GEO · Generative Engine Optimization
When someone asks ChatGPT who does what your company does, does your site get cited?
A growing share of searches ends in a finished answer, with no click on a list of links. GEO is the technical and editorial work that puts your company inside that answer — as a source, with a link.
Free audit. Reply within one business day.
Definition
What GEO is
GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is the set of practices that makes a website readable, understandable and citable by AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Microsoft Copilot. Where SEO competes for a slot in a list of ten blue links, GEO competes to be the source used to write the answer the user reads first.
Three differences that change the execution
- The target is the passage, not the page
- A model does not hand back your whole page: it extracts the paragraph that answers the question. Content that only makes sense after three screens of scrolling is content that never gets cited.
- The target is the entity, not the keyword
- The model needs to know which company this is, what it does, where it operates and why it should be trusted. That is declared through consistent structured data and coherent mentions off-site.
- The target is the first HTML response
- Most AI crawlers do not run JavaScript. Anything that only appears after hydration simply does not exist for them — which is why architecture weighs as much as copy.
Scope
What gets implemented on your site
Not a consulting PDF. Actual changes to the site, shipped and verifiable.
AI crawler access
robots.txt explicitly allowing GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended and the rest. This is the most common silent failure: a great site that is quietly blocked.
Structured data (Schema.org)
Organization, LocalBusiness, Service, FAQPage, Article and BreadcrumbList tied into one graph with a single @id, so the model treats it all as the same company.
llms.txt and machine-readable content
A plain-text index pointing to the canonical pages, one summary line each. It is the map an assistant uses when deciding what to read.
Answer-shaped content
Key pages rewritten with a direct definition up front, verifiable facts, a real FAQ and headings that mirror the question as people actually ask it.
Rendering and performance
Complete HTML in the first server response, Core Web Vitals in order, and no essential content locked behind JavaScript or infinite scroll.
Citation monitoring
Tracking the questions that matter in your market and what the assistants answer today — with a monthly report of what moved and what to adjust.
SEO vs GEO
Not a replacement. The layer above.
A site with bad SEO will not be cited by any AI. GEO starts where SEO ends.
| Criterion | Classic SEO | GEO |
|---|---|---|
| Goal | Rank a link on the results page | Be the source cited inside the answer |
| Unit of competition | The page | The passage that answers the question |
| How the search arrives | Short keyword | A whole question, in natural language |
| Decisive signal | Backlinks and domain authority | Clarity, verifiable facts and entity consistency |
| How it is measured | Average position and clicks | Citation frequency and traffic from assistants |
How it works
Four steps, no mystery
- 01
Audit
We collect the real questions in your market, test what ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity answer today, and find what on your site is preventing a citation.
- 02
Technical base
Crawler access, structured data, llms.txt, sitemap, canonicals and rendering. The part that only needs doing once — properly.
- 03
Editorial layer
Rewriting the pages that answer the highest commercial-intent questions, in the shape a model can extract without ambiguity.
- 04
Measurement
Monthly report: which questions you now show up in, which competitors are cited instead of you, and what goes into the next cycle.
FAQ
Questions about GEO
GEO stands for Generative Engine Optimization. It is the work of preparing a website to be read, understood and cited by AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Microsoft Copilot.
Let’s see what AI answers about your market today
In the audit I run your sector’s questions through ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity and show you who is being cited in your place.