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Whether you’re new to digital marketing or have had a team implementing strategies for a while, it can be easy to get lost while trying to keep up with terminology and acronyms, especially since the industry changes so often.

Decoding the Alphabet Soup

While SEO has existed for decades and is well established, newer approaches like GEO and AEO can be more confusing, so it can be hard to determine their viability and how to approach them. Below, we’ll take a close look at each to clear up the confusion.

SEO

SEO is the popular acronym for search engine marketing, one of the most prominent marketing methodologies in today’s world, and the one that dominates the online space. At its core, SEO uses a variety of tactics to enhance the visibility of websites in online searches within search engines (Google, Bing, etc.), promoting their products and services to users.

Some of the common SEO strategies and techniques include:

All of these techniques, along with other more specialized options, work in conjunction to increase the profile of a website so that search engines will “trust” it for a given niche, delivering its content to users who search for relevant terms.

GEO

GEO stands for generative engine optimization, but, to make matters more confusing, sometimes “GSO” is also used to stand for generative search optimization.

This concept is concerned with enhancing a website’s content and brand so that AI-powered search engines, such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and others, will cite the website with their answers.

Since many users are turning to AI platforms to ask questions and conduct web searches, GEO is a way of drawing in these users in a similar way to SEO’s use on standard search engines.

With some AI platforms now allowing users to make purchases from websites directly within their search windows – including ChatGPT and Gemini – and more likely on the way, it will be imperative for companies to appear in these searches moving forward.

AEO

AEO stands for answer engine optimization. This will be the simplest concept to define because we already have done so – AEO is simply GEO/GSO.

Since the digital marketing and general online space is shifting so much in light of AI, it has led to something of a “wild west” environment, and that extends to terminology. What one outlet calls AEO, another outlet will call GEO or GSO. But ultimately, it all amounts to the same thing – trying to get businesses to appear in AI search results.

How SEO and GEO/AEO Differ

While there is plenty of overlap in these concepts as we’ll discuss below, it’s worth noting a few points of divergence first:

  • Backlinks to your site – SEO has long used backlink acquisition as a key methodology. The more reputable and relevant external websites that link to a company’s site, the more “value” that site would be given by search engines like Google. This is also sometimes called getting “link juice” and boils down to getting the website’s domain equity passed onto yours. Since AI platforms focus more on the content and language of a site rather than its links, the “juice” of backlinks has less viability for moving the needle on AI search results.
  • Unlinked brand mentions – Serving as sort of the inverse of backlinks, unlinked mentions are instances of a company or brand being referred to on a site without link attribution. This is the bane of many SEO strategists, since the lack of a link is seen as a missed opportunity to give search engines the additional signal of authority. For GEO/AEO, however, unlinked mentions can actually be a benefit, as since the link itself doesn’t matter as much, they are seen as “strengthening the position of the brand as an entity within the broader semantic network.”
  • Success metrics – Lastly, one area where these methods differ is in their deliverables. Rankings, clicks, organic traffic, and conversions are the name of the game in SEO. For now, AI citations, brand mentions, and having a presence on AI responses are the only measurable elements under GEO/AEO.

So What Do We Do?

The good news is, as we’ve relayed in a previous post on AI searches, if you’re engaging in good SEO practices, you’re already ahead of the game!

Standard search engines like Google and Bing look for strong website content when delivering search results to users, and AI platforms do the same. To enhance your presence in AI results, we recommend doing the following SEO-approved tactics:

It’s also important to remember that SEO is still the most viable method for drawing users to your site, acquiring leads and conversions, and closing sales. SEO brings users directly to your pages for products and services, allowing them to directly interact with your content.

AI platforms operate a little differently. They will take information from your site to supply answers (usually, and hopefully, with attribution and a link), but by doing so, they will often satisfy a user’s query, so the user never actually proceeds on to your site.

As AI platforms evolve, and more begin to incorporate purchasing directly within their structures, more opportunities will exist for conversions and sales, but for now, at least, such instances are limited.

Looking to Stay Ahead of the Curve on AI? Visit Our Blog!

In an ever-changing search landscape, we know how vital it is to be in the know on fluctuations, so we educate ourselves and update our readers. We regularly write about the current state of the digital marketing industry, highlighting changes as they come.

Be sure to follow our blog to keep up on all things SEO, GEO, AEO, AI, and more! And contact our team if you’re looking to enhance and modernize your site for this brave new world.

About the Author

Linton Lewis

Linton Lewis is our Content Editor where he contributes as an SEO writer for clients, while also overseeing all the editing for client writing. He has been at our agency for over 10 years and also holds an MFA in creative writing, as well as a BS in video production, both of which help our collective marketing efforts.