A growing share of searches now end without a click. The user asks a question, an AI-generated summary answers it, and the sources are credited as small links most people never follow. If your page is not one of those sources, you are invisible in that interaction regardless of where you rank in the classic results.
Two acronyms have grown up around this. AEO — answer engine optimisation — is about being the answer to specific questions. GEO — generative engine optimisation — is about being cited by generative systems such as AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Copilot. They overlap heavily, and neither replaces SEO.
The uncomfortable honest part
Nobody has reliable, industry-wide data on what causes an AI system to cite one source over another. The systems are opaque, they change frequently, and much of the advice being sold is confident extrapolation from small samples.
What we can say with reasonable confidence is that these systems draw heavily on conventional search results, and that they quote content which is clear, specific, factually consistent and structurally easy to extract. That is not a coincidence — it is the same thing that makes content useful to a human skim-reader.
So the practical answer is not a new discipline. It is doing the existing one properly, with a bias towards extractability.
What appears to matter
1. Answer the question directly, early
Put the answer in the first sentence or two after the heading, then explain. A page that spends four paragraphs on preamble before answering is hard to quote. This is the single most actionable change.
2. Use question-shaped headings
Headings phrased as the actual question people ask make the answer boundaries obvious. Every article on this site ends with a FAQ section for exactly this reason — it produces short, self-contained, quotable answers.
3. Be specific rather than safe
Generic, hedged writing is not quotable. “It depends on your business” is true and useless. “Under 2.5 seconds for LCP, measured in field data over 28 days” is quotable. Numbers, thresholds, named steps, explicit trade-offs.
4. Keep facts consistent everywhere
If your business hours differ between your website, your Google Business Profile and a directory listing, you have created ambiguity about a simple fact. Entity consistency across the web appears to matter more for generative systems than for classic ranking, because contradictory sources are risky to quote.
5. Structured data that matches the visible page
Schema is not a magic citation trigger, but it removes ambiguity about what a page is and who published it. FAQPage, Article, Person, Organization, LocalBusiness — valid, and consistent with what the page actually says. See the technical SEO audit checklist.
6. Demonstrate first-hand experience
Original data, client examples, things you tried that failed, opinions you can defend. This is the only durable differentiator left, because it is the one thing that cannot be synthesised from other people’s content.
7. Stay technically crawlable
None of the above matters if the page cannot be crawled and rendered. Indexation and rendering remain the foundation — see why pages don’t get indexed.
Structural habits that help
- One clear topic per page rather than sprawling multi-topic articles
- Short paragraphs and descriptive subheadings
- Lists and tables for anything comparative or sequential
- Definitions stated plainly and early
- Dates on content, and genuine updates rather than a changed timestamp
- Author attribution to a real named person with a real bio
How to measure any of it
This is the weakest part of AEO and GEO right now, and anyone claiming precise measurement is overstating it. Practical approaches:
- Search Console — impressions rising while clicks stay flat is a signal your content is being surfaced and summarised rather than clicked
- Manual spot checks — search your priority questions in AI Overviews and in the main assistants, and record who gets cited
- Brand and citation monitoring — tools tracking AI mentions exist, and are improving, but treat their numbers as directional
- Enquiry quality — if people arrive already informed and pre-qualified, your content is doing work upstream of the click
What I would not do
Do not restructure your entire site around an acronym. Do not buy a “GEO optimisation” package that is a schema plugin and a list of FAQs. And do not abandon conventional SEO — every credible signal indicates these systems lean heavily on the same index and the same quality judgements.
Write clearer, be more specific, keep your facts consistent, and stay crawlable. That is most of it.
Frequently asked questions
What is AEO?
Answer engine optimisation — structuring content so it directly answers specific questions in a way that search engines and AI assistants can extract and present. In practice it means answering early, using question-shaped headings, and being specific rather than vague.
What is GEO in marketing?
Generative engine optimisation — improving the likelihood that generative systems such as AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Copilot cite your content as a source. It overlaps heavily with AEO and with conventional SEO.
Is AEO replacing SEO?
No. Generative systems draw heavily on conventional search results and the same quality judgements, so classic SEO remains the foundation. AEO and GEO are a shift in emphasis towards clarity, specificity and extractability, not a replacement discipline.
Does schema markup help with AI citations?
It is not a guaranteed trigger, but valid structured data that matches the visible page removes ambiguity about what the page is and who published it. That reduces the risk of quoting you, which is likely to help.
How do I know if AI is citing my content?
Imperfectly. Watch for impressions rising while clicks stay flat in Search Console, spot-check your priority questions in AI Overviews and the major assistants, and use brand-mention monitoring tools while treating their numbers as directional rather than exact.
What single change helps most?
Answer the question in the first sentence or two after the heading, then explain. Content that buries the answer under preamble is difficult to quote, and this one habit is quick to apply across an existing site.
Want this applied without the hype?
I have delivered AEO and GEO work as part of a paid client engagement, and the approach was the same as above: clarity, specificity, consistency, crawlability. See Websites & development or get in touch.