January SEO News

Welcome to January’s SEO & Marketing news and insights, in a new format for the new year.

What you can expect:

✅ Regular updates about important search related news you should be aware of. 

✅ More timely updates for any big news you need to know ASAP.

✅ Links to posts, templates and other resources created during the month.

Special bonuses for premium members: right now the cost to join is only $5 a month for the lifetime of your membership. I will be adding a larger template library, database of AI prompts, and more and the price will go up accordingly, so hop on now! You can also use it as toward any job-training related employment benefits.

🔥 Major Industry Shifts

Google’s Anti-Scraping Crackdown
Google has introduced stricter anti-scraping measures, including IP blocking, CAPTCHAs, and other barriers, making data extraction more difficult and costly. This directly impacts rank-tracking tools like SEMRush, Ahrefs, and Moz, which may result in price increases.

👉 Read the full post and grab a ready-made email script (🌟 for premium members) to communicate these changes to your team and set expectations around reporting errors and budgetary needs.

📌 Noteworthy Updates

Google’s Quality Rater Guidelines Get a Revamp
Google updated its Quality Rater Guidelines, shaping how their algorithm evaluates content. The changes focus on:
✔️ Strengthening spam detection, targeting manipulative backlinks, AI-generated junk, and “helpful content” loopholes.
✔️ Prioritizing firsthand expertise and transparent sourcing.
✔️ A likely shift away from generic affiliate sites in favor of brands with real expertise.

I’ll be breaking down the key takeaways in the coming weeks, but for now, you can view the document here, which is also integrated into the Custom SEO Chat GPT I made. If you create content, consider adding author bios to your checklist—it’s becoming more important.

👀 Emerging Trends

Google Expands AI Overviews in ‘Circle to Search’
Google is integrating AI overviews into its “Circle to Search” feature, allowing users to highlight parts of images or videos to search for them.

🔎 What this means for marketers:

• Ecommerce sites may lose some traffic to AI-driven answers.
• Content opportunities exist for brands that optimize for inclusion in these AI overviews.

I’ll be analyzing which types of searches trigger AI-generated responses—more insights soon.

🚨 Industry Buzz

HubSpot’s SEO Plunge—What Happened?
Everyone’s talking about HubSpot’s dramatic drop in search rankings. Many suspect it’s due to Google’s December spam update.

For a deep dive into what may have caused this, check out Glenn Gabe’s analysis here

🤖 AI & Tech Developments

China’s DeepSeek AI Shakes Up the Market
China launched DeepSeek, an AI model competing with ChatGPT. It quickly topped Apple’s app store, triggering stock market reactions. Be mindful of data privacy when testing it.

OpenAI’s Stargate Project & Operator Feature

• Stargate Project: (more info) OpenAI is heavily investing in U.S.-based AI infrastructure, claiming it will create jobs—but whether it leads to more job losses remains to be seen.
• Operator Feature: OpenAI introduced a pro tool that interacts with on-screen pixels, performing tasks across different apps. Google is rumored to be launching a similar tool soon.

💡 Potential for SEO: This could enable large-scale testing of pages, automated audits, and more. Watch the feature demo here.

🎁 Premium Member Perks

This month’s benefits include:
✅ Free Resume/CV Review – Get expert feedback to improve ATS performance, stand out from other candidates, and secure more interviews.

✅ Ready-to-use email scripts – Easily communicate SEO rank-tracking challenges with your team or leadership, ensuring smooth reporting and budget discussions.

✅ Exclusive Custom GPT Agent – Get instant answers on the latest SEO best practices, algorithm updates, and industry insights. Stay ahead with real-time, expert-backed guidance.