Forrester: AI rewrites SEO, the job stays the same

"Understand what someone wants at the moment they want it — and be the best answer." That is how Duane Forrester frames the mission of SEO, one he says has not shifted in 25 years even though the tooling around it has been rewritten twice. Forrester entered the industry before Google existed and spent a decade at Microsoft working on Bing, so he has seen a search engine from the inside.

He calls the current moment a return of the wild west: the rules are being written in real time again. Still, he warns against chasing the absolute leading edge, since most practitioners cannot reach the real frontier anyway. The formula is simpler — keep learning and keep the leading edge in sight. He admits to feeling more exhausted and more excited than at any other point in his career. The "20 for 20" interview was published by Search Engine Land.

• A search engine is heavily compartmentalised inside — even staff cannot see other teams' systems or ranking factors;
• Hence the lesson: SEOs often obsess over tiny details that have almost no practical impact;
• When Google says build for users, it is not corporate misdirection — the engine chases the same customers marketers do;
• Technical excellence and content only work as a pair; neither carries the result alone.

Forrester's forecast: agents will take over routine research, and search will turn into an infrastructure layer feeding them information. Trust will then have to be proven to machines as well as people, and the winners will be the brands with clear, consistent, verifiable content. His practical advice is plain and it works: publish what you are learning, go to meetups, ask questions. In an industry that rewrites its rules every quarter, learning speed is the core competence — worth more than any checklist.