The 10x Content Engineer with Michael King from iPullRank

Michael King is the founder & CEO of iPullRank, a leading SEO and digital marketing agency. A technical marketer and industry pioneer, he blends AI, automation, and structured workflows to drive organic growth. With over a decade of experience, he has helped brands generate $4B+ in revenue and earned accolades like Search Marketer of the Year and Top 10 SEO by USA Today.

Quick Recap

• SEO is shifting from just content creation to content engineering. Teams need scalable, AI-driven workflows that integrate automation, programmatic SEO, and structured processes.
• User experience (UX), authority, and unique insights are now critical ranking factors. Google is prioritizing engagement metrics like time on page and bounce rates over traditional ranking factors.
• AI-powered content isn’t enough—human oversight is essential. AI should be used to automate repetitive tasks while humans ensure quality, originality, and brand alignment.
• SEO teams should optimize for passage ranking and AI-driven search. Google’s AI Overviews don’t rank entire pages—they pull specific, highly relevant paragraphs into search results.
• Scaling content workflows with AI and automation can 10x efficiency. The most successful teams are leveraging retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), prompt engineering, and automated internal linking.

The Challenge of Content Production

Traditional content production processes are inefficient, slow, and siloed.

Many content teams:

• Struggle with manual research, content briefs, and CMS uploads, limiting their ability to scale.
• Rely on keyword stuffing and outdated SEO tactics, leading to diminishing returns.
• Lack cross-functional collaboration with product and engineering, slowing down innovation.
• Fail to differentiate content in a world where AI-generated content is everywhere.

Without scalable workflows and a structured content engineering approach, SEO teams fall behind competitors who leverage automation, programmatic content, and AI-powered insights.

‍

Adopting a Content Engineer Mindset

By adopting content engineering principles and AI-driven workflows, teams can:

• Increase content production speed while maintaining high-quality, authoritative output.
• Improve search rankings and engagement by optimizing content at the passage level for AI Overviews.
• Reduce manual content operations through workflow automation, internal linking strategies, and metadata generation.
• Future-proof SEO strategies against algorithm changes by focusing on originality, UX, and structured content models.
• Scale content personalization by dynamically generating custom content experiences at scale.

How to Build an AI-Powered Content System

To future-proof SEO and content marketing strategies, teams must shift from manual workflows to AI-driven content engineering.

Key steps:

1. Automate repetitive content tasks: Use AI for metadata generation, programmatic content, and structured briefs.
2. Leverage semantic scoring and AI-powered audits: Optimize content relevance at the passage level to rank in AI search.
3. Integrate AI-driven insights into SEO workflows: Combine Google Search Console, SEMrush, and custom AI analysis for deeper content intelligence.
4. Use retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) to personalize content: Train AI models with brand data, customer insights, and internal knowledge bases.
5. Implement human oversight checkpoints: AI should not replace human strategy—use workflows that enforce editorial review before publishing.

Best Practices and Key Learnings

Focus on AI & SEO Convergence

• SEO now requires technical skills beyond keyword research. Teams should understand vector embeddings, passage ranking, and semantic search.
• SEO professionals must become content engineers. This role requires a mix of product management, AI literacy, and process automation skills.

Scale Content Without Sacrificing Quality

• Use AI to handle repetitive tasks (brief creation, metadata, internal linking).
• Ensure human oversight to maintain brand voice, accuracy, and credibility.
• Use structured workflows to improve consistency across content teams.

‍

Optimize for AI-Powered Search & Google’s Changing Algorithms

• Google’s AI Overviews don’t rank full pages—only highly relevant passages.
• Ensure key insights and original data are embedded in every paragraph.
• Passage-level optimization is the new frontier of SEO.

Leverage AI Workflows for SEO & Content Refresh

• Use AI for content audits—analyzing semantic similarity, authority, and readability.
• Automate content refresh strategies to maintain ranking stability.
• Use AI to predict content decay and update content before traffic drops.

Build Cross-Functional SEO Systems

• SEO is no longer just a marketing function—it requires integration with product and engineering.
• Break down silos between content, UX, and technical SEO teams.
• Align content strategies with business goals to secure leadership buy-in.

Putting It into Practice

As SEO evolves, teams must shift toward structured content engineering, workflow automation, and AI-powered personalization.

Key actions to implement now:
✅ Audit and optimize content at the passage level to improve AI Overview rankings.
✅ Build AI-powered workflows to scale content production without sacrificing quality.
✅ Leverage retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) to personalize content at scale.
✅ Use AI for content audits to quickly identify optimization and refresh opportunities.
✅ Ensure human oversight at key workflow stages to prevent low-quality AI-generated content.

🚀 Want to 10x your content strategy? Claim one of our 10 exclusive strategy sessions to build an AI-powered content engine for your team. Email team@airops.com to reserve your spot—first come, first served!