But let me ask you something: Has all the noise changed the rules of strategy? No. It hasn’t. The fundamentals still win. And that starts with your website ... the cornerstone of your digital presence. The “Mothership.”
We’ve seen this movie before. SEO. Social. Video. TikTok. Every shiny thing promises the moon. And for a moment, it even delivers. But eventually, it fades into the broader landscape of marketing tools. AI is no different. Except it might just be the biggest shiny object yet.
AI is a massive change. Maybe the biggest of my 25+ years in this game. But it doesn't change the truth: strategy trumps tactics ... always. Your website, when done right, becomes your strongest strategic asset in this AI-powered chaos.
The Great AI Delusion: Utopia or Useless?
Let’s break down the camps:
AI Maximalists: These folks believe AI will do everything for you. Write your content. Run your ads. Build your site. Sell your stuff. You’re just supposed to kick back with a great bourbon. Sounds great ... and wildly naive.
AI Skeptics: "It’s garbage. It’s a fad. It’s wrong half the time."
Both views are wrong.
The truth is ... AI is just a tool. A powerful one. But not a replacement for thinking. It doesn’t do your job for you. It makes the job more interesting if you know how to use it.
The winners will be those who know when to lean in, when to hold back, and when to lead. That means putting your website back at the center of the strategy.
The SEO-AI Content Paradox
Early AI content was a flood of lazy, generic crap. Copy-paste, spin, publish. Rinse and repeat. Zero thought, zero originality. That’s not content ... that’s landfill.
Here’s the paradox:
AI learns from the web. If the web is full of AI garbage, then AI becomes ... dumber.
Meanwhile, Google still ranks based on E-E-A-T: Experience. Expertise. Authority. Trustworthiness. That’s not changing.
Which means there's a golden opportunity for smart B2Bs willing to create something real, something useful, something new. Not just to rank ... but to lead.
Your Website Is More Important Than Ever
Here’s the hard truth most folks are missing: AI isn’t killing your website. It’s exposing it.
Search patterns are shifting. Clicks are down. AI overviews are cutting into traffic. But guess what? Homepage traffic is up ... by as much as 10% in some reports.
Why? Because people are finding you by name. They’re skipping your deep pages. They’re landing on your front door.
And that’s where most websites fall flat on their face.
If you’re relying on customers landing deep in your site, that era is fading. Users are walking through the front door ... and if that entry point isn’t frictionless, you’re toast.
Here’s what matters now:
People are lazier than ever. They won’t dig. They won’t scroll. If it’s not obvious in 3 seconds, they bounce.
Your Website = Your Industrial Marketing Heart
Forget the "brochure" mindset. Your website is not just a digital pamphlet. It’s the control room. It’s the heart. Everything flows from it.
Get this right, and you multiply the impact of every campaign, every ad, every email, every LinkedIn post.
Miss it ... and you’re pumping water into a leaky boat.
A New Blueprint: ALCHEMY for Strategic Website Planning
Stop winging it. Stop chasing templates. Create a great brand story for your B2B FIRST … then you need a real plan. Enter: ALCHEMY
A seemingly magical process? Yes. But also a practical one. Here’s how it works:
A: Audience Research
Define your ideal customer profiles. Know their pain. Know their journey. Build personas that make strategy possible.
L: Learning
Audit what you’ve got. Your traffic. Your bounce rates. Your conversions. Your competitors. Know what’s working ... and what’s not.
C: Clarify Aim
What’s the actual goal? "Better website" is not a goal. "Increase leads from branded search by 20%" is.
H: Hierarchy
Design the flow. Map the structure. Make sure your homepage guides users to what matters.
E: Essential Features
Cut the bloat. Focus on what your visitors need. Anything else is noise.
M: Mapping
Plan every page with intention. Know the job of each page. Make every click count.
Y: Yield
Compile it into an execution-ready plan. This isn’t theory ... it’s your tactical blueprint.
The ALCHEMY framework was originally published by Mark Williams-Cook and Tom Critchlow at SearchPilot.
Garbage In = Garbage Out
AI tools can build websites faster than ever. But if your inputs suck, your output will too. That’s why this blueprint matters more now than it did five years ago.
If you're serious about building a site that ranks, converts, and adapts to AI-driven search ... then you need to lead with planning.
AI Isn’t the End ... It’s the Beginning
AI didn’t kill websites. It forced us to treat them seriously again.
The algorithm may be smarter, but the customer is still human. And the human still wants:
Everything your website should be doing already ... if you built it strategically.
Final Thought
You can chase every shiny object in the marketing toolbox. Or you can double down on the asset you actually control: your website.
Now’s the time to adapt, refocus, and treat your website like the strategic growth tool it was always meant to be.
Want to know more, go to What We Do or Contact Me in the menu above. Or give me a call at 269-375-0349