GEO, AEO, LLM SEO, AI SEO: one job, four names
The terms appeared one after the other and nobody owns them. GEO (generative engine optimization) is the most used. AEO (answer engine optimization), LLM SEO and AI SEO describe the same goal: be one of the three to five names an AI answer gives. Google’s own guidance treats it as part of SEO.
So when an agency sells GEO as something completely separate from SEO, ask what exactly is different in the work. Usually the answer is: the measurement and the focus on other sources, not a secret technique.
How an AI engine picks the names it gives
When a question needs current facts, the engine runs a search, reads a handful of pages and writes an answer from them. Three things decide whether you are in it: can the engine fetch and read your pages, does it understand which company you are, and do other sources it trusts mention you for this question.
That is why the engines differ. Gemini and Google’s AI Overviews draw on Google’s index; several assistants use Bing; Perplexity and ChatGPT run their own crawlers next to it. Each picks its own sources, so you need to know what all of them say.
What GEO work consists of
First the technical base: AI crawlers allowed in robots.txt and in your firewall, key pages readable without JavaScript, the company described in structured data, and the same name, address and description on every profile.
Then the content: direct answers to the questions buyers really ask, one page or section per question, in each language your buyers use. And then the part most sites skip: earning mentions on the lists, comparisons, trade press and review sites the engines cite for your category.
The guide walks through all eight steps in the order we use for clients.
How to measure it honestly
AI answers change from one run to the next, so a single screenshot proves nothing. Freeze a set of buyer questions before the work starts, ask each one several times in each engine every month, and keep the raw answers with engine, date and run. Then the trend is real.
That is how we work, and our method is public. Nobody can guarantee a place in an answer; anyone who promises “number one in ChatGPT” is showing you the clearest warning sign in this field.
Who does this at ToBeFound
Simon has worked on search visibility since 2013, first in Google and now in AI answers. With the ToBeFound team he serves clients anywhere in the world, in English, Spanish, Dutch and German.