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What are AEO and GEO? How to get your brand into AI search

AEO (answer engine optimization) and GEO (generative engine optimization) are the work of getting AI tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Naver AI Briefing to mention your brand and cite your pages when they answer a question. This guide covers the measurement method and checklist MAKE Marketing uses in practice.

AEO / GEO · · By MAKE Marketing

Key takeaways

  • AEO focuses on being cited as a source of an AI answer. GEO focuses on AI understanding your brand correctly and mentioning it.
  • Pages that AI answers cite often answer the question in the first sentence, organize facts in tables, lists and dates, and match the information on your other channels.
  • Write down 20 questions your customers actually ask and put them to each engine. That shows you where you stand today.
  • Nobody can guarantee a place in AI answers. The basic method is to measure the same questions repeatedly and track the change.

What are AEO and GEO?

AEO (answer engine optimization) is the work of getting AI to use your page as evidence when it answers a question. The goal is for your site to appear in the list of sources shown under the answer.

GEO (generative engine optimization) is the work of getting generative AI to understand your brand correctly and mention it in the body of its answers. The test is whether your brand name, what you do, where you are and your strengths come out right in AI answers.

Customers are moving from typing words into a search box and picking from a list of links to asking AI a full question and getting an answer straight away. If you are not inside that answer, customers have fewer chances to see you at all. The industry also calls the same trend AIO (AI optimization) or LLMO (large language model optimization).

How is it different from SEO?

SEO AEO GEO
Goal High ranking in search results Being cited as a source of AI answers AI understanding and mentioning the brand correctly
Where it shows Google and Naver search results Source citations in AI answers, Naver AI Briefing The body of ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude answers
What matters Keywords, links, page quality Sentences that answer the question directly, structured data Consistent brand information across sources, outside mentions
How it is measured Rankings, clicks Citation rate Mention rate, accuracy of the description

The three do not move separately. AI search also reads web pages to build its answers, so a site that search engines read well is read well by AI too. SEO is the foundation, and AEO and GEO add an "answer-ready" form on top.

Which pages does AI choose as evidence?

AI engines have not published all the criteria they use to choose sources. Still, the pages AI answers cite often have things in common.

  • They answer the question directly. Subheadings are phrased as questions, and the first sentence under each is the answer.
  • They are organized. Definitions, figures and procedures are split into tables and lists.
  • Authorship and dates are clear. You can see who wrote the page and when it was updated.
  • The information is consistent. The company name, address, contact details and service descriptions match across the website, Naver Place, Google Business Profile and social media.
  • They are mentioned elsewhere. The brand appears on outside pages such as articles, blogs and business directories.
  • They are open to be read. robots.txt does not block AI crawlers, and the key content is text, not images.
  • They carry machine-readable markup. Structured data marks up the company, services and FAQs.

How to check whether AI mentions your brand today

  1. Write down 20 questions. Mix category + location questions (e.g. "recommend a dermatologist in Haeundae"), situation questions (e.g. "how long does acne scar treatment take") and comparison questions (e.g. "laser toning vs. pico toning").
  2. Ask each engine the same thing. Put the same sentence into ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude. Answers can vary with login status and location settings, so note the conditions as well.
  3. Mark mentions and citations separately. If your brand name appears in the body of the answer, that is a mention. If your site is in the source list, that is a citation.
  4. Calculate the rates. Mention rate = answers that mention you ÷ number of questions. Citation rate = answers that cite you ÷ number of questions.
  5. Note the sites cited instead. They hint at the content you should create next.
  6. Measure the same questions again a month later. If the questions change you cannot compare, so keep the list fixed.

MAKE Marketing automates this process with MAKE AI, a tool we built ourselves, measuring by engine and by language (Korean, English, Japanese and Traditional Chinese) and comparing each round.

A 10-point checklist you can start today

  1. Check that robots.txt is not blocking AI crawlers such as GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, Google-Extended and ClaudeBot.
  2. Create a sitemap.xml and submit it to Google Search Console, Naver Search Advisor and Bing Webmaster Tools.
  3. Use exactly one H1 per page, and have it state the question the page answers.
  4. Give each service its own page. Do not pile every service onto one page.
  5. In the first sentence of each page, say what it is and who it is for.
  6. Fill your FAQ with real customer questions and add FAQPage structured data.
  7. Put the company name, address, contact details, logo and official channel URLs in Organization structured data.
  8. Make the company details on Naver Place, Google Business Profile and your social media bios identical to the website.
  9. Show who wrote each article and when it was last updated.
  10. Measure your 20 core questions every month.

Naver AI Briefing shows an AI-written summary answer at the top of Naver's integrated search results and attaches blogs, cafés, Knowledge iN posts and web documents as sources. If you serve customers in Korea, this is why your Naver blog posts, not only your website, should be written with AEO in mind. The details are in What gets a post cited in Naver AI Briefing.

Frequently asked questions

Do AEO and GEO replace SEO?

No. AI answers are built from web pages too, so SEO is the foundation. AEO and GEO add answer-ready formatting and consistent brand information on top of it.

Can a small business appear in AI answers?

Yes. The more specific a question is about place and situation, the more room there is for the page that answers it precisely to be cited instead of a big brand.

Do I need an llms.txt file?

llms.txt is a file that summarizes a site's key information in a form AI can read easily. It has not been officially confirmed that every AI reads it, but it costs almost nothing to make, so it is worth having.

How soon will I see results?

Each engine collects and reflects information on its own schedule, so no one can promise a timeframe. Measuring a fixed list of questions every month is the most reliable way to see change.

Related terms

AEOGEOAI visibilityStructured datallms.txtrobots.txtEntityZero-click search

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