Why Now’s The Time to Gen Up On GEO

Search has split in two. Traditional search (Google, Bing) still matters and isn’t going away – Google Business Profile, keywords, backlinks, and reviews all help to optimise your visibility in search engine results. SEO is now joined by a new kid on the block, GEO  – or generative engine optimisation. While the principles and best practices for GEO continue to evolve, it is already reshaping how organisations approach marketing and business communications.

GEO: Becoming a Trusted, Citable Source

GEO is the practice of optimising content so that AI-powered search platforms such as ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot are more likely to recognise, reference, and cite it when generating answers.

With traditional SEO, success means ranking near the top of a list of links. With AI search, success means being one of the trusted sources that helps generate the answer.

How AI Search Works Differently

Traditional search and AI search are built on different principles.

With traditional search, a user enters a query, the search engine ranks relevant web pages, and the user chooses which link to click. Success depends on where your page appears in the search results.

AI search takes a different approach. Users ask questions in natural, conversational language, and the AI generates a direct answer by drawing on sources it considers trustworthy and generates a summary.

Expert Voices Power AI-Generated Answers

People matter to AI. Directors and industry leaders who share their expertise through authored content, interviews, and quoted commentary are more likely to be recognised and referenced in AI-generated responses. User-generated content on LinkedIn, discussions in industry forums, and mentions in online publications all help build the digital signals that AI platforms draw upon. Without a strong public presence and authoritative content, even technically capable brands may struggle to be recognised in AI outputs.

Strong SEO Foundations Still Matter

While GEO is changing how essential industries think about online visibility, the fundamentals of SEO remain important. They help search engines understand your content and contribute to the signals of quality and trust that AI platforms can draw upon.

That means getting the basics right: clear page titles, compelling meta descriptions, descriptive H1 headings, and meaningful image alt text. Google also evaluates content using its E-E-A-T framework – Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness – which provides important signals about the quality and credibility of your content.

For both search engines and AI-powered search platforms, strong technical SEO combined with authoritative, well-structured content lays the foundation for greater visibility.

Find out how to make your content more visible in AI-powered search by joining our AI Marketing Roadmap training course.

In our next blog, we’ll share practical techniques for structuring content that AI platforms can more easily understand, use, and reference.