AI-Generated Content Will Hurt Your Brand (Ft. SEO Heist)
- Tarasekhar Padhy
- Nov 14, 2024
- 4 min read
(Disclaimer: Profanity.)
Jake Ward, an SEO expert, used AI to write 1800 articles within a few hours for a brand called Causal.app. Within 18 months, the brand was getting a few hundred thousand organic visitors per month in October 2023 [1]:
However, only a few months later, it plummeted to almost zero. Ward claimed that Google penalized the site quite unfairly because he made them look like fools:
But was it the truth or is there something more to it?
In this article, I’ve dived deep into how the infamous “SEO heist” came to be, why it backfired, and what it teaches us all about AI-generated content.
SEO Heist: The Complete Saga
Ward started by using tools like Ahrefs and plain Google search to discover topics the audience of Causal.app would be interested in. He also went through the competitor websites to find relevant titles and topics.
After getting the relevant topics, he mass-produced 1800 articles in a few hours using AI.
Anyone with an ounce of intelligence would know that all these articles were simply SEO spam — keyword-stuffed garbage that doesn’t add any real value.
As someone who has been using AI to enhance the overall content production process, it is not that difficult to pull off.
You see, LLMs are great at following patterns. The fundamental keyword-inclusion practices such as using the keyword in the title, introduction, etc., are basically patterns.
But there was an obvious problem — poor quality.
Unsurprisingly, within a few months (after Google’s November 2023 algorithm update), the organic traffic to Causal.app plummeted to almost zero [2].
To be fair, it was a manual penalty, rather than a direct, automated consequence of the November 2023 update. Either way, Ward had it coming.
Moreover, because he is a scumbag piece of shit, he claimed that it was Google who unfairly targeted him because he “embarrassed” them. The window-licking spastic doesn’t have an ounce of accountability in him to accept the obvious — shortcuts don’t give long-term returns.
Interestingly, the reply in the screenshot capturing his excuse I shared above no longer exists in the thread. My assumption is that the bastard deleted it. Grifting cunt. Smh.
Why the SEO Heist Failed
The real reason is engagement.
Since ChatGPT and other LLMs have made their way into the hands of marketers and writers, the internet is riddled with machine-written content. I am pretty sure you have read your fair share of AI-generated articles as well.
And I can guarantee that it doesn’t have that “wow” effect. Maybe it does a good enough job of relaying the information that it promises in the title. However, there is no chance that it will retain readers for the long haul or make a lasting impact on their minds.
This is the primary reason brands shouldn’t publish LLM-powered articles on their platforms.
When Google sees that a website gets a shit ton of traffic but sucks at retaining it, they will take a closer look at what’s going on. Trust me, regardless of how slick inbreds like Jake Ward think they are, AI-generated content can be spotted as soon as you read the first paragraph.
This leads to a horrible user experience because the top positions in the SERPs are hogged by machine-written, keyword-stuffed hot garbage, written by bastards like Ward who know nothing about the matter itself.
The manual penalty was inevitable.
Conclusion: AI is an Assistant
When brands take shortcuts like this, it destroys their credibility. Both in the eyes of search engines and their audience. It will take months, if not years, of repair work to regain that trust once again.
A better strategy is to leverage the Pareto Principle to discover the 20% of articles that pull the majority of the traffic and do a better job than your competitors. Just food for thought.
As I briefly admitted earlier, I’ve been using various LLMs to elevate my content production process. At the same time, it will be a cold day in hell if I publish machine-written text as human-written on this website or for any of my clients.
The reason is simple — AI is great at mimicking patterns and fetching information but sucks donkey balls when it comes to communicating persuasively.
Humans breathe life into their creations. Be it a simple LinkedIn post or a detailed guide.
Something LLMs can seldom do.
To put it simply:
Jake Ward doesn’t understand marketing or the art of persuasion. The bastard lacks accountability as well and is dishonest about the actual impact of his efforts.
Most folks who “do SEO” are cut from the same cloth, unfortunately. They believe that gaining organic traffic is all about writing keyword-rich content and building links.
AI-generated content is useful for the person who is interacting with the LLM. If you are reading the output of a machine that came from someone else’s prompts, it’s shit.
Check out my best practices for creating content with AI. I have talked a great deal about it.
Thanks for reading.
Until next time,
Tara
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