The short version
- SEO (search engine optimization): making your website easy for search engines to crawl, understand, and rank, so people find you when they search.
- AEO (answer engine optimization): making your business the answer when someone asks an AI tool or an answer box a question.
- GEO (generative engine optimization): making your business show up in answers that AI generates. The term comes from a research paper first released in 2023. In practice it means the same thing as AEO.
The difference between AEO and GEO is the name. SEO covers Google’s results, including its AI answers. AEO and GEO point at AI tools like ChatGPT. The work behind all three is the same.
Where you show up
Google, AI Overviews, AI assistants
Found in search results, named and cited in AI answers
What it all draws on
Your website
A website search engines and AI tools can crawl, understand, and trust
Every abbreviation, in one place
You will see all of these on agency websites and in tool pitches. Most of them describe the same thing.
| Term | Stands for | What it means | Same as |
|---|---|---|---|
| SEO | Search engine optimization | Getting found and ranked in search engines. | The foundation for everything else on this list. |
| AEO | Answer engine optimization | Getting your business into direct answers: AI tools, featured snippets, voice assistants. | GEO |
| GEO | Generative engine optimization | Getting your business into answers that AI generates. | AEO |
| AIO | AI optimization, or AI Overviews | Used for both. Read the context. | AEO, GEO |
| AI SEO | AI search engine optimization | SEO with AI answers included. Sometimes it means using AI tools to do SEO, which is a different thing. | AEO, GEO |
| LLMO / LLM SEO | Large language model optimization | Getting your business into what AI models say. | AEO, GEO |
| AI search optimization | None | The plain-language name for AEO and GEO. | AEO, GEO |
| AI visibility | None | How often, and how accurately, AI answers mention your business. A result, not a method. | What AEO and GEO aim for |
Why so many names? A new category sells better with a new name. Agencies, software companies, and researchers each coined one. Even people selling the service say AEO and GEO are the same thing. Profound, an AI visibility software company, says so directly.
The biggest search is still Google
AI search is growing. It is still small next to Google.
Share of search referrals to websites, August 2026
- Google 88.55%
- ChatGPT 0.53%
- All AI chat tools combined Under 1%
In August 2026, Google sent 88.55% of all search referrals to websites. ChatGPT sent 0.53%. All AI chat tools combined sent less than 1%. That is Cloudflare Radar data, as reported by TechnologyChecker.
Google itself says there is no separate AEO or GEO to do for its AI features. From Google Search Central: “There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary.” And: “The best practices for SEO remain relevant for AI features in Google Search.”
AI search changes some things. The work still starts in the same place: a website that search engines and AI tools can crawl, understand, and trust.
What I see in client data says the same thing. Here is where five client websites got their visits in August 2026:
| Website | Organic search | AI assistants |
|---|---|---|
| Website 1 | 68.76% | 1.19% |
| Website 2 | 56.32% | 1.72% |
| Website 3 | 72.76% | 2.13% |
| Website 4 | 67.06% | 0.98% |
| Website 5 | 63.95% | 0.27% |
Organic search sent more than half the visits to every one of them. AI assistants sent between 0.27% and 2.13%.
Website 1 ranks everywhere, in Google and in AI answers. AI assistants still sent it 1.19% of its visits.
A strong website is the foundation for showing up in AI answers. It doesn’t guarantee it. Your pages have to say clearly and accurately what you do and what you know. And you need to establish credibility, which doesn’t come only from your website. More on that in What AI search changes.
Google search is AI search now
Google Search now includes AI Overviews and AI Mode in its results. That changes what your analytics tell you.
A click from AI Overviews or AI Mode is a click from Google Search. Google counts it in your overall search traffic in Search Console, and it lands under organic search in Google Analytics. The AI Assistant channel in Google Analytics covers assistants like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude. So the AI number in your analytics leaves Google’s own AI out, and part of your organic number is AI.
So should you make sure Google’s AI answers choose your website too? Yes. That is SEO.
What Google’s own AI answer gets wrong
Search “AEO vs GEO vs SEO” on Google, and the AI answer at the top calls them “three evolving frameworks.” It gives each one its own targets, its own best practices, and its own success metric. Then it tells you to run all three: SEO to get found, AEO to be surfaced, GEO to be cited.
Here is what it misses.
- It sends AEO after AI Overviews. Google’s own documentation says there are no additional requirements and no special optimizations to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode. Google’s AI answer says they need a strategy of their own. Google’s documentation says SEO covers it.
- The AEO best practices are SEO best practices. Clear headings, the answer at the top of the page, FAQs, tables. That has been how you write a page for search for years.
- The GEO best practices are SEO best practices too. Original data, depth on a topic, your business described the same way across the web. Google asks the same of every page it ranks: “Does the content provide original information, reporting, research, or analysis?”
- The metrics don’t split the way the table says. It puts organic traffic under SEO and AI referral traffic under GEO. A click from Google’s AI Overviews counts as organic search, so the AI number in your analytics leaves out Google’s AI entirely.
- Three strategies for one body of work. Splitting it three ways makes it look bigger and more complicated than it is.
The answer gets one thing right. It says generative and answer engines depend on the technical health, crawlability, and trust that SEO builds. That is the point. The same foundation serves Google and AI.
What a top-ranking article on this gets wrong
One of the top-ranking articles for this search lays SEO, AEO, and GEO out in a table, each with its own target, goal, and way of picking pages. It ends where Google’s AI answer ends: do all three.
- It files keywords under SEO and meaning under GEO. Its table says SEO picks pages by keywords and authority, and GEO by “semantic relevance.” Google has matched searches on meaning for years. In 2019, Google said its BERT models “consider the full context of a word by looking at the words that come before and after it.” SEO hasn’t been simple keyword matching for years.
- It gives one tactic two names. Under AEO: answer-first formatting. Under GEO: a clear answer in the first 40 to 60 words. That is the same instruction.
- It files schema and E-E-A-T under AEO. Google says no special schema is needed for its AI features. E-E-A-T comes from Google’s own guidance on what makes a page helpful. Both are SEO.
- Its click numbers come from Google. It says AI results cut click-through rates by about 34%. That figure comes from an Ahrefs study of Google’s AI Overviews: across 300,000 informational searches, the top-ranking page got 34.5% fewer clicks when an AI Overview showed up. That is a change inside Google search. Being the page that Google and its AI Overview draw on is SEO.
- Its conversion number comes from a study with no method. It says AI visitors convert 4.4 times better than organic ones. That is Semrush’s number, from its July 2025 study of visitors from AI tools outside Google, like ChatGPT. Semrush doesn’t say which websites it measured, which months, how many visits, or what counted as a conversion. Semrush also sells AI visibility tools. When a company sells the tools, the method behind its numbers belongs on the page. And whatever the conversion rate, AI assistants sent no more than about 2% of visits to the five client websites above. You still want to show up in AI answers. It is part of the work of being found.
- Its own explanation is the reason clicks are down. Semrush says these visitors “have likely already compared their options” by the time they arrive. So they are closer to buying. That is also why everyone’s clicks are dropping: the comparing now happens inside the answer, before anyone clicks, in Google’s AI Overviews as much as in ChatGPT. Fewer people click, and the ones who do are further along. More on that in Fewer clicks, better clicks below.
Three names, three columns, one conclusion: do all three. Underneath, it is one body of work.
A question from Reddit, answered
Someone asked this on Reddit:
GEO vs AEO vs SEO can someone just explain what’s actually different and what I actually need to care about?
Here is the short answer. GEO and AEO are two names for the same thing: getting your business named or cited when someone asks an AI tool a question. SEO is getting your website found in search, and search now includes Google’s AI answers.
You don’t need three strategies. You need one, and it starts with SEO: a website that search engines and AI tools can crawl, understand, and trust, and pages that answer the questions around your topic. Make sure your business is described the same way everywhere it appears. Then ask the AI tools your customers use what they say about you, and fix what is wrong.
What AI search changes
Your business can be named without being clicked
In a list of search results, you win when someone clicks. In an AI answer, your business can be named, recommended, or described, and the person never visits your site. What the answer says about you becomes part of how people see you.
Fewer clicks, better clicks
Websites get fewer clicks. The clicks that come through are higher quality, from AI and from Google search. Google says the same about clicks from AI Overviews: people who click spend more time on the site.
I see the same on client websites. Here are two of the websites above, comparing visitors from AI assistants with visitors from search. On both, a larger share of AI visits were engaged, AI visitors did more on the site per visit, and they stayed about twice as long.
| Website | Engaged visits, AI vs search | Time per visit, AI vs search |
|---|---|---|
| Website 3 | 73% vs 63% | 2m 13s vs 1m 06s |
| Website 4 | 83% vs 61% | 2m 27s vs 1m 13s |
The websites, the month, and the numbers are all on the page, so you can see where they come from.
Some call fewer clicks a problem. It isn’t, necessarily. The people who click are more qualified buyers and customers. They are more confident they found what they need, without clicking through several websites. You want to be found by people who are looking for what you offer.
There are two ways to show up: mentioned and cited
- Mentioned: the answer names your business, for example as a recommendation.
- Cited: the answer links to your page as a source.
Mentioned
The answer names your business
Both
Cited
The answer links to your page
- Mentioned
- The answer names your business
- Cited
- The answer links to your page
They are not the same, and they don’t always go together. A business can be cited on a how-to question and never recommended when someone asks who to hire.
One question becomes many searches
Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode use what Google calls “query fan-out”. They issue many related searches across subtopics and put the answer together from the results. A single page that answers a single question covers one of those searches. A group of pages that covers the whole topic covers the rest.
Other websites speak for you
AI answers draw on what other sites say about your business: reviews, directories, articles, forums like Reddit. If those sources describe your business in different ways, or out-of-date ways, the answer does too.
You need to establish credibility, and it doesn’t come only from your website.
Accuracy becomes something to check
AI tools describe businesses wrong. Old prices, a service you dropped years ago, a competitor’s feature credited to you. In search results, the wrong information sat on someone else’s page. In an AI answer, it is delivered as the answer.
What AI search doesn’t change
- AI tools and search engines both have to be able to crawl your website. A page they can’t reach can’t show up anywhere.
- A page has to say clearly what it is about. That was true for Google and it is true for AI.
- A page that answers the question beats a page that talks around it.
- Where someone lands depends on what they asked. Ask for the best roofing company in Austin, and you land on a homepage. Ask how to fix a broken pipe, and you land on an article or a video. Ask to buy a specific car part, and you land on a product page. Google has always done this. AI does it too.
- Authority still comes from other trusted sites pointing to you and talking about you.
- A website with years of old, thin, or conflicting pages confuses a search engine and an AI model the same way.
This is why showing up in AI answers is part of the same work as SEO.
SEO vs AEO and GEO, side by side
| SEO | AEO and GEO | |
|---|---|---|
| Where you show up | Google’s results, including AI Overviews | Inside answers from AI tools like ChatGPT |
| What winning looks like | Ranking and getting the click | Being named, recommended, or cited, and described correctly |
| What it depends on | Crawlability, relevance, content quality, authority | All of that, plus consistency across other sites and coverage of the related questions |
| How you measure it | Rankings, organic traffic, conversions | How often you are mentioned or cited, accuracy, traffic from AI tools, conversions |
| Measurement tools | Mature: Google Search Console, analytics, rank trackers | New, and less exact: AI visibility trackers, AI referral traffic in analytics |
| Size of the channel today | Most search referrals | Under 1% of search referrals in August 2026 (Cloudflare Radar) |
The work that serves both
Most of what gets your business into AI answers also gets it ranked. This is the overlap.
Say what your business is, the same way everywhere
Search engines and AI models build a picture of your business from every place it appears. Use the same name, the same description of what you do, and the same category on your website, your Google Business Profile, LinkedIn, directories, and review sites. When the descriptions disagree, the picture blurs, and AI answers repeat the blur.
Put the answer first
Open each section with the direct answer, in a sentence or two, then explain. A search engine can pull that answer into a featured snippet. An AI tool can quote it or build on it. A person gets what they came for without scrolling.
Build enough relevant surface area
For AI and Google to find your website and recommend you, you need enough surface area. Relevant surface area. This is content strategy, and it varies with your business, your industry, and your audience.
Because of query fan-out, the question someone types is only the start. They also need what it costs, how it compares, what can go wrong, and what to do next. Give each of those its own page, and link the pages to each other and to one main page on the topic.
One topic per page, and a clear structure
A page that tries to cover five things ranks for none of them and gets cited for none of them. One page per service, one page per situation, and internal links that show how they connect.
Back up what you say
Numbers with their source. Named experts. Dates. They make a page more credible to a reader.
Remove what works against you
Sometimes the work is removing junk and reworking what you have. Thin pages, old campaign pages, duplicate service pages, pages aimed at the wrong intent. Every page sends a signal about your business. The wrong pages send the wrong signal, to Google, to AI, and to people.
Keep pages current
Show when a page was last updated, and update it when something changes. Outdated pages are one source of outdated AI answers.
Why one strategy, not two
The question isn’t whether to throw everything you have at growing AI traffic. It is what you need to do to show up, and keep showing up, so that Google and AI surface you and customers choose you.
You can call it SEO, AEO, GEO, or AI SEO. Getting your business found and surfaced now means showing up high in Google’s organic results, in Google’s AI Overviews, and in AI assistants like ChatGPT. The work takes all of them into account, and it is one body of work. When you hire me to help your business get found and surfaced, all of it is part of what I do.
What to do first
- Fix the foundation. Make sure your website can be crawled and indexed, and that nothing blocks the pages you want found.
- Know what you have. What the website covers, what it is missing, and what works against it. Remove or rework old, thin, or conflicting pages.
- Make the website clear. One page, one topic. Each service and each situation on its own page, saying plainly what it is.
- Cover the questions around your topic. Map what people ask before, during, and after the question they searched, and answer those on their own pages.
- Get the outside consistent. Your business described the same way on your website, your Google Business Profile, directories, and review sites.
- Check what AI says about you. Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Mode the questions your customers ask. Note whether you are named, whether you are cited, and whether the description is correct.
The order holds. What goes into each step is specific to your website. The question underneath all of it: what does this website need to get found by Google, AI, and people, and then be chosen by those people?
What should your strategy be? It depends. On what you have, what you are missing, who your audience is, and more. Nothing exists in isolation.
How to tell when someone is selling you an abbreviation
- They sell AEO or GEO as separate from SEO, with its own budget, and don’t ask about your website’s foundation.
- They promise a position in ChatGPT. AI answers change from one ask to the next. No one can promise where you show up.
- They sell a file as the fix. An llms.txt file, or special schema. Google says no special schema is needed for its AI features.
- They quote AI traffic studies with no total. A study that says most AI traffic lands on product pages tells you how AI traffic splits up. It doesn’t tell you how much AI traffic there is. If AI sends 1 to 2% of your traffic, it describes 1 to 2%.
- They cite studies that only looked at winners. Describing pages that already get AI traffic doesn’t show what earned it. The pages that got none were never looked at.
- They report mention counts and nothing else. A mention doesn’t show whether anyone became a customer.
- They start with the acronym instead of your business. The work starts with what your business is, who it is for, and what your website says.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to know the difference?
Not really. What you need to know is whether your business can be found and surfaced organically, without paying for ads: in Google’s results, in its AI Overviews, and in AI assistants like ChatGPT. The work that gets you there covers all of it.
Are AEO and GEO the same thing?
Yes. Both mean getting your business into answers that AI tools and answer engines give. GEO comes from a research paper first released in 2023. AEO is the older marketing term. The work is the same.
Does AEO or GEO replace SEO?
No. AI answers draw on what search engines can crawl and trust. Google says the same SEO best practices apply to its AI features. Without SEO, there is little for AI to draw on.
Which should I do first, SEO or AEO?
It is the same work. If your website doesn’t have a solid SEO foundation, the work starts there, by building it or cleaning it up. Showing up in AI answers is part of that same work.
Is SEO dead?
No. Search is changing shape. More answers appear directly in results, and some searches never produce a click. Showing up still depends on SEO.
How much traffic does AI search send?
For most websites, a small share. Across the web in August 2026, AI chat tools sent less than 1% of search referrals, according to Cloudflare Radar data. On five client websites in August 2026, AI assistants sent between 0.27% and 2.13% of total traffic. It is growing.
Why doesn’t traffic from Google’s AI Overviews show up as AI in my analytics?
Because it comes from Google Search. Clicks from AI Overviews and AI Mode count as Google search traffic in Search Console and land under organic search in Google Analytics. The AI Assistant channel in Google Analytics covers assistants like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude.
Do I need an llms.txt file?
No. llms.txt is a proposed standard, not an adopted one. Contentful’s review found no validated evidence that it improves AI visibility or citations, and it reports that Google names llms.txt among the files you don’t need for its AI search features. It does no harm. It won’t fix a website that AI can’t understand.
Do I need special schema markup for AI search?
Not for Google. Google says there is “no special schema.org structured data that you need to add” for AI Overviews or AI Mode. Standard structured data that matches what’s on the page still helps search engines understand it.
How do I measure AEO or GEO?
The same way you measure search: traffic, leads, and sales. Google Analytics shows AI assistants as their own channel. You can also ask the AI tools your customers use the questions they ask, and check whether your business shows up and is described correctly.