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Ranked on Google, Cited by ChatGPT
SEO gets you ranked. AEO gets you quoted. GEO gets you cited by AI assistants. Here's what each one means, and why you now need all three.
FOUND.
Ranked on Google · Cited by AI
For twenty years, being found online meant one thing: ranking on Google. Now your next customer might ask ChatGPT instead, and never see a results page at all.
Search is splitting. People still type queries into Google, but they also ask Perplexity for recommendations, read AI Overviews at the top of the results page, and get answers from ChatGPT without clicking a single link. Each of these channels decides differently what to surface, which means optimising for one no longer covers you for the rest.
SEO · search engine optimisation
SEO is the discipline you already know: earning a place in the classic list of blue links. Relevant content, clean structure, fast pages, links from sites that matter. None of that has gone away. Google is still the biggest discovery channel there is, and the fundamentals still decide who appears on page one. SEO remains the foundation the newer layers are built on.
AEO · answer engine optimisation
AEO targets the systems that answer instead of listing: featured snippets, voice assistants, and the AI summaries that sit above traditional results. Answer engines want a direct, self-contained answer, and that changes how you write:
Lead with the answer, then explain; don't bury it six paragraphs deep
Use headings that match how people actually phrase their questions
Keep one idea per section, so a section can be quoted whole
Mark pages up with structured data so machines can parse them reliably
GEO · generative engine optimisation
GEO is the newest layer: making your site something large language models cite when they generate answers. AI assistants draw on content that is crawlable, clearly written, and unambiguous about who it belongs to. Schema markup, an llms.txt file pointing crawlers at your best pages, consistent business details, and plainly stated facts all raise the odds that when an assistant answers a question in your field, your name is in the answer.
The good news: it's mostly the same work
The three disciplines overlap far more than they differ. A fast, accessible site with clear headings, direct answers, structured data, and content written by someone who plainly knows the subject performs across all three. What changes is the writing discipline: less padding, more answers.
Where to start
Add schema markup for your organisation, services and FAQs
Restructure key pages so each section answers one question directly
Publish an llms.txt file so AI crawlers can find your best content
Keep your name, location and services consistent everywhere they appear
You can't control which channel your next customer uses. You can make sure that whichever one they pick, you're the answer it gives.
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