SEO for AI: ChatGPT, Gemini and AI Overviews

Are “SEO for AI” and “GEO” the same thing?

Yes. The field is so new that no single word has settled yet, so people search for it with the language they already know: “SEO for AI”, “SEO for ChatGPT”, “ranking in Gemini”, “showing up in AI Overviews” or “optimization for LLMs”. All of those phrases point to one and the same thing.

The technical term taking hold is GEO, short for Generative Engine Optimization. You'll also see AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), which puts the focus on the answer. The acronym doesn't matter: we're talking about making sure that, when someone asks an AI “where can I have a good dinner around here?” or “which physio do you recommend?”, your business is among the few names that come up. We go into it in depth, without jargon, in what GEO is.

The difference with classic SEO isn't the underlying engine —they share a lot— but the goal. SEO wants you to get clicked in a list of links; GEO wants you to be named inside an answer that's already written. And where ten results used to fit on the first page, an AI answer often fits just three or four names. The space narrows; that's why the work of being included starts to matter so much.

Why talk about “SEO for AI” right now?

Because how people search has changed. More and more people, instead of opening Google and scanning links, ask a chatbot directly and stick with its answer. When that happens, a business the AI does not know about simply doesn't exist for whoever asked.

That figure is context, not a promise. More than one in three internet users in Spain —that 35 % above— already ask AI where to buy, where to eat or who to call. And almost no local business has done anything yet to appear in those answers. That window —being there early where almost no one is yet— is exactly what GEO works on.

Is the work the same for each AI? What matters in each engine

The foundation is shared across all of them —a fast, readable website, structured data, a well-kept Google Business Profile and real reviews— but each engine draws on different sources, so there are nuances. Here's the picture engine by engine, so you understand where each one puts the weight:

The pattern is plain to see: there's a shared foundation (a readable website, schema, reviews, brand consistency) that works for all four, and then a per-engine adjustment —Bing for ChatGPT, Google's ecosystem for AI Overviews and Gemini, citable content for Perplexity—. Doing the shared foundation well covers most of the way for all of them.

What are Google's AI Overviews?

The AI Overviews are the AI-generated summaries Google shows at the top of some results, above the blue links we've always known. Instead of just giving you a list, Google writes you an answer and sometimes names businesses or sources within it.

For a business, appearing inside that summary is part of GEO work on Google's side, and the good news is that it builds on foundations you already know from SEO: clear content that answers the question directly, structured data that tells Google what you are, and authority built over time. There's no trick to “get into” AI Overviews; there's well-done work that makes it more likely.

What does the SEO for AI work actually involve?

These are the building blocks the work is built on, shared across all engines and then fine-tuned to each one. It's not a list of promises: it's what gets done so the AI has material to understand you and name you.

1. A website the AI can read and extract from. Clear text, direct answers, well organised. If your website is a pretty image with no readable information, no engine has anything to pull from.
2. Structured data (schema). Technical markup that tells the machine, with no ambiguity, what you are, where you are, what hours you keep and what you offer. It matters especially in Google AI Overviews and Gemini.
3. Bing indexing. Since ChatGPT relies largely on Bing when it searches the web, making sure you're properly listed there —not just on Google— directly moves your presence in ChatGPT.
4. A complete Google Business Profile. The piece that moves both Google Maps and the AI recommendations from Google's ecosystem the most. We cover it in local SEO on Google Maps.
5. Citable content and real reviews. Verifiable data (so Perplexity can cite you) and genuine customer opinions, which are one of the signals the AI uses most to decide who to recommend. Never fake or bought: the law forbids it and the AI detects it.
6. llms.txt file and brand consistency. A file designed so the models quickly find the essentials of your business, and a name, address and phone number that say the same thing everywhere, so no engine doubts who you are.

If you want to see this turned into concrete steps for your business, you'll find it in the guide how to appear in ChatGPT. And for the full picture of how Google and AI fit together, there's our Google + AI ranking page.

And what will you NOT hear us promise?

This is the uncomfortable part almost no one in the industry puts in writing. We say it because it's what sets us apart:

• We don't guarantee that ChatGPT, Gemini, AI Overviews or Perplexity will cite you. No outsider controls any of their algorithms.
• We don't sell “pay per result” or “you only pay if the AI names you”: that would be dishonest, because it depends on many things beyond us.
• There's no ad and no fee to “show up” in AI answers. Anyone selling you that is selling you snake oil.

What we do promise is the work: doing it well, doing it every month across the different engines and showing it to you in a report. That's SEO for AI done honestly: raising the odds, not faking a result.