AEO, GEO and AI SEO: where to start with the labels

The first thing a buyer meets in this market is a vocabulary, not a product. Answer engine optimisation, generative engine optimisation, LLM visibility, AI SEO: four names, most of them coined by vendors, all describing work that overlaps almost completely. The overlap is not a scandal — the surfaces really are new — but it makes comparison shopping harder than it should be, because two quotes that use different words can describe the same deliverable, and two quotes that use the same word can describe different work.

These four pieces do one job: separate the labels, then show what changes once links stop being the unit you count. Two findings run through all of them. First, Google's own guidance says optimising for its AI features is still SEO, so a page that ranks and is readable is the page an answer is built from. Second, the useful distinction is not between the acronyms but between what you measure: a position in a list, or a mention and citation inside an answer. A score produced by one tool cannot be compared with another tool's score, and neither converts into a ranking.

Start with the definition, then read the comparison that matches your question. Nothing here needs a purchase to be useful, and the last piece explains why an SEO audit and an AI visibility audit are both worth having — for different reasons.

Start here

1. What is answer engine optimization (AEO)? A plain-English definition — the label defined, with the checklist items that have evidence behind them and the ones that do not.
2. AEO vs GEO vs SEO: what actually changes — the four things that genuinely change when answers replace links, and the large part that stays the same.
3. LLM visibility, GEO, AEO and AI SEO: what the terms mean — five names for one activity, why two tools' scores cannot be compared, and the two numbers worth tracking.
4. GEO audit vs SEO audit: two different questions — why the two documents barely overlap, and why one does not replace the other.

Where to go next

• See what the questions look like: the free check reads your site and shows you the exact questions a full measurement would ask, before you pay anything.
• Read a complete measurement: the published sample prints every answer and every grade, so you can judge the method rather than the pitch.
• Check the method first: how the measurement works — surfaces, repeat counts, and the confidence range we publish with every percentage.