Answer engine optimization (AEO)

Answer engine optimization, or AEO, is the work of making a site easy for AI answers to find and quote. The answers in question are Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode, ChatGPT search and Perplexity. You will also see it called GEO (generative engine optimization); the work is the same.

Is AEO different from SEO?

Much less than the name suggests. Google's guide to its AI features says a page only needs to be indexed and eligible to show in Search with a snippet (the text under your link). It lists what you do not need: llms.txt files, "chunking" content into small pieces, rewriting for AI, chasing mentions, or structured data added for AI's sake.

The independent data points the same way. In an Ahrefs study of 1.9 million citations (2025), 76% of pages cited in AI Overviews also ranked in Google's top 10. A later Ahrefs study of 863,000 results (March 2026) put that at 38%, with 31% ranking between 11 and 100. Ahrefs puts the drop down to Google running several related searches behind each answer. So ranking for the group of searches around a subject matters, and ranking still decides most of who gets quoted.

What does AEO add to SEO?

Three things, each small:

1. Be in Bing as well as Google. ChatGPT search draws on Bing's index. Verify your site in Bing Webmaster Tools and submit your sitemap (the file that lists your pages).
2. Let the search bots in. The bots that fetch pages for AI answers, such as OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot and PerplexityBot, are separate from the ones that collect training data, such as GPTBot. Blocking a training bot is a choice; blocking a search bot keeps you out of that assistant's answers.
3. Keep pages current. Ahrefs found AI-cited pages are fresher than the average search result. Update a page when its subject changes and show the date you did.

How should a page be written for it?

The same way a good answer page is written for Google: the answer in the first sentence or two, sections with headings that say what they cover, and every figure linked to where it came from. Google's AI features lift a section rather than a whole page, so a section that answers first is easier to quote.

Nothing guarantees a mention. We write pages to be quoted; we do not measure or promise what an AI answer says.

The evidence behind each point, rule by rule, is in what does and doesn't affect Google rankings. See also llms.txt.