What is GEO? Well, GEO stands for generative engine optimization. It is the practice of structuring and refining your online content so that AI-driven search and answer engines (like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, and AI Overviews) can easily find it, understand it, and cite it in their generated responses.
While SEO focuses on ranking in a list of web links, GEO focuses on getting your content cited or quoted by AI models. Success in GEO relies on authoritativeness, clear data structures like tables and direct factual answers that AI can easily parse and verify. The goal is more brand visibility inside AI generated answers, accurate representation of your information and ultimately traffic or leads coming from those AI platforms and their source links.
Success metrics for SEO are based on heavy emphasis of keywords, meta tags and backlinks. Whereas success metrics for GEO typically consists of emphasis on clear sections, Q&A formatting, concise definitions, tables and bullet points that models can easily parse and quote.
GEO techniques
- Create clear, direct answers to specific user questions (eg. What is X? How to do Y?) at the top of your content
- Use descriptive headings, short paragraphs, and bullet lists so generative models can extract snippets cleanly.
- Demonstrate authority: original data, expert quotes, precise definitions, and up-to-date information to make your page a “citation-worthy” source.
- Maintain a consistent, trustworthy brand presence across your site and profiles so AI systems see you as a reliable source across queries.
Top GEO tools