BrightonSEO 2025 gave us plenty to think about (and talk about)

BrightonSEO is the world’s biggest search marketing conference, and last week the Oban team spent a couple of days taking it all in. Between the talks, spotting trends, and swapping notes, we came away with plenty of sharp insights on how people are discovering, scrolling, and buying online – and what that means for brands trying to keep up. Here are our key highlights from the conference.

Treat TikTok as a full ecosystem

In her talk, Amanda Easter made it clear that TikTok is not just another social platform. It’s a place where people discover, watch, and shop all in one. The algorithm predicts what users want before they even know it, leaving brands just 1.2 seconds to make an impression.

TikTok has evolved into an ecosystem of search, entertainment, and shopping. Gen Z and Millennials trust it, engage with it, and increasingly buy through it. Some figures that stood out: 50% of Millennials and 40% of Gen Z will stop scrolling to make a purchase, and brands on TikTok Shop can see up to five times higher conversion when they get it right. Gen Z alone accounts for around $450 billion in worldwide income, making them an essential audience.

Success on TikTok comes down to understanding how people use the platform. It’s not enough just to post content; brands need to think like creators, experiment with formats, and pay attention to how the audience responds. Practical takeaways from Amanda’s session include:

Do:

• Discover your niche
• Create TikTok-first content
• Use influencers and creators
• Integrate Shop Now
• Amplify organic content with paid ads

Don’t:

• Over-control creative
• Stuff keywords
• Treat TikTok Shop in isolation
• Ignore platform data

The comment section is an underused source of insight, showing what questions people have and what resonates in real time.

Make every post count on social

Francesca Tighinean’s session reinforced the point that brands that act like creators and focus on authenticity grow fastest. However, the approach differs by platform – for example:

• Instagram still rewards a polished, curated feed, especially with carousels and Reels. When a post performs well, build on the momentum by sharing a new, related post within a day or two. Audiences are more likely to engage when you stay part of the conversation.
  
  
• TikTok favours content that feels real and unpolished, with strong hooks, niche hashtags, and a willingness to experiment.
  
  
• YouTube remains valuable for longer-form content that gives audiences depth and keeps them engaged.

A key lesson is that every post should make sense on its own. Even if someone has not heard of your brand, they should still get value from it. Brands that win on social are visible, human, and experiment intentionally, while brands that lose often post faceless content or chase trends without purpose. Focusing on clarity and stand-alone value helps brands grow steadily without stretching their resources too thinly.

Put humans at the heart of search

Jane Fulcher reminded us that people still look to other humans for guidance. While many searches start on Google or Bing, more Gen Z users begin on social platforms, and TikTok and Reddit are increasingly used for opinions, inspiration, and first-hand experiences. 41% of Gen Z start searches on social media, 74% use TikTok for discovery, and 51% prefer it over Google. Reddit acts as an opinion engine, with 70% of users combining it with Google to get unfiltered first-person perspectives. Meanwhile, 30% of people trust ChatGPT more than traditional search.

Local insight still matters. AI can process vast amounts of data, but it can’t always pick up on the small and often subtle signals that show what people in a particular market actually care about. Understanding these nuances helps your content feel relevant and trustworthy. Brands that combine human insight with a social-first approach are the ones that connect.

Make accessibility your advantage

Mark Walker’s session on accessibility and SEO was a clear reminder that making content accessible is smart business. Around 25% of the UK population identifies as disabled, and over 80% of disabilities are acquired in adulthood, a figure that may grow as Western societies become older. It’s not just about legal requirements or ethics; it’s about making your content genuinely usable for everyone. Simple fixes like captions, clear fonts, and strong contrast make a real difference to engagement, while neglecting them can cost both customers and revenue. Beyond compliance, designing with accessibility in mind can help brands reach new audiences and build trust by showing they understand and care about their users’ needs.

Let AI work smarter for your content

Frank van Dijke and Myriam Jessier explored how tools like semantic analysis, embeddings, and OCR (Optical Character Recognition, which reads text from images, scans, or videos) are reshaping content strategy. These technologies can identify content gaps, strengthen internal linking, and improve structure so both humans and machines can understand it more easily.

AI can handle the heavy lifting – organising, checking, and refining content – but it still can’t replicate human judgement. The challenge is knowing when to use automation and when to step in to make content genuinely meaningful for readers.

Teach GPT to speak your brand

Silke Vanbeselaere showed how AI can be trained to think and write like your brand. The important part is clearly defining style, structure, tone, and the subtle quirks that make a brand recognisable. These tools can speed up drafting and planning while keeping content consistent, distinctive, and true to the brand voice. By giving the AI examples of hooks, paragraph design, syntax, stylistic breaks, and tone, it can produce drafts that reflect the brand without losing personality.

Meet your audience where they are

Overall, Brighton SEO left us full of ideas on how brands can meet audiences where they actually are – whether that’s TikTok, YouTube, or through accessible, human-first content. If you want to see how these insights could work for your brand, let’s chat.