GEO
7 insights on geo. Each opens with the direct answer.
Generative engine optimization (GEO) is the work of becoming the brand an AI engine names when a buyer asks a question. It is also called AI SEO or answer engine optimization. The goal is different from classic search. You are not competing for a position on a results page. You are competing to be one of the two or three names inside a single answer.
How is GEO different from SEO?
Search engines rank pages. AI engines retrieve a handful of sources, read them, and write one answer. That changes what counts. A page that ranks fifth can still be the one an engine quotes. A brand with a strong site but no independent coverage can be left out entirely, because engines lean on third-party sources more than on what a company says about itself.
GEO does not replace SEO. Engines still use search indexes to find sources, so a site that is hard to crawl or badly structured loses in both places.
What do AI engines look for?
Five things, which we measure as the five pillars of digital authority:
- Press coverage. Real, indexed articles in the publications the engines already cite for your category.
- AI visibility. Whether you are named today, in what position, and for which questions.
- Search presence. What page one shows for your brand name and your buyer questions.
- Brand entity. Consistent, machine-readable records of who you are: schema, Wikidata, LinkedIn, Google Business Profile.
- Organic authority. Domain authority, referring domains, ranking keywords and Core Web Vitals, measured against your strongest competitor.
Where should you start?
Start with the entity records, because they are cheap and everything else depends on them. Then pick a small set of buyer questions, find out which sources the engines cite for those questions, and earn coverage there. Measure monthly across more than one engine, because a single answer is an anecdote.
The practical sequence is in the five-pillar checklist. The reasoning behind it is in how AI engines choose which brands to name.
What you will find here
Every insight below covers one specific GEO question: how retrieval works, what gets cited, how to measure it, and what to fix first. Each opens with the direct answer.
Google now puts an AI Overview on your brand name. Who writes it, and what you can change
AI Overviews reached about 82% of branded searches in late September 2026. Why the trackers differ, what opting out does, and a seven-step source audit.
→ 2026.10.07 · 8 MINChatGPT now searches brand domains directly. A readiness audit for your own pages
In August 2026 ChatGPT began scoping many background searches to named domains. What the trackers agree on, where they differ, and a seven-step audit.
→ 2026.10.05 · 8 MINDoes changing the date get a page cited by AI? What counts as an update
AI engines cite recently updated pages, not new ones. What the date-only experiments show, what counts as an update, and how often to review each page type.
→ 2026.10.04 · 8 MINWhich AI crawlers to allow, which to block, and what each choice costs
AI crawler access is decided in three places, and robots.txt is the weakest. A bot by bot decision table and a seven step audit.
→ 2026.10.03 · 8 MINHow to measure AI visibility when the answers keep changing
AI answers change between runs. Here is how many questions, engines and repeat runs you need before an AI visibility number means anything.
→ 2026.10.02 · 3 MINHow ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews choose which brands to name
AI engines do not rank pages. They retrieve a short list of sources they trust, read them, and name the brands those sources agree on. Here is what that means for how you earn a mention.
→ 2026.10.01 · 4 MINHow to get your brand cited by AI: the five-pillar checklist
A practical checklist for becoming the brand ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews recommend. Ordered by effort and payoff, with what to fix first.
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