What is Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO)?
Generative engine optimisation (GEO) is the work of making your brand the source that AI assistants, including ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, Copilot and Google AI Overviews, cite and recommend when shoppers ask what to buy. You'll also hear it called answer engine optimisation (AEO), AI search or AI visibility. GEO on Monday, AEO on Tuesday, GXO on Wednesday: there's a new acronym every week. They all describe one discipline, and underneath the hype it runs on the same fundamentals SEO always has: relevance, authority and experience.
"Rooted in SEO" doesn't make it easy, though. The content, the citations, the structured authority and the measurement are all different. That's why we built a methodology to win it.
Why GEO matters for eCommerce now
Discovery doesn't work the way it used to. Search engines and AI don't surface "the best websites". They surface specific products from brands they trust.
- Pages → Products
- Lists → Recommendations
- Volume → Trust
Customers don't want ten options, and the platforms don't show ten. They show one or two. So the question is no longer "how visible is our site?" It's "are we the brand the platforms choose to recommend?"
Try it now. Ask ChatGPT to recommend a brand in your category. If it doesn't name you, that's revenue going to whoever it did name. Most eCommerce brands are invisible in AI answers and have no idea why. The brands that measure and build for this now take share while their competitors stand still.
SEO vs GEO vs AEO
GEO and AEO are two names for the same thing: optimising for AI-generated answers. SEO is the foundation underneath them. AI search works in three stages, and we cover all three.
Stage | Focus | Optimisation Examples | Analogy |
|---|---|---|---|
Search Engine (Retrieval) | SEO Crawl, index, rank | Internal links, meta tags, site speed, and architecture | "You're seen" |
Relevance Engine (Reranking) | AEO Match intent & context | Topic depth, persona fit, originality | "You're relevant" |
Answer Engine (Output) | DPR Authority & trust | Brand mentions, citations, external validation | "You're mentioned" |
If you don't have good SEO, you won't have good GEO, because AI can't recommend what it can't discover. SEO isn't dead. GEO is how organic search has evolved.
Technical GEO and AI crawlability
Many LLM bots are less sophisticated than Google. Many don't render JavaScript at all. We audit what AI crawlers can actually see and fix it, covering robots.txt and AI bot access, server-rendered content, site architecture, internal linking and structured data (Product, Organization, FAQ and more).
Content and product data structured for LLMs
We restructure category pages, product pages and buying guides so a model can lift a clear answer straight from them. That means topic depth, persona fit, original insight, clean product attributes and consistent brand facts everywhere AI looks.
Digital PR for authority and citations
Digital PR now includes citation building. You need backlinks to rank, so LLMs can retrieve your content. You also need coverage in the publications each LLM sees as authoritative, and these can differ from the sources that built your existing SEO rankings. You could argue AI search needs roughly twice as much Digital PR as traditional SEO. We place your brand where AI looks, and we point that coverage at your commercial pages.
AI visibility tracking and reporting
We track your visibility across the major AI engines by topic and against competitors, find where you're being left out, and report on your share of AI answers and your NOVOS Signal score.
Everything You Need to Know About GEO
A GEO agency helps your brand get cited and recommended in AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, Copilot and Google AI Overviews. In practice, that means technical work so AI crawlers can read your site, content and product data structured for LLMs, Digital PR to build authority, and tracking your share of AI answers against competitors.
Look for an agency that works only in eCommerce, combines SEO and Digital PR, has a named way of measuring AI visibility, and can show real results. NOVOS is a UK GEO agency built for eCommerce. We measure every brand with NOVOS Signal, and our work made Osprey the #1 brand in AI answers in its category, with a 72.6% share of AI answers.
GEO (generative engine optimisation) and AEO (answer engine optimisation) are two names for optimising your brand for AI-generated answers. SEO is the foundation: AI assistants retrieve from search results, so if you aren't discovered and ranked, you won't be recommended. GEO adds the content, citation and measurement work that AI answers need.
Make sure AI crawlers can access and read your site, structure your category and product content so it answers buying questions clearly, and earn repeat coverage in the publications ChatGPT trusts for your category. Then track how often you're named against competitors and keep building where you're missing.
Strong SEO comes first, because AI Overviews draw on pages Google already ranks and trusts. Add clear, structured product and category content, accurate structured data and authoritative third-party coverage that links to your commercial pages.
Yes. It's one of the biggest levers. Each AI assistant has its own idea of which sources are authoritative, and they often differ from the sites that built your SEO rankings. Digital PR earns citations in those sources, and coverage that points to your category and product pages strengthens commercial intent.
Not always. Many LLM crawlers don't run JavaScript, so content that only appears after scripts load can be invisible to them. Robots.txt rules or firewalls can also block AI bots. We test what AI crawlers actually receive and make sure your key content is in the server-rendered HTML.
Our Work in Action
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Osprey
How Osprey became the #1 brand in AI answers in its category.
The Body Shop UK
How The Body Shop grew non-brand organic traffic by 33% while brand search fell
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Vitabiotics
Supplementing Vitabiotics Growth with 46% More Revenue
Osprey
Unpacking 40% Growth Across 4 Key Markets for Osprey
Pooch & Mutt
Pawesome >200% revenue growth across core categories
Piglet in Bed
Successfully Building 2,000+ Authoritative Pieces of Coverage for Piglet in Bed
Confused.com
How our integrated SEO and digital PR strategy led to an impressive 376% increase in YoY conversions for Confused.com
A CMO's Guide to AI Search
Report to a board that's asking about AI? This guide cuts through the noise of what AEO actually is, how it differs from SEO, and how LLMs decide which brands to surface. Built for eCommerce leaders who want the competitive advantage before everyone else catches on.
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Ready to be the answerTM in your category?
Find out where your brand stands in AI search and what it takes to win it.