AEO stands for Answer Engine Optimization. It's about getting mentioned when people ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini or Claude for advice instead of searching on Google. Businesses that get mentioned there win customers who have almost made up their minds.
What's the difference between SEO and AEO?
With SEO, you compete for a spot in a list of links. With AEO, you compete to be mentioned in the answer itself, where the customer often sees only three to five names.
Most good SEO helps AEO too. The difference is who's reading: an AI model that has to summarize, and that prefers to trust what several independent sources agree on.
How does an AI answer get made?
- The model searches the web and pulls in between five and twenty pages.
- It picks the pages that answer directly, have concrete numbers and are backed up by other sources.
- It writes an answer and names the sources it relied on.
What you say about yourself counts the least. What others say about you counts the most.
What can your business do now?
- Check that AI crawlers like GPTBot and ClaudeBot are allowed on your website.
- Add structured data to your website, so it's clear who you are and what you do.
- Write one page per question your customers ask, with the answer in the first forty words.
- Fill out your Google Business Profile and the directories and industry listings you belong in.
- Ask happy customers for a review.
How do you know if it's working?
Ask several AI tools the same questions every month, and see whether you get mentioned. Track how often, in which answers and next to whom.
It takes time. The first results usually show up after a few months, and they tend to stick once they're there.
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