The Dangerous Seduction of Click-Chasing
When a publisher elevates traffic to its primary KPI, it changes how the newsroom thinks about its output. This can lead down a very dangerous path.
It works, until it doesn’t.
The Chase
Imagine you’re a news publisher. Your journalism is good, you write original stories, and your website is relatively popular within your editorial niche.
Revenue is earned primarily via advertising. Google search is your biggest source of visitors.
Management demands growth, and elevates traffic to the throne of all KPIs. Engagement, loyalty, subscriptions - these are now secondary objectives. Getting the click, that is the driving purpose.
You look at your channels to determine where growth is most likely to come from. Search seems the most viable channel. So, you make SEO a key focus area.
As part of your SEO efforts, you come across specific tactics that cause your stories to generate more clicks. These tactics are very effective. Applying them to your stories results in significantly more traffic than before.
You’ve caught the scent. The chase for clicks is on.
These tactics demand that your stories focus on clicks above all. Within the context of these SEO-first tactics, every story is a traffic opportunity.
At first, you manage to apply these tactics within the framework of your existing journalism. Your stories are still good and unique, and you apply SEO as best you can to ensure each gets the best chance of generating traffic. It works, and your traffic grows.
But the pressures of management demand more. More growth. More revenue. More ad impressions. More traffic.
The newsroom submits. Stories are commissioned only if they have sufficient traffic potential. Journalists learn to just write stories that generate clicks. Headlines are crafted to maximise CTR, not to inform readers. You write multiple stories about the exact same news, each with a slightly different angle. Articles bury the lede.
Everything is subject to the chase.
Your scope expands. You don’t just write stories within your established specialism - you branch out. Different topics. New sections. Product reviews and recommendations. Listicles.
Everything is fair game, as long as it generates clicks.
And it works. Oh boy, does it work.
The flywheel gathers momentum. You learn exactly what people click on, how to craft the perfect headline, select the ideal image, find the precise angle that will make people stop scrolling and tap on your article.
Traffic keeps growing.
But, somehow, you don’t feel entirely at ease. Because you know that, when you look at your content objectively, something has been lost. Your site used to be about journalism, about informing readers, improving knowledge and awareness, and enabling policies and decisions. It used to be good.
Now, none of that really matters anymore. Your site is about clicks. Everything else is secondary.
But management is happy. Revenue is up. Profits surge. So it’s alright, isn’t it?
Isn’t it?
Google rolls out a core algorithm update. You lose 20% of your search traffic overnight. It’s a shot across the bow. A warning. But you ignore it. You focus on the chase even more. Tighter content focus. More variations of the same stories. Better SEO.
Traffic stabilises. No more growth, but you’re chugging along nicely. You maybe change a few things, try to get back onto a growth curve. Nothing works, but you’re not losing either. Things look stable. You can live with this.
Then the next Google core update hits. You lose 50% of your current search traffic. It’s code red in the newsroom. All hands on deck.
How do we recover? How do we get this traffic back? It’s our traffic, Google owes us!
You do what you’ve gotten very good at. You SEO the shit out of your site. Everything is optimised and maximised. Your technical SEO goes from ‘that will do’ to a state of such perfection it could make a web nerd cry. Your content output becomes even more focused on areas with the biggest traffic potential.
In the chase for revenue, you try alternative monetisation. Affiliate content. Gambling promos. Advertorials. More listicles. More product recommendations. More of everything.
Then the next update arrives. You lose again.
And the next one.
And the next one.
You lose, almost every single time.
It worked. Until it didn’t.
And now your site is on Google’s shitlist. Your relentless focus on growth at the expense of quality has accumulated so many negative signals that Google will not allow you to return to your previous heights.
You know none of what you try will work. Those traffic graphs won’t go back up. Every Google core update causes a new surge of existential dread: How much will we lose this time?
And yet, you still chase. You’ve long since lost the scent. But the chase still rules. Because you know that, to stop the chase, something needs to change. Something big and profound. And making that change will be painful. Extremely painful.
But do you have a choice?
Hindsight
I wish this scenario was unique, a singular publisher making the mistake of focusing on traffic at the expense of quality. But it’s a tragically common theme, played out in digital newsrooms hundreds of times over the last ten years.
In every instance, at some point the seductive appeal of traffic began to outweigh the journalistic principles of the organisation. Compromises were made so growth could be achieved.
And because these compromises had the intended result - at first - there was nothing to caution the publisher from travelling further down this path.
Well, nothing besides Google shouting at every opportunity that you should focus on quality, not clicks.
Besides every SEO professional that has ever dealt with a bad algorithm update saying you should focus on quality, not clicks.
Besides your best journalists abandoning ship in favour of a quality-focused outlet or their own Substack.
Besides your own loyal readers abandoning your site because you stopped focusing on quality and went after clicks.
The writing has been on the wall, in huge capital letters, for the better part of a decade. Arguably since 2018, when Google began rolling out algorithm updates to penalise low-effort content. If you’d been paying attention, none of this would have been a surprise.
Hey, maybe you did see it coming. But you weren’t able to make the required changes, because the clicks were still there. You were never going to deliberately abandon growth for some vague promise of sustainable traffic and audience loyalty.
If only you’d known that, once the Google hammer came down, the damage would be permanent. Maybe you wouldn’t have started the chase in the first place.
If only you’d known.
Recovery
When a site is so heavily affected by consecutive Google core updates, is there any hope of recovery? Can a website climb its way back to those vaulted traffic heights?
We need to be realistic and accept that those halcyon days of near-limitless traffic growth are not coming back. The ecosystem has changed. Growth is harder to achieve, and online news is working under a lower ceiling than ever before.
But recovery is possible, to an extent. You will never achieve the same traffic peaks as in your prime days, but you can claw back a significant chunk. Providing you are willing to do what it takes.
The recipe is simple, on paper: Everything you do should be in service of the reader.
Every story needs to be crafted to deliver maximum value for your readers. Every design element on your site needs to be optimised for the best user experience. Every headline must be informative first and foremost. Every article must deliver on its headline’s promise in spades. Every piece of content should serve to inform, educate, and delight your audience.
In short, your entire output should revolve around audience loyalty.
Not growth. Not traffic.
Loyalty.
Build a news platform so good that your readers don’t ever think about going anywhere else.
Of course you still need traffic, but this must be a secondary concern. Start with your audience, and then apply layers on top of your stories to aid their traffic potential.
Your output should be focused on original journalism - not rehashing the same stories that others are reporting. If all you do is take someone else’s story and write different angles on it, you’re not doing journalism.
Provide breaking news, expert commentary, detailed analysis, and a deep focus on your editorial specialities.
And accept that your audience isn’t a singular entity, but consumes news on multiple platforms and in multiple formats. Video, podcasts, newsletters, social media, you name it. Fire on all channels, as best you can.
Sounds simple. But very few publishers I’ve spoken with have the internal fortitude for such drastic cultural changes in their online newsroom. Most of the publishers I consult with that were affected by core updates just want a list of quick wins, some easy fixes they can implement and get their traffic back.
They want busy-work. They’re not interested in meaningful change. Because meaningful change is hard, and painful.
But also absolutely necessary.
Beers & SEO with Barry & Steve (and Luke!)
We published another episode of our podcast, this one featuring Luke Halls, Head of SEO at The Times. If you want to learn directly from a publisher whose editorial strategy makes them pretty much immune to Google’s algorithmic whims, pay attention to this one.
In this podcast we explore why The Times is so successful and growing their search traffic, the role that SEO plays in a hard-paywalled site, and why putting your readers first is the best long-term strategy.
Check out the podcast on your favourite platform via this link.
Also make sure you read this article on Press Gazette, where they spoke with The Times’s Deputy Head of Digital Anna Sbuttoni (a speaker at the 2023 News & Editorial SEO Summit). It details how their strategy of ‘fewer and better stories’ resulted in strong audience and subscription growth.
The 2026 News and Editorial SEO Summit
Want to know what actually works to generate sustainable traffic and audience loyalty? Buy a ticket for the 2026 edition of our News and Editorial SEO Summit.
This will be the sixth edition of our fully virtual online event dedicated entirely to SEO and audience growth for news and publishing.
The 2026 edition will be bigger than ever before, with three days of talks. Every day will have its own theme:
SEO for News
SEO and AI at large
Audience growth beyond search
I’m really excited for this edition, because John Shehata and I are putting together another truly epic roster of speakers and panellists from all over the SEO and publishing industry, with returning names and new speakers.
Super Early Bird tickets are now on sale, a staggering 47% discounted from the full price, so get in early and grab your seat to the best and biggest SEO for News event in the world.
Miscellanea
Official Google Docs:
Latest in SEO:
Clicks don’t count (and they never did) - Jono Alderson
How To Do Evergreen Content in 2026 (and beyond) - Leadership in SEO
Paywalls: Expert tips for technical and editorial SEO - WTF is SEO?
Do explainers still work? The experts discuss - WTF is SEO?
SEO in 2026: Higher standards, AI influence, and a web still catching up - SEL
GEO Was Invented on Sand Hill Road - The Inference
Interesting Articles:
The Metric That Lied To Newsrooms - News Pain points
BREAKING! News Thrives in the Age of AI - Define Media
The Role of News Publications in AI Citations [New Data] - Buzzstream
Where do Americans turn first for information about breaking news? - Pew Research
How publishers are diversifying and evolving their revenue models - INMA
New Research: Search Happens Everywhere; an Analysis of 41 Websites with Significant Search Activity - Sparktoro
How Accurate Are Google’s A.I. Overviews? - The New York Times
What AI Userbot Traffic Actually Reveals About Your Website - Sistrix
Which journalists and news outlets are most cited by AI answer engines? - Press Gazette
My Appearances:
I’m Feeling Unlucky - ABC News Australia
Optimising for Google Discover in the age of AI - SEO Charity
How our Advisory Partners help build the capabilities that media leaders need - FT Strategies
That’s it for another edition. As always, thanks for reading and subscribing, and I’ll see you at the next one!