Masters of Search

The website as we know it is dying | James Ward, Head of Digital Experience @ Personio

The website used to be the shop window. Now buyers do half their research inside an LLM before they ever land on it, and the role of the site itself is starting to shift. My guest today is James Ward, Head of Digital Experience at Personio, one of Europe's fastest-growing HR tech companies, where he leads web strategy, SEO, content and CRO across multiple international markets. Before Personio he spent years at Salesforce and ADP, so he's seen this shift play out from inside both enterprise giants and a fast-moving scale-up. We dug into what happens when your buyers already know everything about you before they hit your site, why your own Wikipedia page might be quietly undermining your positioning, and whether websites are heading toward becoming databases for LLM front ends. WHAT WE COVERED IN THIS EPISODE * Why Personio's Wikipedia page was quietly miscommunicating their ICP to LLMs, and how a single line of off-site content can undo your entire positioning strategy * The reverse-prompting exercise every marketing leader should block out half a day for before buying any AEO tooling * Why "dark AI traffic" is forcing a rethink of the website itself, from curated navigation paths toward prompt-based, deeply personalized experiences * The shift from technical SEO hacks to brand narrative and reputation management as the real AEO lever * Why Reddit hype has already peaked, and where first-party content and third-party listicles now sit in the AI visibility stack * How AI is turning specialists back into T-shaped marketers, and why James thinks everyone (yes, even content writers) should be building with Claude Code or Lovable * Why traffic is becoming a vanity metric at Personio, and what they measure instead in an era where LLM citations, branded organic and direct all blur together * Whether the future of B2B SaaS buying happens natively inside ChatGPT, and what that means for the role of your website ▶ Let's connect! 🔗 Niklas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/] Radyant on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/] James on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameswarddigital/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameswarddigital/] Personio on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/personio/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/personio/]

How Webflow gets 10% of signups from AI Search | Vivian Hoang, AEO & SEO Lead @ Webflow

AI search is already driving nearly 10% of Webflow's signups. A key person behind that number is Vivian Hoang, AEO & SEO Lead at Webflow. In this episode, we'll dig into how Webflow's SEO function has evolved over the years, how Vivian started thinking about answer engine optimization before most people even had a name for it, what's actually working for them in AI search, and how she's using tools like AirOps to scale content without sacrificing quality. I'm really excited about this one because Vivian isn't speaking about theory here. She's already built the playbook and has the numbers to back it up. WHAT WE COVERED IN THIS EPISODE * ~10% of Webflow's signups now come from AI search, a real and measurable number that proves AEO is a growth channel worth investing in * AEO builds directly on a strong SEO foundation; don't abandon SEO, optimize both in parallel * If you create genuinely authoritative, useful content, you're already doing the right thing for both Google and LLMs * Webflow shifted from top-of-funnel to mid/bottom-funnel content because conversion rates were higher and ToFU traffic was declining with AI Overviews * Audit what you already have before creating anything new, refresh high-potential pages, and build from there * You can't optimize what you don't measure: identify the prompts your audience uses, track your LLM citations, and find your way into the sources LLMs trust in your category * AEO is a team sport: get leadership bought in with data, educate your marketing team, and run small experiments with visible results before scaling ▶ Let's connect! 🔗 Niklas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/] Radyant on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/] Vivian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivianhoang/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivianhoang/] Webflow on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/webflow-inc-/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/webflow-inc-/]

Why HubSpot killed 50% of their blog | Jennifer Lapp, Head of Growth Marketing, LATAM & DACH

HubSpot literally buried traffic as a metric last year. Not because they stopped caring about reach, but because in a world where AI systems deliver answers directly, the old playbook stopped working. My guest today is Jennifer Lapp, Head of Growth Marketing for LATAM and DACH at HubSpot, where she's been rebuilding the growth engine from the ground up. We'll dig into the real experiments she's been running, what's actually working and what isn't, and how she's steering her team through one of the biggest shifts in the marketing space ever. WHAT WE COVERED IN THIS EPISODE * Why HubSpot held a literal funeral for traffic as a KPI, and what replaced it: brand presence, AI mentions, citations, and behavioral influence * Operation Everest: how HubSpot killed 50% of its blog content using a Marie Kondo style scorecard tied to ICP fit and revenue quality * The pricing accuracy experiment that moved HubSpot's AI answer accuracy from below 20% to around 80% across all regions * Why AEO is not SEO in new packaging, and where digital PR, classical PR, and SEO start to merge * How HubSpot restructured its growth team from channel ownership to product ownership across Marketing Hub, Sales Hub, Service Hub, and more * Prompt tracking at scale: why 25 well-chosen prompts beat 100 generic ones, and a hint at how many HubSpot actually tracks per language * AI-generated vs AI-assisted content, the revival of personas, and the copyright question most marketers are not asking yet ▶ Let's connect! 🔗 Niklas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/ Radyant on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/ Jenny on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappjennifer/

You are what you EEAT | Lily Ray, Founder @ Algorythmic & VP SEO & AI Search @ Amsive

Lily Ray is one of the most respected voices in SEO. She even launched her own Substack recently to create a "safe space for ranting about all things SEO and AI Search". WHAT WE COVERED IN THIS EPISODE * Lily's launch of Algorythmic, her new consultancy, while staying on as VP of SEO and AI Search at Amsive * The flood of AI slop in the SEO/AEO space and why original content is the only way to cut through * Short-term gains vs. long-term risks of listicles, brand-vs-alternative pages, and scaled AI content * How to build a meaningful prompt universe using GSC, keyword tools, PAA, fan-out queries, and paid search data * Why EEAT and expert-led brand building still drive long-term results, and why Reddit, LinkedIn, and Facebook groups are increasingly cited * The tension between ad monetization and the frictionless AI search experience, plus Claude's explosive consumer growth * How Google's fragmented AI surfaces (AIO, AI Mode, Gemini, Discover) might consolidate into a personalized assistant experience LINKS FROM LILY: * Substack: https://lilyraynyc.substack.com/ [https://lilyraynyc.substack.com/] * Algorythmic: https://algorythmic.co/ [https://algorythmic.co/] * Branded Questions for AI Search Visibility Checklist: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mQ8kuAZUkEUaKas6IwVDCODbvAJXhXTzpMZKA7BuPlQ/ [https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mQ8kuAZUkEUaKas6IwVDCODbvAJXhXTzpMZKA7BuPlQ/] ▶ Let's connect! 🔗 Niklas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/] Radyant on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/] Lily on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lily-ray-44755615/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/lily-ray-44755615/]

How big is AI Search, Rise of Claude, ChatGPT fan-out shake-up | #MonthlyLandwehr

Malte is CPO & CMO at Peec AI, one of the leading AI search analytics platforms, and one of the brightest minds in the field. So I want to take all the news, new research and interesting developments and get his perspective on them. WHAT WE COVERED IN THIS EPISODE * Ethan Smith's "AI is much bigger than you think" study: his 20% market share figure, how it compares to other estimates (PKA 12%, SEO Clarity 15%, Rand Fishkin 4-5%), and why the industry resists the higher numbers * Claude's rapid rise: 3x growth Jan–March, overtaking Perplexity, the mix of strong product + OpenAI missteps + Anthropic's PR savvy, and the professional vs. consumer usage split * Why people still treat AI search as a "black box": the parallel to early SEO reverse-engineering, lack of official spokespeople, and influx of non-SEO "experts" muddying the waters * ChatGPT's fan-out query changes (GPT 5.3 → 5.4): site search becoming more common, brand bias implications, and evidence that Google is still the primary grounding source * Digital PR as the key lever for AI visibility: why technical SEO alone isn't enough for LLM citations, the importance of matching content formats (listicles vs. profiles vs. how-tos) to what actually gets cited, and needing PR with an AEO/SEO mindset ▶ Let's connect! 🔗 Niklas on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/niklas-buschner/] Radyant on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/radyant/] Malte on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/landwehr/ [https://www.linkedin.com/in/landwehr/] Peec AI on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/peec-ai/ [https://www.linkedin.com/company/peec-ai/]