SEO makes a search engine show your website in its list of links. AEO makes your content the ready answer: in a Google featured snippet, in voice search or from an assistant. GEO makes generative AI models such as ChatGPT and Perplexity mention and cite your business in the answer they write themselves. These are three layers of the same thing: being found.
What is SEO?
SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is all the work that gets Google or Bing to show your website high in the list of results when someone searches for what you offer. The audience is the search engine and the person who scans the links and picks one to click.
SEO has four areas: technical (speed, how the site works on a phone, indexing), content (the right words and answers to customer questions), local SEO (city pages, Google Business Profile, reviews) and images (file names, alt text).
What is AEO?
AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) is optimisation for answer engines: you make sure your content is given as the direct answer rather than as one of ten links. It covers Google's featured snippets, the "People also ask" section, voice search (Google Assistant, Siri, Alexa) and AI assistants.
The aim of AEO is to be the answer the user gets straight away, read out loud by an assistant or shown at the top of the screen before any links appear. It's built with a short, specific answer placed right under the question, backed up by structured data and unambiguous facts.
What is GEO?
GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) means preparing your business for generative AI models: ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, Copilot and Google's AI Overviews. The aim is for the model to mention and cite your business in the answer it writes from scratch, not just to show a link.
The term GEO comes from a 2023 study by researchers at Princeton and other institutions. In that study, adding sources, quotations and statistics to a text increased its visibility in AI answers by up to 40%.
Customers used to type two words and get ten links. Today they increasingly ask a full question and get one answer naming two or three businesses. Either you're in that answer or you're nowhere: there is no second page of results any more.
SEO, AEO and GEO - the differences at a glance
| SEO | AEO | GEO | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Goal | A place in the list of links | Being the ready answer | Your business mentioned in an AI answer |
| Where | Search results | Featured snippets, voice, assistants | ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews |
| Audience | A person scanning links | A person who wants one answer | A language model putting an answer together |
| Query | Two or three words | A full question | A full question with conditions and a location |
| What decides | Content, links, technical setup | A short answer under the question, structured data | Structured data, unambiguous facts, sources that agree |
How does AEO differ from GEO?
AEO and GEO overlap heavily and are sometimes used interchangeably. The difference is one of emphasis: AEO is about being the ready answer, including in classic places such as a featured snippet or voice search. GEO is about being the source a generative model cites when it writes an answer from scratch. In practice, each supports the other: the same short, unambiguous answer that lands in a featured snippet is also readily cited by ChatGPT.
Will AEO and GEO replace SEO?
No. AEO and GEO are layers added to good SEO, not a replacement for it. Answer engines and language models largely take their information from the same sources as search engines: your website, your Google Business Profile and industry directories. Without sound SEO, there's nothing to give as an answer and nothing to cite. Google states plainly that there are no additional requirements to appear in its AI features beyond good SEO. That's why most of the work is shared by all three.
How to prepare your business for SEO, AEO and GEO
- Structured data - a description of your business, services and contact details in schema.org format, readable by machines.
- Content in question-and-answer form - written exactly the way customers ask, with a short answer right under the question.
- Unambiguous facts - one version of your name, address, service area and list of services. With conflicting details, the model can't tell which version is true.
- Consistent details across the web (NAP) - the same name, address and phone number on your website, on Google and in directories.
- An llms.txt file - a short file on the server that states plainly who you are and what is worth quoting. It's a proposed standard: not every AI tool reads it, but adding it costs nothing.
- Sound technical setup - speed, how the site works on a phone, and indexing. It's a foundation nobody sees, but without it nothing else works.
In most local industries, competitors aren't doing AEO or GEO yet. That's why today a properly described website and consistent details are enough, while in two years this will cost as much as classic SEO does today.