Insights
What is AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), and how is it different from SEO?
AEO is the work of making your content easy for answer engines and AI assistants to find, understand and cite. Here is what it involves and how it relates to SEO and GEO.
Published 6 min read Erö Digital Solutions
Why AEO matters now
More buyers start with a question rather than a search term. They ask an AI assistant which supplier fits, or read the answer at the top of a results page, and may never visit a list of links.
If your business is not part of that answer, you are not part of the shortlist. AEO is how you give answer engines a clear, verifiable reason to include you.
How answer engines choose what to cite
Answer engines look for passages that answer a question directly, come from a source they can identify, and agree with what other trusted sources say about the same entity.
Pages that bury the answer, mix several topics, or describe the business differently from one place to the next are harder to quote with confidence.
What AEO work involves
Answer-first writing: each important page opens with a short, plain answer to the question it exists for, followed by the detail.
Structured data: schema.org markup that describes the organization, its services, its pages and its FAQs as one connected graph, so machines read the same facts people do.
Consistent entities: the same name, description, location and services everywhere the business appears, including directories and profiles.
Crawlable, fast, accessible pages: content that is in the HTML, loads quickly, and works for assistive technology is also easier for machines to read.
AEO, GEO and SEO: how they fit together
SEO is the foundation: technical health, relevant content and authority so pages can be found and ranked.
AEO focuses on being the quoted answer. GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) focuses on how generative AI tools describe and recommend you. In practice they share most of the same work, and good SEO makes AEO and GEO possible.
Where to start
List the ten questions your buyers ask before they choose a supplier. Ask them to the AI assistants your buyers use and note who gets cited.
Then fix the basics on your own site: answer-first pages for those questions, complete structured data, and a consistent description of who you are and what you do.