1:09:18$30B Founder: SEO is Dead.. Do This Instead
From My First Million · Published Oct 7, 2025 · Watch on YouTube
TL;DR
Darmesh Shah, founder of HubSpot (a $25-30B company), explains how he built the company using inbound marketing (blogging/SEO) when everyone else relied on paid ads. He argues that SEO is now declining because ChatGPT and other AI tools give direct answers instead of ten blue links, reducing organic traffic by 20–40%.
Key insights
- HubSpot’s early breakthrough came from Darmesh’s personal blog (OnStartups) outpacing VC-funded companies with CMOs and ad budgets, simply by writing high-quality, high-volume content.
- Darmesh deliberately did not trademark “inbound marketing” so that others would adopt the term, making it a category and driving demand for HubSpot’s tool.
- SEO’s core lesson still applies: create content that genuinely deserves to rank higher than current results; Google’s smart people will eventually reward better content.
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