Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO): How to Get Cited by AI Search

Generative engine optimisation, or GEO, is often used interchangeably with AEO, but the useful distinction is scope. AEO is usually about winning a single, specific answer. GEO is about how your content performs across a longer AI-driven research process: the follow-up questions, the comparisons a model draws, and the recommendations it makes once it has gathered several sources.

AI research is a conversation, not a query

A customer researching “best CRM for a small services business” or “agency for a Shopify relaunch” rarely stops at one question. They ask a follow-up, then another, and a generative AI system carries context between them. A page that only answers the first, obvious query misses the follow-up questions where a real buying decision often gets made, such as pricing structure, implementation time, or what happens if the project changes scope.

Structuring content for a multi-step conversation

The practical fix is to map the two or three follow-up questions a genuinely interested buyer would ask after your headline claim, and answer them on the same page or in clearly linked content, rather than leaving them to a sales call. This does not mean publishing pricing you would rather negotiate case by case; it means answering the process questions: how the engagement starts, what the first weeks look like, and what a buyer should expect to provide.

Measuring something that resists measurement

GEO does not yet have the equivalent of a search-console ranking report. The workable approach is qualitative: periodically ask the AI tools your buyers use the real questions they would ask, track whether your business appears and how accurately, and treat drift in that answer as a signal worth investigating, the same way you would treat a ranking drop. It is early enough that businesses doing this consistently still have a real advantage over ones treating it as a one-off project. Our performance marketing service includes this kind of ongoing AI search tracking alongside standard SEO and paid media.