🐹 Hamsterdam Part 115: Weekly SEO & AI News Recap (9/6 to 9/12, 2025)
By Ethan Lazuk
Last updated:
A weekly look-back at SEO & AI news, tips, and other content shared on social media & beyond.
Opening notes, thoughts, and musings:
- Welcome to another new week of Hamsterdam! 🐹
- I appreciate you being here, and look forward to sharing the week’s news! 🙌
- Spam update is still rolling out. Hopefully, you’ve stayed safe. 😉
If you’re in a rush, hop down to the news portion. 📰
Or continue reading for two vocabulary lessons plus an introduction.
And we’re off …
🧑💻 Marketing word of the week: “Top of mind awareness (TOMA)”
Top of mind awareness is the first brand that comes to mind for a consumer when they think about a product category.
For example, the first brand that comes to mind when someone says “soda” is likely Coca-Cola. That’s TOMA.
TOMA is the same as recall, which is different from recognition. It’s not that customers simply know your brand, they actually think of it first by default. This is a powerful influence on purchasing decisions and a competitive advantage.
With regard to SEO, search visibility can equate to digital TOMA. Appearing in AI Overviews, for example, even if you don’t get the click, can reinforce your brand’s visibility and contribute to TOMA. As far as a content strategy goes for TOMA, focus on the full buyer’s journey and earn brand mentions that signal authority.
🤖 AI word of the week: “Tokenization”
Tokenization is the process of breaking down text into smaller units called tokens. These can be words, subwords, or even characters, depending on the AI model.
Tokenization allows AI models to understand, analyze, and generate language because they can’t process raw text directly.
Some details on how it all works: Models use a fixed vocabulary of tokens to make processing more efficient. These tokens feed into embeddings, which help the model understand meaning. LLMs also have token limits that affect how much text they can handle at once.
Regarding SEO, search engines and AI-powered search experiences rely on tokenization to index, interpret, and rank content. SEs tokenize queries and content, and tokenization feeds embeddings that drive semantic search, passage ranking, and AI summaries.
😊 Introduction to week 115: “Programming Note”
Just a quick note: Hamsterdam Part 116 (next week’s edition) will be delayed by one week. I’ll be traveling to NYC for the US Search Awards.
This is my first trip/vacation in a long while, so I’m looking forward to spending some quality time with my wife and exploring new scenery.
Expect photos in the next edition. 😉
Thank you for supporting Hamsterdam and the cause of SEO & AI learning. 🙏
Enjoy the vibes:
Missed last week? Don’t worry, I got you! Read Part 114 to catch up.
🌟 Other great sources of weekly SEO news:
- The SEO Weekly – Garret Sussman, iPullRank
- SEOFOMO – Aleyda Solis
- Weekly Video Recaps – Barry Schwartz, SER
- Weekly SEO News YouTube channel – Olga Zarr, Seosly
- Niche Surfer – Yoyao Hsueh
Time for our weekly review of SEO social posts, articles, & more …
Now, let’s step inside the white flags of Hamsterdam …
⏩ Jump to a section:
- News, Google updates, & SERP tests
- SEO tips & tidbits
- Fundamentals & resources
- Articles, videos & case studies
- Local SEO
- Technical SEO
- Content marketing
- Local SEO
- Data analysis & reporting
- AI, LLMS, & machine learning
- Miscellaneous & general posts
- Older stuff that’s good!
Or keep scrolling to see it all. ⏬
📰 SEO news, Google updates, SERP tests & notable posts
Notable updates or news related to Google Search or related SEO topics.
🍟 SEO tips & tidbits
Actionable tips, cool tidbits, and other snackable findings and observations that can be teaching moments.
Essential information, concepts, or resources to learn about SEO or AI.
Longer-form content pieces shared on social, in newsletters, and elsewhere.
Counter point:
🧑💻 Technical SEO
Everything from basics to advanced moves (and also tools).
✍️ Content marketing
From what is helpful content to user journeys and beyond.
📍 Local SEO
From Google Business Profiles to reviews and more!
📊 Data analysis & reporting
Showing that what you’re doing is helping.
🤖 AI, machine learning, & LLMs
News related to models, papers, and companies.
🤔 General marketing & miscellaneous
This is for great content that isn’t necessarily SEO or marketing-specific. PPC, PR, dev, design, and social friends, check it out!
💎 Older stuff that’s good!
Not everything I find worth sharing is new as of this week, so these are gems I came across published in the past.
Great job making it to the end. You rock! 🪨
Let’s connect!
Hit me up anytime via text or call at 813-557-9745 or on social or email:
Cheers! ✌️
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