114 million impressions in Google Discover

The case

What was the starting point?

In the first project phase the site's Discover figures rose from 515,652 to 2.72 million clicks and from 4.78 to 29 million impressions.

After this first jump the client kept building his site. Direct visits and his own newsletter established themselves as the second and third pillar alongside Discover.

Approach

Which SEO measures work?

At the centre is content that nobody else in the niche has. We prepare predictable events editorially and support breaking news live.

Content levers

At the centre was the authority and entity principle: unique, journalistic content that cannot be found elsewhere in the niche. Added to that were trusted authors with subject depth, for example on topics such as company pensions, and topic research with current data and LLMs.

Publishing levers

We prepare predictable topics early with evergreen content. Refreshes and republishing are used deliberately and in moderation.

With live blogs and live support during breaking news we secure reach as soon as topics trigger traffic.

Strategic support

Added to that are strategic SEO seminars and workshops, the optimisation of Google Discover and of the Core Web Vitals. Over the past twelve months a total of ten project days went into the project.

Before and after

What results did the site achieve?

The comparison of the Discover figures for 2024 and 2025 shows a factor of 9 in clicks and a factor of 16 in impressions.

Google Search and LLMs

What role do brand and newsletter play?

In parallel to Discover the site earned 4.5 million clicks in organic Google Search. We could not detect any impact from AI Overviews, LLMs or chatbots.

The reason is the brand: users open the site directly, and the newsletter adds further reach. Both channels run independently of the search algorithm.

Language models currently do not reproduce depth of content and original reporting. That is exactly what keeps the traffic stable.

Learnings

What can be taken from the project?

Three points: why no Google core update cost reach, what really causes Discover fluctuations, and whether Google Discover is still a relevant channel.

Why did no core update cost reach?

When a Google update costs traffic, in most cases we find the reason. In this project we set up topic strategy, author trust and content quality so that the updates followed the algorithm's logic instead of breaking it.

Main causes of Discover fluctuations

• Excessive republishing with URL changes and no content updates
• Generic content
• No clear and consistent topic strategy
• Clickbait
• No authors with trust
• Exploiting the algorithm

Is Google Discover dead?

No. Google Discover is changing, but the user feed remains by far the most important referrer in the Google universe.

During breaking news, publishers earn a great deal of traffic with Discover when newsroom, timing and execution fit together.

Whether large publisher, local newspaper, solo publisher or special interest: publisher SEO has to fit the newsroom and the topic area.