It’s tempting, right? You’ve just discovered ChatGPT or Gemini, maybe even Claude. You paste in a prompt like, “Write an article about how amazing my business is,” and within seconds — boom — 1500 words of what looks like Pulitzer-quality prose. You hit “publish,” go grab a celebratory latte, and wait for the search rankings to roll in.
And they might… for a day.
But then — like clockwork — your traffic drops faster than the Nasdaq after Elon tweets.
This, my friends, is what I’ve come to call “The Tuesday Dip,” and we at Above Bits (or AB, as our clients like to contact us) have been seeing it all too often lately. As a seasoned SEO company in Charlotte, we’ve worked with content since the days of FrontPage and FTP uploads, and we’ve watched the web go from human-written masterpieces to AI-generated mountains of sameness.
And now? The backlash is here.
Let’s talk about why AI content ranks… briefly, what makes it crash, and how to navigate this new jungle without losing your SEO soul — or your budget.
The Rise of AI-Written SEO: From Novelty to Noise
2023 was a turning point. With ChatGPT surpassing 180 million users and tools like Jasper AI, Koala, Writesonic, and Copy.ai selling “rank-ready” blog posts at breakneck speed, the global internet was flooded with machine-generated text.
Companies like BuzzFeed openly admitted to using AI to write listicles, while CNET quietly published AI-written financial advice that contained factual errors. Oops.
From Berlin to Bangalore, content mills began replacing human writers with prompt engineers. The promise? Massively reduced cost, faster turnaround, and “good enough” quality. And yes, some of it ranked. Google’s Search Central even stated in early 2023 that AI content wasn’t inherently against guidelines as long as it was valuable and high-quality.
But here’s where things started going sideways.
Every SEO company in Charlotte with a keyboard and an API key jumped on the trend. Suddenly, everyone had hundreds of “unique” articles about “The Benefits of Local Lawn Care,” “10 Tips for Great Plumbing,” and “Why SEO is Important in 2024.” And they all said… pretty much the same thing.
Because AI, no matter how clever, is still regurgitating patterns from its training data. And Google? It noticed.
The Algorithm Claps Back — Quietly, Then Loudly
Remember the Helpful Content Update in September 2023? That was Google’s polite way of saying: “We know you’re gaming the system. Please stop.”
However, it wasn’t until March 2024 that things took a turn for the worse. A wave of de-indexing hit sites across sectors — especially affiliate blogs, content farms, and, yes, AI-saturated business sites.
We audited over 40 client and non-client sites that month, and here’s what we noticed:
Sites using AI to bulk-generate SEO pages experienced an average drop in ranking of 38%. Those who paired AI with minimal human editing fared slightly better but still lost ground.
The real winners?
Sites with a clear human tone, honest insights, and actual firsthand experience.
As a long-standing SEO company in Charlotte, we’ve always believed in adding value first and keywords second. That philosophy is suddenly in vogue again. But we never stopped using it.
But AI Does Work — If You Use It Like a Human, Not a Bot
Let’s be clear: AI isn’t the villain. I use it every day. AB uses it to brainstorm ideas, summarize competitor content, or help with rewriting drafts that need a punch-up.
The problem isn’t the tool — it’s the temptation to automate insight.
AI content can get you started. It’s fantastic for meta descriptions, structured outlines, and even technical schema markup. But when it comes to building trust — both with your readers and Google’s increasingly sophisticated algorithms — you need to go deeper.
And that’s something no machine can fake. Trust me, we’ve tested it.
Take one of our Columbia-based clients in the dental space. They initially utilized an AI tool to publish over 80 articles within a month. They ranked fast. However, by the following algorithm update, 50% of those pages had disappeared from the SERPs. We rebuilt the strategy using real patient questions, doctor interviews, and thoughtful writing. Rankings came back within 60 days, stronger than before.
SEO by Above Bits isn’t about flooding the internet. It’s about standing out within it.
But Doesn’t Everyone Just Use ChatGPT Now?
Yes — and that’s the problem.
The more people rely on the same models, the more the internet becomes an echo chamber. AI tools are trained on existing content. That means they can’t create anything truly new — only remix what’s already out there.
This is especially dangerous for local businesses. If you run a landscaping company in Charlotte or a bakery in Columbia, AI won’t know that your hydrangea frosting has won the county fair five years in a row. It won’t know that your roofers specialize in post-hurricane recovery. It’ll just say what every other site says — bland, forgettable, and punished by Google’s freshness and originality signals.
And that’s where a trustworthy SEO company in Charlotte steps in.
At Above Bits, we blend automation with authenticity. We might use AI to map out keyword gaps or simulate user intent across various platforms, but the writing? That’s where the humans take over.
AI Plagiarism: The Silent Traffic Killer
Let’s talk about something that gets overlooked in all the AI hype: plagiarism.
Most AI tools don’t understand originality — they know probability. They string together phrases based on what seems most likely to come next, given their training data. The result? Content that may look unique but contains recycled phrasing.
We’ve seen cases where AI-generated content triggered plagiarism detectors with scores over 20%, even though the writer believed it was entirely original. And when Google’s SpamBrain gets a whiff of that? Your rankings won’t just drop. They’ll vanish.
One business owner from North Carolina told us they unknowingly used AI to build out their HVAC website’s blog. Their traffic halved in a month. When we reviewed their copy, we found over a dozen phrases copied word-for-word from Wikipedia and other blogs — none of it cited, all of it auto-generated.
Guess what? Google didn’t care if it was an accident.
So, What Does Google Want?
Surprisingly, the answer remains unchanged after 15 years: unique, valuable, human-centric content.
What’s changed is how well Google can detect the opposite. With ML-based ranking systems, EEAT signals, semantic indexing, and increasing integration of user behavior data, Google now knows if your article was written by someone who cares — or by someone who just wants to rank.
At Above Bits, we’ve weathered every algorithm update since 2006. Panda. Penguin. Possum. BERT. Helpful Content. March Core Updates. We’ve danced with them all — and helped hundreds of clients recover when they didn’t.
Our clients stick around because we don’t offer magic. We offer muscle memory.
And that’s something every serious SEO company in Charlotte should bring to the table.
The Future of SEO in an AI-Flooded World — And Why the Human Touch Still Wins
In the grand war between automation and authenticity, 2025 is turning out to be less “Rise of the Machines” and more “Revenge of the Humans.” Google’s recent documentation and patents (yes, we’ve read them) indicate that they’re working to flag AI-generated content not just on what it says but also on how it says it.
According to Google’s AI Content Detection Framework, launched as part of the Project Owl initiative, the company has been quietly expanding its LLM detection capabilities across Gmail, Docs, and — most relevant to us — Search. That means if your blog post reads like a thesaurus with amnesia assembled, Search now knows.
And what’s more fascinating? During the 2024 Google I/O conference, their VP of Search dropped a subtle bombshell: pages created with “non-original insights” or “formulaic outputs” would see a decline in visibility. That’s Silicon Valley code for “Stop copy-pasting AI articles and pretending it’s thought leadership.”
As a long-established SEO company in Charlotte, we’ve seen this coming for a while. And we’ve been training our clients to adapt, not just react.
International Data Doesn’t Lie — People Still Want to Read You, Not Just “Content”
Let’s zoom out for a moment. A 2024 Statista report showed that over 47% of internet users say they now distrust articles that “sound AI-written.” That number increased from 32% the previous year.
Even more alarming? Forty-two percent of people in the U.S. admit that they actively leave a website if the writing sounds generic or robotic. The figure’s even higher in countries like Germany, Japan, and Canada — cultures with a strong emphasis on editorial quality.
Now, combine this user behavior with Google’s updated systems, and you’ve got a double-edged sword. You’re not just losing rankings — you’re losing readers.
At AB, we’ve had clients in Charlotte and Columbia come to us after their shiny, AI-generated blog empires collapsed under their weight. In nearly every case, the rebuild required one thing: human narrative. Something Google can’t replicate and your competitors can’t fake.
Can AI Still Be Part of the SEO Equation?
Absolutely — but you’ve got to be strategic. Here’s how we use it (the right way) at Above Bits and why any innovative SEO company in Charlotte should be following suit:
We utilize AI to identify content gaps across our competitors. It’s excellent at identifying patterns in how others write, which helps us discern what not to say. We also use it to generate alternate meta titles, simulate multiple user intents from search terms, and stress-test internal linking strategies.
However, we never publish content without editing.
Because here’s the reality: AI doesn’t know what it’s like to fix a leaky roof in a North Carolina thunderstorm. It doesn’t know the vibe of Charlotte’s South End or the design quirks of local websites. It can’t teach experience. And in 2025, that’s the currency that matters most.
The Real Risk? Losing Your Brand Voice to the Machine
One of the most unspoken tragedies in AI-written SEO is this: everyone starts to sound the same.
Every roofing company becomes “Your Trusted Partner in Home Protection.” Every dentist offers “Gentle, Expert Care.” Every digital agency? “Your Growth is Our Mission.”
We’ve helped clients in Columbia who lost their entire brand identity after outsourcing all content to AI freelancers. Their bounce rate shot up. Time on the page dropped. Even their long-term customers started calling, asking if the business had been bought out. The content felt different — because it was.
The solution? Reintroduce the human voice. Infuse personality. Let your site say what you would say. Because in a world of clones, authenticity isn’t just rare — it’s SEO gold.
And if you work with an SEO company in Charlotte that has been writing and optimizing sites since Google still listed AltaVista as a competitor (yes, that old), you get more than just strategy. You get survival instincts.
One Mistake We See in 80% of AI-Written Blogs
We see this over and over again: long-winded, keyword-stuffed intros written by AI that bury entirely the point. Google’s passage ranking system penalizes this behavior. If your real topic doesn’t appear until paragraph six, your bounce rate goes up, and your ranking falls off a cliff.
Even the most innovative AI tools — such as Jasper and Claude — still do this. Why? Because they’re guessing what you want based on patterns, not intent. Humans can tell when you’re rambling. Bots? Not so much.
This is why Above Bits still reviews every paragraph with human eyes. We think about how a real reader — someone in Columbia on a lunch break or a Charlotte small business owner Googling at 11:45 p.m. — is going to engage with your page.
And we optimize accordingly.
Beyond Content: Technical SEO Still Matters More Than Ever
While everyone’s distracted arguing over whether GPT-5 writes better than Claude 3, the smart money is still on technical SEO.
Did you know that in 2024, over 61% of the top 10 ranking pages in competitive niches had Core Web Vitals scores of 90 or higher? (Source: SearchMetrics Global Technical Report). Or that Google’s Mobile-First Indexing is now actively testing local speed weights — meaning your site’s speed in Columbia might affect how you rank in North Carolina?
You can write the best content in the world — AI or not — but if your site loads like a GeoCities fan page on dial-up, you’re toast.
Above Bits works on platforms like AlmaLinux 9 with Centminmod, tuned to the byte for performance. And if you’ve got a WordPress site bogged down by legacy plugins and themes from 2014, you can bet we’ve fixed worse.
Because an excellent SEO company in Charlotte understands both content and code.
Future-Proof SEO: The Blend of Humanity, Tools, and Long-Term Strategy
We get it. AI is intoxicating. It’s fast. It’s shiny. It promises results without the cost of real effort. But that’s not sustainable — and Google knows it.
If you want to build an SEO presence that lasts longer than a TikTok trend, you need to combine human insights, tech precision, and editorial quality that still makes someone stop scrolling.
That’s what we do. That’s what AB has done for nearly two decades.
When our clients ask, “How do we future-proof our SEO?” we tell them this:
Don’t chase trends. Define your value. Show up, honestly. Be helpful, not just optimized.
It sounds simple. But in a digital world full of shortcuts, it’s rare.
We’ve seen it all: spinning software in 2009, keyword density hacks in 2012, schema overloads in 2016, voice search mania in 2019, and now, the AI tsunami of 2023–2025. The only thing that has consistently worked across every phase?
Writing for real humans.
That’s what we do at Above Bits. And we’ve been doing it long before Google said it was cool.
If your business is ready for SEO that doesn’t just rank, but connects and reaches out, reach out. Whether you’re in Columbia, Charlotte, or somewhere in between, our team has the miles, the muscle, and the mindset to make your content work past Tuesday.
Let’s stop chasing the algorithm and start leading it.
Learn more about affordable SEO by Above Bits — we’re ready when you are.
