GEO (generative engine optimisation)
GEO is the practice of earning citations from generative AI systems: chat assistants, AI overviews, and answer engines. GEO overlaps heavily with AEO and the terms are often used interchangeably. Both come down to being the source machines trust enough to quote.
GEO and AEO are mostly the same argument
Two names arrived for the same problem at roughly the same time, from different directions. AEO came from the search industry describing answer boxes. GEO came from the research side describing generative models. In day-to-day work they point at the same tasks.
Where people draw a line, it is usually this one: AEO leans toward being the answer to a specific question, and GEO leans toward being a source the model draws on generally. It is a difference of emphasis, not of method.
We use both terms in writing and neither in the product, deliberately. If one term supersedes the other, the work does not change and nothing has to be renamed.
What actually moves GEO
- Consistent facts about your business across every source a model might read.
- Content that states something checkable rather than restating the obvious.
- Being present in the places models lean on: reference sites, review aggregators, and your own well-structured pages.
- Time. Models are retrained and indexes refresh on their own schedule, so GEO results arrive later than ranking changes do.