Sam Altman Says the AI Bubble Is Popping: What It Means for SEO and Businesses

Sam Altman has said what many suspected. He believes AI is in a bubble and that investors are “overexcited.” The LA Times reported it bluntly: “Say farewell to the AI bubble, and get ready for the crash.” Investors are nervous. For businesses, the right move is not panic. It is clarity. SEO is not dying. It is changing shape.

The Financial Bubble vs. Search Reality

• 95 percent of generative AI projects fail: An MIT study found almost all GenAI projects are missing their targets, despite $44 billion invested in the first half of 2025 (MIT study).
• Market signals: Nvidia stock fell 5 percent and Palantir fell 16 percent in a single week (Reuters).

What AI Overviews Are Doing

• BrightEdge: Impressions rose 49 percent year over year while CTR fell 30 percent when AI Overviews appeared (BrightEdge).
• Ahrefs: CTR for the top result dropped 34.5 percent when an AI Overview was shown (Ahrefs).
• Amsive: Non-branded queries lost ~20 percent CTR. When a Featured Snippet and AI Overview combined, CTR fell ~37 percent (Amsive).
• Semrush: AI Overviews appeared in 13.14 percent of U.S. queries by March 2025, double the January rate (Semrush).
• Sparktoro: 64 percent of Google searches now end without a click (Sparktoro).

AI Search Engines: Small and Unstable

• Glenn Gabe: AI search referrals remain under 1 percent of site traffic for most properties (GSQi).
• Search Engine Land: AI engines drove just 1.24 percent of organic traffic in early 2025 (Search Engine Land).
• Siege Media: Google delivered ~131 million visits vs. ChatGPT’s ~283,000 in July 2025, a 460 to 1 ratio (Siege Media).
• Similarweb: ChatGPT referrals to publishers jumped from under 1 million to over 25 million in one year (TechCrunch).
• Volatility: A July 2025 LinkedIn analysis showed a 52 percent drop in ChatGPT referrals after OpenAI shifted citations to Reddit and Wikipedia (Josh Blyskal).
• ahrefs: The team at ahrefs vibe coded this website using all of their data, and it’s shocking how little traffic LLMs refer vs that of Google. (Tim Soulo)

Winners and Losers

• Publishers: Visits from Google fell from 2.3 billion to under 1.7 billion in a year. CNN traffic fell 28 percent. HuffPost fell 40 percent (NY Post).
• Stack Overflow: Traffic cut in half since 2021, tied to AI adoption (Ars Technica).
• Chegg: User growth collapsed when students adopted ChatGPT (The Verge).
• Brands: Siege Media data shows homepage traffic rose ~10.7 percent as AI answer citations drove more branded searches (Siege Media).

E-E-A-T and Structure as the Moat

• iPullRank: Pages included in AI Overviews had 23 percent more structured data than non-included pages (iPullRank).
• FAQ schema: Pages with FAQ markup were 31 percent more likely to be cited (iPullRank).
• Google: AI Overviews favor authoritative, trustworthy sources with clear expertise signals (Google Search Central).

My Take

Altman is right about the financial bubble. But he is wrong if you assume that means SEO is collapsing. SEO is not dead. It is evolving. Authority, structured clarity, and technical discipline decide who gets attention. AI is draining some clicks, but it is also shining a light on who has earned trust. When the bubble bursts, shortcuts will vanish. Businesses that invest in credibility and clarity will be the ones left standing.

Final Thoughts

AI hype may dominate headlines, but businesses should focus on what actually drives visibility. Impressions are rising even if some clicks are falling, and the brands that invest in authority, trust, and clarity are still showing up. The bubble will deflate, and the noise will fade, but SEO built on execution will outlast the hype.

The companies that treat SEO as a foundation rather than a shortcut will not just survive the AI shakeout. They will be the ones left owning attention when competitors lose their footing.