AI Hype vs Reality: What actually works in marketing (w/ Rand Fishkin) | S3 EP2

Episode notes

AI hype is everywhere. But what does an AI future look like for marketers? Is AI genuinely the future, or just an over-hyped bubble that'll eventually burst, causing chaos in the process?In this episode of The Paid Media Lab, Rand Fishkin (Co-Founder/CEO of SparkToro and many, many other companies) joins us to cut through the noise. Rand shares fresh data on how people really use AI tools like ChatGPT, what’s driving the “AI bubble,” and whether claims of Google’s supposedly inevitable death at the hands of AI hold any truth. We also cover:• What SparkToro’s data says about Google vs ChatGPT usage• The real reason your organic traffic is falling• How to adapt to the rise of zero-click marketing• Whether the AI economy is the dot-com bubble repeating itself, or whether it's something else entirely• Why attribution is broken (and what to measure instead)• How to make your brand visible inside AI models and search resultsIt’s an honest, data-driven look at what works in marketing today, minus the hype.

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