LLM SEO vs MCP: Competing or Complementary Visions?

As large language models (LLMs) become the new interface to knowledge, a new field is booming: LLM SEO — optimizing content not for search engines, but for AI agents.

Agencies and tools are now promising:

• Better visibility in LLM answers.
• Optimized prompt targeting.
• Structured content for better parsing.

But is this compatible with the vision of an Agentic Web based on open, transparent standards like MCP?

The rise of LLM SEO

LLM SEO techniques include:

• Optimizing headings and context windows.
• Embedding structured data and semantic cues.
• Testing outputs across multiple LLM platforms.

Some practices are positive (clarifying content structure), but others risk gaming opaque systems — exactly the problem SEO was meant to avoid.

The MCP alternative

MCP (Model Context Protocol) offers a fundamentally different approach:

• Sites expose intentional, signed metadata about their capabilities and trust models.
• Agents consume this data via

  .well-known/mcp.llmfeed.json

  .
• Interactions are transparent and verifiable.

Rather than trying to guess how an LLM might interpret a page, MCP lets service owners clearly declare:

• What they offer.
• How they expect to be engaged.
• Under what trust assumptions.

Complementary, not competing

Ideally, LLM SEO and MCP should not compete but complement each other:

• Content optimization improves human and agent readability.
• MCP feeds provide machine-verifiable context and interaction guidelines.

The risk is if LLM SEO evolves into a black-hat practice — manipulating LLMs in ways that undermine trust and transparency.

Our take

The future of the Agentic Web must prioritize:

• Verifiability over trickery.
• Transparent intent over opaque optimization.
• Open standards over platform-specific hacks.

At wellknownmcp.org, we see MCP as a necessary counterpart to emerging LLM SEO — ensuring that agents interact ethically and transparently with the web.

Next steps: We invite SEO practitioners and tool makers to engage with the MCP community — and help build a healthier, more accountable Agentic Web.