The Only True SEO/GEO/Reddit Strategy: “If It Is Easy to Do, It Is Not Effective in the Long Run”
Shortcuts are great if you are ready to lose everything within a few months
The SEO industry has always been looking for shortcuts, and now we are trying to do the same for GEO/AEO and Reddit marketing.
Here’s how SEO shortcuts work: You exploit a known tactic; you gain traffic for 3-6 months; you either sell or just set up a new site to do the same.
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This build-and-flip model has been here for ages. And it is not rocket science if you are willing to lose everything before you start a new site.
Unfortunately, these so-called success stories have been loud enough for brands to start trying things like these. And this is nothing new. Let’s go back in time to list some of the most notable brands that lost 90% of their visibility and had to fire 90% of their teams because they were willing to try shortcuts:
Panda Updates (2011): This is when businesses thought it was a good idea to create a semi-auto-generated page for every variation of a search query. Unfortunately, those low-quality pages dragged high-quality pages down to the bottom as well. This was a sitewide automated penalizing update. Lucky for them, there was a solid recovery route there. You just had to nuke 90% of your site and slowly build your visibility up.
Penguin Updates (2021-2016). These have been part of Google’s core algorithm (updates) ever since. These updates have been hitting lots of websites trying to take advantage of quick link-building shortcuts (PBNs, bulk guest posts, paid links, etc.). Those were devastating for lots of well-known brands, but yet again, Google gave them some recovery routes (like Disavows).
As you can see, back then, there were well-defined recovery steps. Ever since Core Updates started, there have been none. You actually need to fix everything in hopes of recovery, and the stakes are much higher.
Ever since AI content generation has become a thing, we all saw where it was going
All those smart tools using ChatGPT content and generating “AI-undetectable” content. It didn’t last long. Quite predictably.
It has always been the main rule: “If something is easy to do, it won’t last”
Google cracked down on easy links, easy content, easy anything else before.
It was quite logical that AI-generated content would not last.
It is obvious that self-serving listicles won’t last.
We already have lots of well-documented cases when pretty big brands are losing visibility because they tried both or either of those shortcuts.
Glenn Gabe is reporting on those cases, and so is Lily Ray:
It was equally obvious that Reddit would crack down on AI-generated content and automated spam.
I actually think that Reddit is well equipped to do that, since most of it is manually moderated.
And it is quite logical: If something is easily scaled, why won’t everyone do it? How would you stand out?
Shortcuts are not effective in the long run because they are not competitive.
If everyone can do it easily, who is rewarded with visibility?
To be visible, you need to stand out:
Create something original, like proprietary studies, tools, reports, etc.
Build a real Reddit presence, which takes time and creativity, hence most of your competitors will fail.
Invest in tactics that help everywhere, from organic search to LLMs, for long-term organic visibility.
Stop looking for silver bullets and invest in something real and long-term!