It’s 2025, and the SEO arena is more competitive and complex than ever before. I know exactly what’s on your mind 24/7: How to get my website to outshine competitors in search results for the most competitive keywords out there.
Let me tell you, this is going to be fun — and useful. Because man, I’ve been knee-deep in the SEO trenches throwing out one well-planned strategy after another. It’s time to divulge what worked.
Here are the top-5 SEO tactics that we use at SLINKY Digital Agency that will help give your website visibility the boost it needs in 2025.
- The Power of AI-Generated Content — With a Human Touch
Yes, Google and other search engine algorithms are identifying AI content and as a result, hitting you where it hurts: search rankings. So we settle on an optimized balance.
Use AI to generate ideas, create outlines, or maybe even draft a piece of content — but use everything as a starting point. Once you have something to work with, now work with it. The robots have done their jobs.
Now dive in, add that personal anecdote, bring in the human touch and sprinkle in that brand voice that makes your web content stand out. Search engine algorithms are getting smarter at identifying the boxed cake mix — but you have that special ingredient that can make AI content GREAT content.
SEMrush recently published a study that showed AI-assistant human-enhanced content performs just as well as fully-human-written content. It’s all about quality — that’s what search engines are searching for. Give it to them.
Real-world example: While recently working on a client’s blog, I got an AI tool to brainstorm some fun ideas. The tool suggested “Top 10 Gardening Tips for Beginners.” Sounds standard, I know. But we built on that idea and came up with: “Confessions of a Plant Killer: How I Finally Grew a Thriving Garden (And You Can Too!)”. It sounds fun, is highly relatable, and attention-grabbing. Basically, human.
- Video Content is Not Just for TikTok Anymore
Video content is a massive opportunity that should be a part of your SEO strategy. You don’t need to go viral on TikTok (unless you can, which would be awesome!)
Here’s the thing: Google, too, is a video lover. That’s because users are video lovers. In fact, according to an estimate by Cisco, over 80% of all traffic in 2024 was generated by video. Insane!
You can get the most out of youtube videos by embedding them on your web pages. Maybe some video snippets in your blog posts? And you don’t really need to invest a lot of money on video production. Be genuine and authentic, and your viewers will feel the feelings.
Real-world example: One of my clients runs a bakery, and we produced a series of short videos of her making basic pastries at home. Simple, non-embellished videos, but really valuable to her target viewers. We embedded them into posts that had the full recipes, came up with some separate pages with video transcripts, and even made some GIFs to go on social media. She cashed in on a 156% web traffic increase in three months. Average time on page went from a minute to four minutes! People engaged with the video, then decided to explore.
- Core Web Vitals And The Importance of Speed
What are core web vitals? It’s Google’s way of judging how engaging and user-friendly your website is.
There are three main things Google looks at:
- Loading speed (LCP or Largest Contentful Paint )
- Interactivity (FID or First Input Delay)
- Visual stability (CLS or Cumulative Layout Shift)
In layman’s terms, your site needs to load fast, respond quickly when something is clocked, and not have the layout switch around as it loads.
Of course, this is technical stuff. But here are some simple steps that can help optimize Core Web Vitals.
- Optimize your images. Those massive 4K images need to go. Scale them down, compress, and switch to next-gen formats like WebP.
- That animation looks cool, but it’s not worth slowing down your whole site and tanking search rankings. Minimize usage of those massive JavaScript libraries.
- A good caching plugin (if you’re on WordPress) will do wonders.
- Leverage a Content Delivery Network (CDN) to serve your content faster to users around the world.
A Deloitte study states that a mere 0.1 second improvement in site speed can bring up conversion rates by 8% for retail sites, and 10% for travel sites. Not bad at all, right?
Real-life example: One of my clients — let’s call him Tee — sold artisanal cheeses online. Beautiful site. High-res images of every cheese — that took forever to load, giving his site a horrendously unappealing bounce rate. By optimizing these images, streamlining code, and setting up a CDN, the load time went from 6 to 2 seconds! Bounce rate dropped by 35%!
- E-A-T For SEO
Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
A big deal in SEO, especially for sites that fall under what Google calls “Your Money or Your Life” (YMYL) categories — health, finance, and safety.
Here are a few tactics to boost your E-A-T:
- Display credentials. If you’re a doctor, display your qualifications. A certified financial planner, flaunt that certification!
- Get quality backlinks from reputable sites in your industry.
- Keep content up-to-date and accurate.
- Include author bios for content, especially if you have multiple contributors.
- Gather and display customer reviews and testimonials.
E-A-T isn’t just about impressing Google. When your audience trusts you, they’re more likely to engage with your content, share it, and come back for more — that’s the signal Google sees.
Real-life example: My client Dr, Jane had great content but it wasn’t ranking for competitive terms. We updated her ‘about page’ to highlight her Ph.D. and vast clinical experience, then added author bios to each blog post. Then we got her a bunch of guest post opportunities on health and wellness sites. We also encouraged client reviews and displayed them on her site. In six months, organic traffic for YMYL terms rose by 200%, and her website ranked on page one for many highly competitive keywords.
- Local SEO Wins
Have a physical location or serve a specific geographic area? Local SEO is a must. Why? People searching for local businesses often have high intent. When someone types in “pizza delivery near me” at 8 PM on a Friday, they’re ready to order. You want to be the one they find.
Here are some tactics to win at local SEO:
- Claim your Google Business Profile — and optimize it. This is non-negotiable.
- Get local citations — mentions of your business on other websites, especially local directories.
- Encourage and respond to reviews — on your Google Business Profile and on sites like Yelp.
- Create location-specific pages on your website (if you serve multiple areas).
- Local schema markup on your website will help search engines understand your location and services.
BrightLocal’s Local Consumer Review Survey reported that 93% of consumers used the internet to find a local business in 2020, and 34% searched every day. Those percentages deliver great news for 2025, of real customers that could be walking through the door.
Real-life example: The owner of a small chain of coffee shops came to us. Even with three locations in a mid-sized city, bigger chains were taking top ranks in local search results. We created individual location pages for each shop, added unique content about the neighborhood, and locally-inspired menu items.
We also encouraged happy customers to leave reviews, making sure to personally respond to each one. Results? In three months, “Bob’s Beans” had made it to the top 3 local results for “coffee shop” searches in all three neighborhoods. Foot traffic went up by 30%, and many customers reported they found the shop through a local search.
Balanced Synergy
SEO is a thorough, and long game. Leveraging powerful AI and video content, optimizing your Core Web Vitals, building your E-A-T, and nailing your local SEO — these strategies have the potential to make a marked difference in your search rankings.
No quick fixes — because in 2025, you really can’t game the system. A website that serves users’ needs and delivers consistent value — will bring home the rankings.