Kevin Lee interviews John Busby, CMO of Centerfield, to
discuss what’s now being called the “new SEO:” how visibility is shifting from
classic search results to large language models (LLMs), social platforms, and
private communities.
John explains how Centerfield’s comparison properties were
built around strong E‑A‑T principles (expertise, authority, trust):
real humans testing products, deep reviews, and structured listicle-style
content. While traditional organic traffic has declined as users get more
answers directly from AI tools, that same content now drives citations
within LLM responses. In other words, good SEO content hasn’t stopped working;
it’s just shifted upstream into the models that power modern search
experiences.
Kevin and John explore the “return of the
author.” With AI making content cheap to generate, who is
behind an article or review becomes an increasingly important trust signal.
John and Kevin discuss how LLMs could start to weigh attributes like: Is this
person quoted by major publishers? Do they speak at conferences? Do they
publish original research? For brands and publishers, that suggests doubling
down on real experts, clear bylines, and thought leadership that builds
individual as well as domain authority.
John also highlights the unexpected power of video.
Centerfield invested early in YouTube reviews and thought-leadership content,
often without a clear ROI story. Today, those videos (and their transcripts)
are being consumed by LLMs and helping establish authority for Centerfield and
its clients. That combination of authentic human video and searchable
transcripts is becoming a significant visibility asset.
We then turn to walled gardens like Google, Meta, and LinkedIn. Their message (“give us your budget and conversion pixel, the AI will do the rest”) is tempting, but dangerous if you’re optimizing only to leads or surface-level metrics. John argues for full-funnel measurement to actual revenue and LTV, plus a clear understanding of incrementality so you’re not overpaying for activity that merely harvests demand.