Expand your understanding of clustering – with Gianluca Fiorelli
13/03/2026 | 16 mins.
Gianluca Fiorelli advises that, to truly understand and deliver for your customer in 2026, you should be revisiting how you utilise clustering at every touchpoint. Gianluca says: “Rethink the concept of clustering. We usually think of clustering as something that is only for creating content, especially in the informational space. However, we know that we need to be visible along the entire search journey and customer journey. This means we must be visible with our informational content, but also our commercial, navigational, and transactional content – to use the classic definitions for intent. When you cluster, you need to do so for different types of clusters. The first one is still clustering for topics: entity search, and so on. Then, it is also interesting and very effective to start clustering these queries and segments for other things, like the buyer personas that are implied by these queries. You can cluster them by sentiment, in order to understand the urgency and needs that are implied by those searches.
Investigate your audience, and discover how user intent is changing – with Becky Simms
12/03/2026 | 16 mins.
Becky Simms shares that user intent doesn’t stand still, and this is something that you should be continually analysing. Becky says: “We are seeing huge shifts in how people search, and you need to stay on top of that, but not just by looking at what platforms are doing. You need to understand what users are doing, and how their intent is changing where they search.”
Be where your users are - Joao Pereira
11/03/2026 | 16 mins.
Joao Pereira shares the importance of being where your users are. Talking points include: How do you know where your users are? How do you identify who your users are? What tools do you use to help to identify where they interact? What do you do once you know where your users are? How does this fit into your marketing funnel? What measurable SEO benefit does this have?
Switch seats with your customers to discover how they search – with Eli Schwartz
10/03/2026 | 15 mins.
It’s one thing to understand who your audience is, but how do you get a true sense of what your customers experience? Eli Schwartz advises walking a mile in their shoes. Eli says: “Map out your customer journey and figure out where search fits.” How do you start mapping an actual search journey? “It's very, very simple: you switch chairs. Marketers always have this marketing hat on when they're trying to sell something. Their boss gives them something, or it's their own product, and they put their marketing hat on. ‘What are the things I need to do? How do I package this? How do I promote it? What should the price be for SEO? What should my keywords be? What should my pages look like? How much content do I need? Who am I going to hire to do this?’
Make your writing into mixtapes, for real people – with Will Slater
09/03/2026 | 14 mins.
Will Slater uses a ’90s analogy to demonstrate the importance of being unique, even though it takes a little bit longer to get done. Will says: “Be more mixtape, specifically when you're writing content. To explain that, I need to take you back in time to the mid-90s. I'm a big music fan, I have been for most of my life, and my formative years with music were in the ‘90s. Back then, there were two main ways to share music: listening to the radio and making mixtapes and sharing those mixtapes with your friends. Now, creating mixtapes was hard work. It was a faff because you had to figure out exactly what tracks were going to be in what order. You had to sit in front of your stereo, picking out your records or your CDs and pressing ‘play’ and ‘record’ on your tape deck. However, that meant that every mixtape that anybody made was special because people put so much thought and effort into it.
SEO is continuing to change at an alarming pace. And yet, in some sense, the principles of good SEO remain the same.
Hello, and welcome to SEO in 2026 – a significant repository of current thinking from many of the world’s leading SEOs.
We're pleased to be able to welcome you to the fifth book and fifth series in this podcast, now well and truly an annual tradition, brought to you by Majestic.
“How people search has seen a bigger shift in the last 12 months than the last 12 years, and this makes SEOin2026 a must-read for anyone working in the industry. Majestic has brought together 117 of the SEO industry's brightest minds to share their insights into what matters, and what doesn't, to continue to drive growth with organic search during a period of massive uncertainty, and the book should be seen as a valuable reference point to keep your strategy on the right track.”
JAMES BROCKBANK
Managing Director and Founder, Digitaloft
“I highly recommend that every SEO professional set aside a couple of days for SEOin2026. You'll thank me for helping you plan your year effectively. I'm extremely grateful to have the opportunity to work alongside some of the world's leading SEO champions.”
NITIN MANCHANDA
Founder & Chief SEO Consultant, Botpresso
“This collection of wisdom from many of the best minds in SEO today is a great line in the sand of where we as an industry are, what problems we face, and how we tackle them. Anyone in SEO or marketing should be dipping into this on a regular basis.”
SIMON COX
Technical SEO Consultant, Cox and Co. Creative
“This series continues to be the industry’s leading source of the most timely advice a marketer could ever want. The most forward-thinking SEO experts in the world come together once a year to create this invaluable collection of new knowledge that should never be passed up on!”
PAM AUNGST CRONIN
President and Founder, Pam Ann Marketing and Stealth Search and Analytics
“2025 has been a sprint for the SEO industry, with AI reshaping how we understand visibility, relevance, and authority. SEOin2026 is not just another trends book; it’s a roadmap for what’s actually coming. I loved being part of it and seeing how experts around the world approach the same challenges from different angles.”
RAMONA JOITA
SEO Consultant and Founder
“David is good at drawing out the substance of a conversation. He will explore the topic and challenge assumptions, steer the conversation into an unexpected direction, and build on your ideas – making you think a bit deeper and sharper. Our recent conversation flew by as always, and as always – I’ve come out energised about the topic with more to think about.”
SUKHJINDER SINGH
Freelance SEO Consultant
Ireland