AI SEO agents are AI-powered assistants that handle multiple search engine optimization-related tasks.
Their primary goal is to help SEO specialists streamline their strategies by automating specific activities, such as keyword research and SEO audits.
They can also compile large amounts of data on competitor performance, SERP, and keyword metrics and turn it into practical insights.
Although these agents seem promising, this technology is new and has several limitations.
That said, I'll walk you through everything you need to know about AI SEO agents—from what they are and aren't to how you can use them.
What You Will Learn
- What are AI SEO agents
- Key capabilities of AI SEO agents and their practical applications
- Examples of AI SEO agent tools
- The benefits and limitations of using AI-powered SEO agents
What Are AI SEO Agents?
AI SEO agents are AI-powered assistants designed to automate various SEO tasks, such as keyword research and content optimization, SEO audits, and real-time performance tracking.
Unlike regular SEO tools that automate and assist in specific tasks, AI SEO agents take it a step further.
They can conduct complete SEO processes with little to no human intervention. Although, they're not quite there yet.
For context, suppose I want to create a blog post about "intermittent fasting."
An AI SEO agent like KIVA can automate most of the ideation and development process, from identifying relevant keywords to drafting an SEO-optimized outline.
In the first step, the agent identified and listed loads of search queries related to my seed keyword, along with useful data like ranking difficulty, search volume, and user intent.
In a few steps, it can generate an SEO-optimized content outline—just like so:
While it would have undoubtedly taken longer to do this manually, KIVA didn't fully automate the process. It still required human intervention to move through the different steps of it.
AI agents are not completely autonomous yet.
In this sense, they're not that different from SEO content platforms like Surfer.
For instance, with Surfer AI, you can write a fully optimized article with just a few clicks.
What Is the Difference Between AI SEO Agents and AI Chatbots?
AI SEO agents are autonomous tools built specifically for SEO tasks, while AI chatbots are conversational assistants that can support certain SEO aspects but primarily focus on user engagement.
While AI chatbots like ChatGPT help with SEO tasks including keyword research, sitemaps, and content outlines, they are not specialized SEO tools. That means they cannot conduct complex tasks, like accessing website traffic data to perform analyses on it.
For example, I used the following prompt for both ChatGPT and Chatsonic:
"Analyze URL: https://www.webmd.com/ and identify top SEO pages, primary keywords and SEO strategies used to drive organic traffic for geography: United States."
Here's ChatGPT's output:
Although ChatGPT did offer some helpful information about WebMD's SEO strategy, these details are pulled from other articles that discuss the website's SEO success. ChatGPT only compiled these resources to answer my prompt.
In contrast, Chatsonic leveraged actual data from a third-party tool to run a thorough website analysis and draw conclusions—it performed an SEO task independently.
Key Capabilities of AI SEO Agents
These AI-powered tools can assist you with various tasks, from automating keyword research to performing technical SEO audits. Let's take a look.
1. Automated Keyword Research
AI SEO agents automate keyword research processes. They can measure keyword data like search volume and ranking difficulty and use the gathered details to spot high-value keywords.
Let's do keyword research using Chatsonic. The platform explains its thought process step-by-step, which helps us better understand how SEO agents work behind the scenes.
Here's the prompt I used:
"Do keyword research on the topic: intermittent fasting in region: United States, cluster these keywords. Sort keywords by difficulty to rank."
The platform first went through Ahrefs to analyze my seed keyword. Chatsonic then concluded based on the gathered data that although this particular keyword is quite popular, it's also highly competitive.
And here's the first hiccup—Chatsonic moved on to generate clusters using my seed keyword, but couldn't do so due to insufficient data.
The platform then searched for "intermittent fasting topic clusters in the US" across search engines to try and find ideas.
In any case, Chatsonic did create a few keyword clusters. The search terms you see on the right are pulled from Ahrefs, which Chatsonic compiled and organized into different categories.
Dedicated keyword research tools still do a better job—they give you more control over the process and offer more detailed insights into ranking opportunities, in less time.
Surfer's Topical Map automatically does the keyword research and clustering for you.
Topical Map generated 1,929 content ideas on "intermittent fasting" and grouped them into 113 clusters.
In the Recommendations tab you'll find a list of keywords to prioritize based on metrics like volume and difficulty.
Connect your Google Search Console account and Surfer will create a personalized content plan based on your data.
2. Content Optimization
AI tools use Natural Language Processing to understand and respond to human input. AI agents can also analyze your content and offer improvement suggestions for better search engine rankings.
Case in point, I plugged in one of my older posts in Chatsonic and asked it to look for optimization opportunities. Here's the rundown of what the platform recommends:
The platform suggested various improvements, like adding extra visuals and infographics to enhance the reading experience.
It also recommended including the exact keyword "Domain Authority" (both words capitalized) a few times within the first 100 words of the blog post. This feels unnatural and doesn't make much sense readability-wise.
That said, take AI suggestions with a grain of salt and double-check them using your own expertise—especially since other AI agents for SEO, like Alli AI, also auto-implement recommendations.
A small overlook might lead to ranking and brand reputation issues.
That's why you should find the right content optimization tool.
Surfer's Content Editor gives you detailed content optimization guidelines. You can see which keywords to use and how frequently, how to best structure your content, and which topics to touch upon.
Content Editor comes with a group of tools that can assist you in implementing these content optimization guidelines.
For example, you can have Auto-Optimize include these keywords throughout your article. Auto-Optimize can even add new sections to make sure there are not gaps in the content. You can always review the changes and make edits before accepting them.
If you want even more control over the process, then use Surfy and Topics to write comprehensive content.
P.S. People who optimized their content with Surfer saw an average organic traffic growth of 205% in 2024 💜
3. Technical SEO Audits
AI SEO agents can crawl through your website to spot and fix any usability and indexing-related issues.
For example, Alli AI found website loading speed issues and suggested several fixes, like minifying stylesheets, converting images to WebP formats, and more.
From here, I could let Alli AI handle most of the fixes by itself—it can minify code, optimize images, etc. The platform can also automatically generate Schema markups or suggest improvements for existing markups.
You can approve and implement the requested changes in bulk. Alli AI can also spot duplicate pages and add canonical tasks.
But again, it's super important to double-check AI recommendations because some suggested improvements may actually have a negative impact on your website—just like what this user on Capterra pointed out:
4. Link Building Automation
AI agents are also handy for discovering link-building opportunities. They help monitor competitor backlinks and find other resources targeting your main keywords.
For example, Alli AI used my focus keyword to discover other blog posts and community forums discussing the same subject.
From here, I could click on each specific resource, and the platform will share a few outreach suggestions.
Examine each particular link to ensure you don't accidentally target low-quality websites.
Also, consider passing each site through a DA checker to ensure you collaborate with authoritative resources within your niche.
5. SERP Analysis
AI SEO agents can look at massive amounts of search engine data and turn them into quick actionable insights.
Let's see how KIVA conducts a SERP analysis using "keto diet ideas" as a keyword.
The platform will analyze user intent, pull and categorize top-ranking pages, list other semantically related terms, and spot patterns across search results.
KIVA does include links to the top content in search engine results pages along with each post's total word count, but it lacks extra insights, like side-by-side performance comparisons, for example.
Surfer's SERP Analyzer fixes that. You can see how your page compares to top-ranking pages for a given keyword.
Benefits of Using AI SEO Agents
AI SEO agents can obviously save you loads of time—especially in data-heavy tasks, like keyword analysis and audits. The tasks I showed throughout the article would've taken significantly more time manually.
Still, prompt-based platforms like Chatsonic tend to be finicky. However, I found that pre-written prompts work very well, which makes AI agents for SEO extremely useful for some use cases.
And although AI tools are sometimes prone to decision-making errors, a good portion of the platforms' optimization recommendations were genuinely helpful, like Chatsonic's content suggestions.
Limitations of AI SEO Agents
AI agents are not fully developed yet. That means they're prone to the occasional hiccup and AI hallucinations—just as I showed throughout this post.
This can cause AI agents to provide inaccurate information—if not careful enough, you might base your SEO efforts on false recommendations.
Also, prompts might involve quite a bit of trial and error until you get the platform to do what you want, which sometimes negates the time-saving benefit AI tools promise.
That said, treat AI SEO agents as assistants—not complete replacements. Although their goal is to handle complex SEO tasks autonomously, they still require significant human involvement to get good results.
Also, your AI SEO agent will be as good as its third-party data sources, which it pulls from other SEO tools.
You might be better off going directly to the data source and use a tool like Surfer to manage your content optimization efforts.
Key Takeaways
- AI SEO Agents are AI-powered tools designed to autonomously handle complex SEO-related tasks such as keyword research, content optimization, and technical SEO audits.
- These AI-powered tools leverage data from multiple sources, like Ahrefs and Google Search Console, to provide actionable insights and enhance search engine optimization strategies.
- While AI SEO agents can significantly streamline SEO workflows and improve efficiency, they still require human oversight to ensure accuracy and relevance.
- Despite their capabilities, AI SEO agents are not fully autonomous and should be used as assistants rather than replacements for SEO professionals.
- As this technology continues to evolve, it holds the potential to further enhance SEO strategies, but users should remain cautious of errors and rely on their expertise for critical decisions.
