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Everyone is saying something along the lines of “once you have authority, it’s easier.” For me, while that is true in general, SEO is also just becoming more and more competitive as more businesses are realizing its value, and, at the same time, Google is making changes and showing more ads, AI Overviews, and other SERP features, all of which leads to the organic listings getting fewer clicks, especially for high-intent keywords that show a ton of ads and any informational keywords.
SEO keeps evolving, and I think it will only get harder to rank in general. A big brand and authority doesn’t necessarily mean everything is easy. Those big brands are often competing against other big brands for highly competitive keywords and topics. A big brand can also still see a rapid fall. For instance, we’ve widely heard major news publishers having issues with huge traffic drops like Wash Post, WSJ, and CNN, anyone with lots of informational content likely saw drops. HubSpot is a good example. Sites like Forbes and CNET declined due to reputational abuse. Affiliate sites seem to have all but disappeared. Social sites like Digg and Vine crashed and burned, Tumblr declined a ton.
When working with big brands that have a lot of authority, I tend to be extra careful and feel even more pressure to do things perfectly. There is a bit more freedom with small brands that are just starting or don’t have much traffic. It’s also just fun to get those small brands huge growth like 2x, 3x, or 4x in a year, whereas a big brand might only be able to grow 10% or something.
