. Almost all of our traffic came from Google. For us and our competitors, it was a race to rank highly on Google. Now, affiliate sites are seeing revenues shrink. They're going through rounds of layoffs.

Smart affiliates will change it up. They will look into Google Discover and build strategies to rank there. This will be a change of pace, because Google Discover is not as natural of a traffic source for affiliates. Their main audience is high-intent users. Google Discover, meanwhile, is more of a, "Hey, here's what's going on in your world and areas of interest" platform where the intent isn't as relevant.

Clicks for affiliate links on Google Discover content might be more happenstance — "I came across this product and found it interesting enough to whip out my wallet." That's okay. It's all about diversifying traffic sources.

It could be worth dedicating time (maybe even a year) to creating content without affiliate links that rank on Discover, then worrying later about how to weave in links without angering Google.

Either way, affiliates need to look outside of organic search to survive in the long run.

They'll go in droves to Google Discover in 2025.

Matthew is the Customer Success Manager at Marfeel.

Ryan Kellett

I've been studying the creator journalist (also known as news influencer) shift this year, and most often my conversations with anyone on the topic sound like this: "Oh, I follow this great [insert topic] person on [insert social platform]. Can't remember the name, but it comes up on my feed. Love them!"

How helpful! 🙄 But no, really — how will I ever find that creator/person?

This scenario is the intersection of our social media and SEO futures: Creators, known for being firmly planted in the social media sphere, are being dragged into SEO because narrow, intentional search matters in connecting them to high-intent audiences.

On the creator side, it goes something like this: They first realize they need to optimize their Instagram, YouTube or TikTok bios for keywords. Then, as they monetize their audiences, they grab their own domain. They then expand to another social platform, perhaps adding a Substack to nab some email addresses. Maybe they've confused things more by adding a brand of their own, separate from their name. Write a book? Another entity created at Amazon and your book publisher. The list goes on.

None of these seem like SEO in the way a publisher knows it, but it's related: Optimizing across domains and platforms, most of which you do not own, is not unlike great author SEO. You need a strong and consistent bio with what you cover, credentials and links all pointing toward one spot. Oh — and get your headshot and Wikipedia entry in order.

Creators are likely to be Googled with just a few barely descriptive words. Without a longstanding domain and brand name to lean on, creators must think like SEOs even before designing their actual content.

Ryan is a Nieman-Berkman Klein fellow for Journalism Innovation at Harvard University.

Steve Wilson-Beales

If you thought 2024 was a challenge, then get ready for an even more challenging 2025. I think the percentage of traffic from Google to publishers will decrease further, albeit propped up by the occasional spike in Google Discover, which can sometimes distract from an overall year-over-year dip.

That said, it doesn’t mean we should just give up. Knowing your audience’s user intent and the keywords they are using is more important than ever as publishers adapt accordingly to this social/search traffic deficit. To give up would be to return to a time before data-driven decisions and where the direction of an editorial team was driven by those that banged their fists loudest.

So yes — AI Overviews will encroach more on news queries, AI search will steal more of your content, Google Discover will be seen as the (new) holy grail by senior leaders and you will get more questions about generative engine optimization (GEO) as another possible saviour. But this is also an exciting time as SEO to know thy enemy — swot up on ChatGPT, get to grips with Python, spend time looking at why your competitors are appearing in Perplexity and the like. There may be no reassurances at the moment that the quality of Google search will improve, so this is the time to smash those communication skills and play a leading role in the future content strategy direction for your team.

Steve is the Head of SEO & Editorial Product for Global.

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THE JOBS LIST

Audience or SEO jobs in journalism. Want to include a position for promotion? Email us.

NBC Sports is hiring a Senior Director for Digital Strategy (Hybrid, San Francisco Bay Area)
Rest of World is hiring a Chief Audience Officer (New York).