You have probably seen three new terms this year: AEO, GEO and AI SEO. They sound like three new skills. Here is what each one means.
What the terms mean
- AEO (answer engine optimization): making your content easy for tools that give answers (Google’s AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity) to find and use.
- GEO (generative engine optimization): almost the same idea. It is about being mentioned or cited when an AI writes an answer.
- AI SEO: a catch-all label for doing SEO with AI search in mind.
What Google says
In mid-May 2026 Google published a guide called “Optimizing your website for generative AI features on Google Search”. Its main message, as reported by Search Engine Journal and Search Engine Land: AEO and GEO are not separate things. Optimizing for AI search is still SEO.
The guide also lists some myths. According to the coverage, Google says you do not need:
- an llms.txt file (we explain this in our llms.txt article);
- special markup or special schema just for AI features;
- to chop your content into tiny pieces for AI systems.
What Google says to focus on instead:
- Content that adds something new. Google calls it “non-commodity content”: insight beyond what everyone already knows.
- The technical basics: pages that can be crawled, clean HTML, JavaScript done properly, good page experience, and less duplicate content.
- For shops and local businesses: keep your Merchant Center feeds and Google Business Profile up to date.
Danny Sullivan said something similar earlier: good SEO is good GEO, and great content for people works for AI search too.
The other side of the argument
Not everyone agrees Google’s guide tells the whole story. Search Engine Land published a commentary calling it “naive and self-serving”. Its point: AI tools also lean on what the rest of the web says about you, such as Wikipedia, Reddit and other publications. So being mentioned elsewhere can matter, not only what is on your own site.
Also, Google’s guide is about Google. ChatGPT and Perplexity may weigh things differently, and the guide does not settle that.
What this means for you
- Do not buy a new “AEO service” before the basics are solid. Crawling, clear writing and original insight come first.
- Write answers clearly, but do not chop pages into robot-sized bits.
- Be useful enough that other sites and communities talk about you.
- Treat advice from tool vendors as ideas to test, not rules.
Next: see what query fan-out is and a practical checklist for AI search.
