AI search visibility (GEO): how to get cited by ChatGPT & co.
What Generative Engine Optimization is, how AI assistants pick which websites to recommend, and the concrete steps that make your site citable.
Why this matters now
A growing share of buying decisions starts with a question to ChatGPT, Perplexity or Google's AI Overviews instead of a classic search. The AI's answer usually names a handful of brands — and everyone else is invisible. Getting into those answers is what GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) are about.
The good news: AI systems read the same web as Google. Much of what works for SEO works here too — but a few things matter disproportionately more.
1. Let AI crawlers in
Each AI provider reads the web with its own crawler: GPTBot (OpenAI), ClaudeBot (Anthropic), PerplexityBot, Google-Extended. Your robots.txt file decides which of them may read your site. Many sites block them all by accident — a blanket rule copied from a template — and then wonder why AI never mentions them.
Blocking AI crawlers is a legitimate choice (for example for paywalled content). It should just be a conscious one: whoever the AI can't read, it can't recommend.
2. Say who you are in structured data
Structured data (JSON-LD, schema.org) is a machine-readable summary embedded in your pages: this is a business, this is its name, address, offering, opening hours. AI systems use it to build a factual profile of your brand — facts you control, in a format they can't misread.
Minimum: an Organization or LocalBusiness block on your homepage with name, url, logo, contact and sameAs links to your social and directory profiles. Then add types matching your content: Product, Service, Article, FAQPage.
3. Write content an AI can quote
AI answers are assembled from snippets. Content gets cited when it contains liftable units: a crisp one-sentence definition, a bullet list of steps, a concrete number, a short Q&A. A 1,500-word wall of storytelling gives the AI nothing to grab.
Practical rules: one idea per paragraph, descriptive headings (ideally real questions), bullet lists for enumerations, explicit facts (prices, dates, dimensions) in text, and an FAQ section answering what customers actually ask.
4. Prove you're real (E-E-A-T)
Language models are trained to prefer trustworthy sources — sites that show who is behind them. A visible About page, real contact details, named authors on articles and consistency with external records (Google Business Profile, registries, reviews) all feed that trust assessment.
This is also the part a single-page scan can't fully measure: your off-site authority. Reviews, mentions in media and links from established sites remain the strongest long-term signal — for AI just as for Google.
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