GEO, AEO, SEO: What’s in a name, and how are strategies evolving?

The introduction of generative AI summaries and answers to search, as well as the popularisation of tools like ChatGPT, has rapidly accelerated a shift towards searchers receiving a single, definitive answer to their questions.

With that acceleration comes a debate from search specialists about whether we’re now dealing with something fundamentally different to ‘SEO’ (search engine optimisation). Many marketers have started to talk instead about ‘GEO’ (generative engine optimisation) or ‘AEO’ (answer engine optimisation).

How much does it matter what term we use to refer to optimisation for search and discovery in the AI era – and have the underlying principles really changed?

I reached out to a number of experts in search, visibility and discovery to get their insights, which will be serialised in two parts. In this article, I’ll look at why the new names might – or might not – matter and what the impact will be on strategy.

The second part of this piece digs further into how marketers can adapt their approach to optimisation, how to measure what works, and how to make sure that above all, the result is human-centric.

“We can’t ignore the growing interest in terms like GEO or AEO”

Irina Ginghină, SEO Director at Modern Citizens, points out that, “SEOs and digital marketers do love their acronyms. We invent new jargon faster than anyone else.”

However, she emphasises that coining and adopting new terms serves a purpose as well. “New terms like GEO or AEO act almost like signals that things are shifting. By using them, we’re showing that we see the changes and that we’re adapting.”

Ginghină argues, “SEO is still the umbrella here. At the end of the day, whether results come through traditional blue links, AI Overviews, or summaries produced by LLMs, they’re all powered by search engines…

“At the same time, we can’t ignore the growing interest in terms like GEO or AEO. They’re useful because they point to the new traffic layers created by AI-driven answers – and because people are actively searching for them.

“Using those terms in the right places makes sense: it attracts attention, frames the conversation, and maps neatly onto what’s happening in the industry.”

Sean Begg Flint, Founder at Position Digital, acknowledges that marketers might be getting a bit hung up on terminology. “Fundamentally, [people] are still using these AI chatbots and LLMs to conduct searches,” he points out.

“The difference is that the LLMs take a given prompt, break it down into smaller searches (a method called query fan out), assimilate all that information and ‘generate’ the answer in exactly the format it thinks works best for the user, hence the term ‘generative engine optimisation’.”

He notes that it’s possible the new language may be temporary. “When mobile and the app store came out, we created terms for that too – ‘mobile optimisation’ and ‘app store optimisation’ – which turned out to be pretty similar to SEO and now fall under the SEO umbrella. I think we just love to take on new shiny things and brand them up.”

Using [terms like GEO and AEO] in the right places makes sense: it attracts attention, frames the conversation, and maps neatly onto what’s happening in the industry.

– Irina Ginghina, SEO Director, Modern Citizens

New terms help to communicate the specialism to non-specialists

Judith Lewis, Founder at Decabbit Consultancy, reflects, “I don’t think we are too hung up on terminology per se, as we are trying to describe to someone who doesn’t have a knowledge of the specialism what it is we do.

“However, SEO alone encompasses several distinct specialisms already, so it is already a catch-all for content, link building, technical site optimisation or whatever.

“Ultimately, this is optimisation for organic digital marketing channels. Good, solid, old-fashioned SEO will [still] serve a website well … [along] with an understanding of psychology (and thus how people are likely to ask an LLM or other model a question).”

“From my experience, there are two camps when it comes to the terminology,” Begg Flint says. In discussions with clients, the priority is using a term that is easy for them to understand.

With this audience, Begg Flint and his team favour ‘AI search optimisation’ – “it’s simple and it makes complete sense; after all, it’s exactly what we’re doing” – although he admits that “we love abbreviations and ‘AISO’ doesn’t quite roll off the tongue.”

Amongst the more technically-minded SEO community, Begg Flint has noticed that “‘GEO’ is what’s sticking the most … because, strictly speaking, we are optimising for generative engines and generative AI – platforms that generate text.”

When communicating with clients and internal teams who are anxious about declining metrics like traffic, Ginghină also highlights that using different language can help to reframe the conversation.

“Instead of talking about ‘traffic losses’ due to AI, we can frame it as a ‘traffic transfer’ to new discovery layers. This reframes a potentially negative situation (fewer direct clicks) into a more proactive one, highlighting a new area for optimisation.

“It’s about managing expectations and guiding the narrative, especially when explaining these shifts to clients or internal teams who might be worried about declining traditional metrics.

“This mindset shift is tough, because people don’t always adapt as quickly as the platforms do.”

Terminology is less important than the underlying strategy

Charlie Marchant, CEO at Exposure Ninja, makes a distinction between the tactics that aid visibility in generative AI and those that help businesses rank in web search engines. “We don’t use ‘SEO’ to describe AI Search,” she says.

Ultimately, though, she believes that getting too focused on the name leaves marketers in danger of missing the point. “New terms like GEO and AEO can be helpful if they get marketers to think differently and build strategies that reflect the new reality. But if we get too hung up on definitions … we risk falling behind while competitors earn visibility in a space we’re not even showing up in.

“Honestly, whether you call it GEO, AEO, or AI Search Optimisation, the terminology is less important than the strategy behind it.”

AI tools and platforms “aren’t just citing the pages ranking in the traditional top 10 positions. They’re pulling in citations from pages that are most relevant to the user query, and that’s been shown to be anywhere, including from page two onwards. That’s a major shift in how visibility works.”

As a result, Marchant says, “My advice is to focus less on the acronym and more on whether your brand or content is being found, cited, and trusted in these AI platforms.”

Echoing this, Carl Hendy, founder at Audits.com, advises, “When it comes to optimisation, I think it’s more important than ever to control your brand knowledge graph, salience, and overall discoverability across the web.

“That should have always been the case, but with LLMs now giving much broader responses, it’s even more crucial to protect what sits beyond the first page of Google.”

He concludes: “I think marketing as a whole often gets distracted by ‘shiny objects’. New technology can overshadow what really matters: the customer journey, UX, brand, and product.”

New technology can overshadow what really matters: the customer journey, UX, brand and product.

– Carl Hendy, Founder, Audits.com

The fundamentals of SEO haven’t disappeared, but they’ve evolved

Duane Forrester, CEO at Unbound Answers, states that: “We need to be more focused on what work is changing, and how it’s changing … We’re still SEOs until companies start changing job titles and recognizing the work is evolving.

“The fundamentals [of search] have not changed. They remain intact and important. You still have to do all that work. What is changing is the new areas we must become educated in, pay attention to and develop new ways of executing the work around, and track the outcomes from.

“Think of it like going for your PhD after graduating university.”

“We… need to remember that while acronyms are useful for driving awareness, shaping demand and sparking conversations … SEO is still SEO,” adds Ginghină. “[T]he acronyms are the new wrappers we use to make sense of the change.”

“The fundamentals of SEO haven’t disappeared, they’ve just evolved. High quality, useful content, clear site structure, strong technical foundations, and trusted authority are still the bedrock.

“What’s changed is the context: AI systems now parse content at a micro level, build semantic connections between entities, and then deliver compressed research journeys that cut down the number of clicks.”

Marketers should think more broadly about search and discovery

Will Findlater, Group Head of Content at Nelson Bostock, believes that new terms like GEO and AEO are “definitely useful in helping to frame how we think about optimising content for this new era of AI-led discovery.” At the same time, “The danger is that they can lead to one-track thinking, with brands putting too much stock in siloed disciplines and technical optimisation.

“Instead, they need to think in terms of cross-channel discovery and the shared practices that will help them build influence and discovery in all the places their audiences look, search, and discover.” To encompass this much broader approach to visibility and discovery, Findlater advocates for the term ‘DiscO’, or ‘Discovery Optimisation’.

“[B]rand discovery is bigger than any one discipline,” he says. “Audiences are increasingly using AI platforms to aid search, discovery and decision-making, but they use a host of other platforms too. And LLMs draw from various trusted sources such as media publications, Wikipedia and online forums, so digital PR activities are more important than ever.”

Ginghină also points to the need to optimise for searches across a more diverse array of platforms. “There’s… a fine, debatable line between SEO and ‘social search’,” she says.

“Platforms like TikTok and YouTube are now behaving like search engines too, just in a more social and visual way compared to Google, ChatGPT, or Perplexity. As user behaviour evolves, new names, new lenses, and new concepts are bound to appear on the horizon.”

As a result, “rather than picking one label, it’s better to recognise SEO as the discipline at the centre – and see GEO, AEO, and even social search optimisation as extensions of it.

“The job is the same: help people (and now AI assistants) discover and trust our content. It’s just that SEO is becoming more complex by the day.”