If Reddit Was Your SEO Strategy, You Haven't Got One, FFS!

About this episode

Reddit's share of ChatGPT citations went from nearly 4% to half a percent in about a week. Nobody can fully explain it — not the people who measure it, not Reddit, and definitely not the bloke who sold you a Reddit visibility package back in March. And if that was your strategy, you haven't got one anymore.

Hi, I'm Nikki Pilkington. My site is https://nikki-pilkington.com/ and in this episode of "SEO F**king What", I'm talking about what happens when you build your marketing on ground you don't own — because I've watched this exact film five or six times now, and it ends the same way every single time.

This isn't really a Reddit story. It's an article directories story, a guest posting story, a Facebook reach story, a Google Plus story. It works until it doesn't, every single fucking time.

Here's what I'm covering:

— What actually happened to Reddit's ChatGPT citations between the 8th and 17th of August, and why nobody — including the people who measure this professionally — can fully explain it — How the industry decided Reddit was "a channel", and what happened to the agencies selling packages and the people buying aged accounts

— Mark Williams-Cook's two rules, which I've been banging on about for years: stop building your strategy around holes in the system, and it works until it doesn't

— The graveyard tour: article directories and Panda, guest posting and one Matt Cutts blog post, Facebook reach going from 15% to basically zero, and Google Plus in people's actual job titles

— The only two things you own — your website and your email list — and why everything else, including your AI visibility score, is rented from a landlord who doesn't have to tell you before changing the locks

— The very specific mistake the Reddit crowd made: they didn't diversify, they substituted

— The one thing Reddit is genuinely brilliant for, which is free, which almost nobody uses, and which works whether or not ChatGPT ever cites a single thread

I also give you a proper piece of homework. Not the "might do that one day" kind. The actual do-it-this-week kind — including the site:reddit.com trick that hands you your next content plan on a plate.

If you know someone who went all in on Reddit for AI visibility, or who's building their entire business on one rented platform, send them this. It might save them from a very bad Monday morning.

Get found. Make money. Stop stressing. And never build your castle on someone else's sand.

Chapters:

00:00 — If that was your strategy, you haven't got one

00:41 — An 86% drop in a fortnight

02:48 — Stop building around holes in the system

04:24 — I've watched this film five times: the graveyard tour

07:20 — What you own, and what you're renting

10:07 — Three things to do this week

11:54 — What Reddit was supposed to be

Links mentioned:

Non-Wanky SEO Courses — the On-Page SEO Toolkit is now completely free: https://nonwankyseo.com

The data on the Reddit citation drop (Promptwatch, via Search Engine Land): https://searchengineland.com/reddit-chatgpt-search-citations-fall-report-485473

Mark Williams-Cook on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markseo/

Also Asked — Mark's tool, and a brilliant one: https://alsoasked.com/?via=nikki-pilkington (aff link)

Episode 2 — who actually owns your Google accounts (same problem, one floor down)

https://seofuckingwhatpodcast.co.uk/episode/your-seo-sht-who-actually-owns-it

Follow Nikki:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nikkipilkington/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nikkipilkington/

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/nikkipilkington.bsky.social

Mentioned in this episode:

ICN Network