What Is GEO? An Overview of Generative Engine Optimization

Optimizing content in 2025 isn’t just about considering search engine optimization (SEO). 

There’s a new way to boost your content’s online visibility — generative engine optimization (GEO).

You still need SEO to rank on the traditional search engine results pages (SERPs). However, if you also want to optimize your content for the growing popularity of generative AI search engines, taking a GEO approach can be a game-changer.

To help you get started, we’ll walk you through what GEO is, how it’s different from SEO, and provide tips on improving your online visibility on generative AI search engines.

Key Takeaways (TL;DR)

• Generative engine optimization techniques help your content appear in generative AI search engine responses.
• The main difference between GEO and SEO is that SEO improves your visibility in traditional search engine results pages, while GEO improves it in AI search responses.
• To get started with GEO, you should research more natural, conversational keywords to appear in AI-assisted voice search responses and consider how to structure your content in an AI-friendly way.
• Including multiple types of media, statistics, and citations in content may help you optimize for AI search engines.
• Challenges of GEO and generative AI search engines include content oversaturation, a potential drop in organic traffic, as well as trust and credibility issues.

What Is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)?

Search Engine Land notes that generative engine optimization, or GEO, involves optimizing your content so it’s more likely to appear in generative AI search responses. For instance, from AI Overviews, Perplexity AI, or ChatGPT search.

What sets generative AI search engines apart from traditional ones is that their goal isn’t simply to provide a list of relevant links. Instead, they focus on giving users direct, conversational answers to their queries, often summarizing information from multiple sources.

Therefore, the goal of GEO is a little different than that of SEO. Its aim is to tailor content to align with the algorithms and preferences of AI-driven search engines. 

That’s not the only difference, though.

GEO vs. SEO: What’s the Difference?

There’s no doubt that GEO and SEO share some similarities. For example, they both prioritize user experience, content quality, and relevance. 

However, a few key differences set the two strategies apart.

• Goal. The focus of SEO is to improve rankings on traditional search engines like Google, while GEO’s target is to increase visibility in AI-driven generative engines like ChatGPT search.
• Output. In response to user queries, traditional search engines generate a list of the top sources that could provide answers. Generative engines, on the other hand, summarize information from sources to provide a more direct, comprehensive response.
• Metrics. To track SEO performance, you’ll commonly look at keyword rankings, click-through rates, and time on page. With GEO, though, keeping an eye on impression metrics, like how often your content appears in AI responses, is key. 
• Content strategy. SEO works for all types of content, regardless of topic. However, the most effective GEO strategy for content may depend on the subject matter.

With such distinct differences between SEO and GEO, it’s certainly worth incorporating GEO into your content strategy, especially if you can do so before the rest of the competition. 

Fortunately, implementing GEO techniques into your content creation process may be even easier than you think.

Getting Started with GEO Strategies

Ready to start improving your content’s visibility on generative search engines? 

Here are some tips to help get you started with GEO.

Do your research

First things first: you need to do your research. To implement GEO strategies effectively, you need to understand:

• The keywords your audience uses in generative engines, as well as their search intent.
• How AI search engines generate and structure their responses.
• Your competition’s GEO performance.

For example, let’s say you want to do some GEO keyword research. With an expected 157 million voice assistant users by 2026, as noted by Statista, targeting more natural, conversational keywords can help you start reaching that AI-assisted search audience.

Once you have your keywords, you should look into how AI platforms generate their responses so you can tailor your content accordingly. Take Google’s AI Overviews, for example. You may notice that they give quick, direct answers to user queries, so you could try replicating that in your content.

Not sure where to start? Well, as with SEO, performing a competitor analysis can help you uncover both effective GEO keywords and content structures. By keeping an eye on competitors that AI search engines pull from most often, you can see what has been working for them and adapt GEO strategies.

Optimize content for GEO

One of the best things about GEO optimization is that you’re likely already familiar with it. As with SEO, you should still aim to create GEO-optimized content that aligns with Google’s E-E-A-T principles, which stands for:

• Experience
• Expertise
• Authority
• Trustworthiness

Engaging, relevant, high-quality content is still necessary to help your content appear in GEO search responses. 

However, there are a few extra things to pay attention to with GEO content optimization:

• AI-friendly structuring. A clear, organized schema markup is essential for GEO, as it makes it more accessible to AI systems.
• Multimedia elements. Incorporating a variety of content formats is key. Think blog posts, videos, images, interactive content, etc.
• Back research with data and statistics. According to a GEO study, including statistics and citations in content may help to improve the visibility of certain topics.

Working these GEO tips into your current SEO and content marketing strategy can help improve your online visibility on multiple types of search engines. However, you may still face a few challenges along the way.

Challenges of GEO

Although optimizing for GEO has its benefits, it has some drawbacks too.

Here are some of the top challenges of implementing GEO:

• Content oversaturation. Content originality is more important than ever thanks to the flood of AI content in Google search results. With so much similar content out there, you need to create unique, high-quality content to stand out. Plagiarism checkers can help, so that you avoid publishing duplicate content, but it’s up to you to find unique angles.
• A potential decrease in organic traffic. Since generative search engines provide direct answers instead of just links, users may not need to click through to the source of the information, potentially reducing organic search traffic. Coming up with other strategies to drive traffic to your website becomes essential.
• Trust and credibility issues. AI-generated responses prioritize content accuracy and authority. If your content is missing trustworthy sources or seems poorly researched or inaccurate it may not appear in AI search results. Since AI is known to produce hallucinations or factual errors, using an AI detector to check for AI-generated text as well as a fact-checker can identify areas that need review.

Successfully navigating these challenges is essential for effective GEO.

Final Thoughts

It’s important to note that since GEO is still a relatively new field, a lot of the recommendations and current thoughts surrounding it could change over time. 

For example, the GEO study mentioned earlier notes that one of the limitations in evaluating the efficacy of GEO, with data points that “resemble real-world queries” is the changing nature of queries. Further, it notes that its analysis is a “first step towards understanding the impact of generative engines on the digital space.”

Considering the recency of GEO, the continuous development of AI search engines, and that research into GEO is still in the initial phases, GEO optimization requires an experimental approach to see what works best for you and your brand. 

Yet, with AI playing an increasingly important role in our everyday lives, there’s no doubt that getting a headstart on your GEO efforts may be worth your while.

Read more about the latest in AI and content marketing:

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