The buying journey is moving from the search box to the AI answer. When people ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini — or Doubao and DeepSeek — “what’s the best X?”, the model answers and recommends. If your value isn’t expressed the way AI reads it, you don’t get seen. GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is how you optimize that layer.
How GEO relates to SEO
SEO optimizes where your page ranks in a list of search results. GEO optimizes whether your product is retrieved, cited, and recommended inside the answer the model generates. They share some foundations (structured data, authority, crawlability), but the target differs: SEO aims at a ranked list of links; GEO aims at one synthesized answer.
How an AI answer is produced
Mainstream AI answers aren’t conjured from nothing. The model retrieves web sources, selects a few, and synthesizes an answer with citations. Who gets retrieved and who gets cited is patterned and influenceable — which is exactly why GEO works, just as SEO once shaped search rankings.
What GEO actually optimizes
- Make content extractable for AI: proposition-dense, structured, FAQ;
- Fill gaps about you in authoritative sources and third-party reviews;
- Stabilize your entities and facts with structured data (schema.org);
- Show up in the content pool AI draws on (rankings, reviews, comparisons).
In one line: SEO gets you found; GEO gets you expressed and recommended by AI.