SEO vs GEO vs AEO: What AI Search Actually Means for Your Traffic
AI Overviews, ChatGPT and Perplexity are changing what "showing up" means. Here is how SEO, GEO and AEO differ — and what to actually do about it.
Search is splitting into two jobs: ranking on results pages, and being the source an AI cites. Three acronyms describe the work.
SEO — Search Engine Optimization
The classic discipline: earning visibility in the organic results of search engines like Google. Still essential — most journeys still pass through search — and still the foundation everything else builds on.
GEO — Generative Engine Optimization
Optimising to be referenced by generative AI systems — Google's AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini. The unit of success shifts from "rank #1" to "be the cited source in the AI's answer". That rewards clear, authoritative, well-structured content with strong entities and real expertise.
AEO — Answer Engine Optimization
Closely related: structuring content to directly answer specific questions, so it can be lifted into featured snippets and AI answers. Think concise, direct answers near the top of a section, backed by depth below.
How AI systems choose sources
They favour content that is genuinely useful, clearly written, and easy to attribute — pages with a clear author, direct answers, structured data, and signals of first-hand experience and expertise. In other words, the same qualities good SEO has always rewarded, now with citations at stake.
What to actually do
Keep your technical SEO sound. Answer real questions directly and completely. Strengthen your entities (who you are, what you're an authority on). Add first-hand experience and specifics an AI can't get elsewhere. Do that, and you earn visibility in both the blue links and the AI answers.