The SEOFOMO Newsletter​

October 26, 2025
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Your weekly SEO & AI Search News to Stop the FOMO, read by +39.6K SEOs.
Today's sponsor is Weglot. Want to advertise? Ask here.​

Move over Chrome

​OpenAI Introduces the ChatGPT Atlas web browser​
​OpenAI​
​OpenAI has just released its browser with ChatGPT (including agent mode) built in: ChatGPT Atlas, which you can download now already for free.

"A browser built with ChatGPT takes us closer to a true super-assistant that understands your world and helps you achieve your goals."

This is definitely a huge next step for OpenAI to 1) more user acquisition 2) integrate further into users web tasks, including their agentic experience and use that information for memory/training/improved experience 3) expand into a full OS like experience in the future.

• Related: Technical SEO Considerations for ChatGPT Atlas by Dan Taylor​

I'm grabbing my 🍿

​Reddit sues Perplexity, SerpApi over scraping Google Search data​
​Danny Goodwin / Search Engine Land​
​Reddit is taking four data-scraping companies to court – including AI search engine Perplexity and SEO data firm SerpApi – accusing them of illegally using its content via Google search results:

"Reddit alleged the companies hid their identities to bypass technical restrictions and scraped its data at an industrial scale."

• Related: Perplexity Responds To Reddit Lawsuit Over Data Access by Matt G. Southern: "Perplexity posted a public response, saying it summarizes Reddit discussions with citations and doesn’t train AI models on Reddit content."

It looks like it’s fixed now

​Google working on fixing Search Console performance report delay​​
​Barry Schwartz / Search Engine Land
​Google Search Console’s performance report was stuck and not showing an update in the main report since Sunday, October 19th. However, a couple of days ago Google confirmed the issue and said it would catch up... which has already based on the Google Search Console profiles I have access to.

Focus on quality

​Google: Links, Site Moves & Technical SEO Don't Fix Quality Issues​​
​Barry Schwartz
​Google has again said that links, site moves or technical SEO won't fix your rankings if you have overall quality issues with your site.

Because holiday season is almost here

​How to achieve early clicks and bigger wins with AI before Black Friday​​
​Danielle McMeekin / Microsoft Advertising
​Microsoft shares how discovery is shifting with 71% of consumers saying they want AI powered help for holiday shopping, while providing recommendations for Black Friday and Holidays campaigns to leverage AI; from optimizing for natural language to structuring your content around questions.

Not surprising?

​ChatGPT, LLM referrals convert worse than Google Search: Study​​
​Danny Goodwin / Search Engine Land​
​ChatGPT referral traffic converts worse than Google search, email and affiliate links, trailing on both conversion rate and revenue per session, according to a new analysis of 973 ecommerce sites.

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+327% More Citations: Why Translated Websites Are Winning at AI Search

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Weglot’s latest study reveals a powerful insight: AI favors multilingual websites.

Analyzing 1.3 million citations across Google’s AI Overviews and ChatGPT, the research asked a key question: does AI reward translated content?
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The answer: a resounding yes.
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Translated websites saw 327% more visibility in Google’s AI Overviews for searches in other languages, and 24% more citations per query overall, simply for offering content in multiple languages.If you want your site to be seen (and cited) by AI, it needs to speak more than one language.

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A must read if you were impacted

​How to tell if you were impacted by the August 2025 spam update (and what to do about it)​
​Marie Haynes​
​Marie goes through how you can tell if you were impacted by the August 2025 update, which pages were affected, and if you can recover from it.

A citation is nice; with a link, even nicer.

​Ha and you all said backlinks were dead​​
​Nick LeRoy / SEO For Lunch​
​Link building has always been one of SEO's most debated topics. The truth? Links have always been a signal of credibility, and now, in the age of LLMs, that credibility extends far beyond a simple “followed” hyperlink. Nick goes through it in the latest edition of SEO for Lunch.

The title is not all that matters

​How and Why Google Rewrites Your Hard-Earned Headlines​​
​Harry Clarkson-Bennett ​
​Headlines are the proverbial shop window, but we have less control over them now than ever. Why? The Google Leak leaves some clues.

• Related: The Definitive Guide to Title Tag SEO Best Practices post Google leak by Shaun Anderson ​

Featuring +30 decks

​The Best of Published Decks from the Latest BrightonSEO [October 2025]​
​SEOFOMO​
​The October 2025 edition of BrightonSEO took place earlier this week in Brighton. If you weren’t able to attend — or if you did but couldn’t catch all the presentations — here are some of the published decks for you to check out.

It's survey time!

​The 2025 Digital Agency Survey​
​Paddy Moogan, Rand Fishkin​
​The annual digital agency survey from Paddy and Rand is back! Answer the survey and so you can compare your own results against those across the field. No individual answers or personal details will ever be shared.​
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What’s Actually Different?

​How OpenAI’s Product Feed Redefines Commerce Data​
​Mike King / iPullRank
​Mike explains how eCommerce websites can optimize their ChatGPT product feeds and the nuances that differentiate it from Google's Merchant Center in this guide.

Owned content is just the baseline

​Third-Party Sources Drive 85% of Brand Discovery​​
​Oshen Davidson / AirOps
​A research developed by AirOps across +21.3K brand mentions across ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity found brands mentioned in AI search for top-of-funnel commercial queries are 6.5x more likely to come from third-party content than the brand itself, showing how owned and earned visibility must work together.

Real wins come from brand, product, PR...

​Leveling Up SEO for the AI Era​
​Gianluca Fiorelli, Tom Critchlow / Advanced Web Ranking
​Tom shares about the power of linking out, what really moves SEO, the key to reducing organic dependence, and much more in this insightful interview with Gianluca.

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• ​Remote SEO Strategist at Brafton​
• ​Content & SEO Lead at SaaStorm​
• ​SEO Associate at Seer Interactive ​
• ​Senior ASO Executive at LiveScore Group ​
• ​SEO Outreach Manager at LiveScore Group​
• ​SEO Manager – LiveScore Media at LiveScore Group​
• ​Sr. Artificial Intelligence Search Engine Optimization Manager at Microsoft​
• ​Technical Artificial Intelligence Search Engine Optimization Manager at Microsoft​
• ​LinkedIn Content Marketer at Animalz​

Search ’n Stuff Antalya Conference 2026: A Community-Powered Crowdfunding Edition 💚

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Search ’n Stuff is launching a special Surprise London Edition, happening in June 2026 (The official announcement coming soon 👀), but the community’s most-loved event — the Antalya retreat — only returns if the community itself makes it happen.

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To secure hotel pre-payments and early production costs, the organisers are introducing a crowdfunding model. If 50 early supporters secure their spot by January 1st, the Antalya 2026 conference is confirmed. The lineup and sponsors will then be finalised throughout the year. If the target isn’t reached? Every supporter receives a full refund — transparent and risk-free.

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For those who believe in independent, community-driven industry events: this is the moment to take action. Support the vision. Enable the conference. Keep Antalya on the map. 🌴

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