The short version
- SEO — Search Engine Optimization. Ranking in Google, Bing, and traditional search.
- AEO — Answer Engine Optimization. Being the answer in featured snippets, People Also Ask, Siri, Alexa.
- GEO — Generative Engine Optimization. Being cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude.
The work overlaps. The intent differs. You need all three.
Why this matters now
In 2024, roughly 60% of Google searches ended without a click. In 2026, AI assistants like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity handle hundreds of millions of daily queries — none of which visit your website unless they cite you. If your content is structured for classic SEO only, you're invisible to the channels where your customers are asking questions.
What changes under the hood
- Structured data — schema.org markup (
FAQPage,Article,LocalBusiness) makes your content machine-readable - Clear answers — direct, factual paragraphs near headings; AI engines lift these verbatim
llms.txt— a sitemap-equivalent for AI crawlers that tells them what to read- Crawler allowlisting — GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended need explicit permission in
robots.txt
We'll cover each in depth in future posts.