GEO, or generative engine optimisation, is the work of making a business's information useful and discoverable in AI-generated answers. It shares foundations with SEO: accessible pages, reliable information and a clear account of what the business does. It does not give a business control over whether an AI system recommends it.
Does GEO replace SEO?
For Google Search, the SEO foundation still applies. Different discovery systems may use different sources and controls, so avoid treating every AI experience as one channel.
Google's July 2026 guidance says its generative search features rely on core Search systems. It does not require special AI markup or an llms.txt file. That is guidance about Google; it is not a specification for every assistant or shopping platform.
For a business deciding where to invest, the useful question is whether a prospective customer can find a dependable answer. A technically accessible page with vague claims still leaves the customer unsure. A strong explanation on an inaccessible page has a distribution problem. Both need attention.
Sources: Google Search Central — Optimizing for generative AI features, updated July 2026
| Decision | SEO foundation | AI discovery consideration |
|---|---|---|
| What to publish | A page that resolves a real search need | An answer with enough context to be understood when cited |
| How to organise it | Stable URLs and descriptive internal links | Clear relationships between company, service, evidence and topic |
| How to judge value | Qualified visits and business outcomes | Accurate mentions, referrals and useful discovery alongside outcomes |
What information should a business make easier to understand?
Explain the work, its boundaries, who it helps and the evidence behind any claim.
Consider a service business whose website says it delivers intelligent transformation. A buyer still cannot tell what it will build, which systems it can connect, or what happens when something fails. Replacing that phrase with a concrete explanation improves the buying decision without multiplying pages.
An illustrative service description might say: we connect enquiry forms, scheduling and invoicing so a completed job creates the next administrative action. It should also say which inputs are required, where review is needed and what the project does not include. Publish customer outcomes only when you have permission and evidence; label hypothetical examples clearly.
- Give each service a clear problem, deliverable and next step.
- Name the organisation and responsible author consistently.
- Keep pricing conditions, policies and availability current where they affect a decision.
- Link deeper explanations to the service they support, using descriptive words.
- Keep an existing useful page when it already answers the question well.
How do you make a website readable without rebuilding it?
Audit representative pages and fix barriers before changing the architecture.
Choose the homepage, an important service, an article and a conversion page. Check that the main answer, links and company details appear in the rendered page. Confirm that the intended public URLs return successfully and identify the correct canonical. Inspect mobile readability, navigation and form labels as part of the same review.
Google advises keeping important content available as text and ensuring structured data agrees with visible content. Use relevant supported markup, such as an article's author and date. Adding fields that do not reflect the page creates a consistency problem; it does not create expertise.
For ecommerce, carry the same discipline into product variants, availability and policies. A beautifully written buying guide cannot correct contradictory stock information in the systems receiving an order.
Sources: Google Search Central — AI features and your website
How should you measure AI discovery?
Combine platform reporting with qualified visits and business outcomes; keep sampled AI answers in a separate observation log.
Google announced dedicated generative AI performance reports in Search Console in June 2026, with a worldwide rollout note dated 31 August. Use the current reports available for your property and keep their definitions alongside your baseline. They describe Google's surfaces, not all AI discovery.
Record enquiry quality and conversion behaviour for the pages you improve. Referrer data can help identify some visits, but it cannot reveal every conversation that influenced a customer. Avoid treating unattributed traffic as proof of AI impact.
For spot checks, use a repeatable set of genuine buyer questions. Record the engine, query, date, location, cited URL and whether the answer describes your business accurately. A handful of answers is a diagnostic sample, not a stable global ranking. Compare patterns over time before deciding that a change worked.
Sources: Google Search Central — Generative AI performance reports, June 2026; August rollout update
What should you prioritise first?
Repair factual and access problems, strengthen a small set of useful pages, then expand around unanswered questions.
Start with pages closest to a real buying decision. Assign an owner to each material fact, record the current state and make a limited set of changes. Preserve valuable URLs, existing internal links and working conversion paths. Recheck those behaviours after publication.
This creates a maintainable knowledge base for visitors and discovery systems. It also gives the team a clearer reason for every article it publishes: a specific question, a credible answer and a useful next step. Neither formatting nor publication volume guarantees inclusion in search or an AI answer.
Common questions
Do we need a separate AI version of our website?
Usually the first step is to improve the public information you already maintain. A separate version can create conflicting facts and extra maintenance. Check the actual requirements of any specific platform before building another publishing channel.
Can structured data guarantee an AI citation?
No. Markup describes the page; it does not guarantee indexing, selection or a recommendation. Use it accurately as part of a useful, accessible website.