5 Key Variations Regardless of the Similarities

In 30 seconds, right here’s what it is advisable know in regards to the variations between search engine optimization and GEO:

• search engine optimization (Search Engine Optimization): Getting your web site to indicate up in Google searches. Purpose: Get folks to click on your hyperlink.
• GEO (Generative Engine Optimization): Getting AI chatbots like ChatGPT to say your model or data. Purpose: Get AI to cite and point out you.
• Major variations: search engine optimization brings guests to your web site. GEO places your model or content material instantly in AI solutions (no click on wanted). search engine optimization brings high-volume visitors that explores your website. GEO will convey much less visitors to your website instantly, however these guests could also be extra prone to convert.
• What to do: Begin with good search engine optimization (it’s nonetheless important), then add GEO techniques like together with extra unique information, protecting your most necessary content material up-to-date, or getting your model talked about extra throughout the net.
• Backside line: You want each. Consider search engine optimization as your basis and GEO as future-proofing your on-line presence.

Need the complete story? Learn on.

As you most likely already know, Search Engine Optimization (search engine optimization) is the observe of bettering your web site so it seems increased in Google, Bing, or different search engine outcomes when folks seek for matters associated to your enterprise.

The aim: get folks to click on in your hyperlink within the SERPs and go to your web site.

How serps work

Search engines like google and yahoo work in three important steps:

1. Crawling. Applications known as net crawlers (or spiders) browse the web, following hyperlinks and gathering webpages.
2. Indexing. The collected pages are analyzed and saved in an enormous database known as the search index.
3. Rating. Once you kind in a search, the engine seems to be by means of the index and makes use of an algorithm to type the outcomes, displaying essentially the most related pages first.

Briefly, whenever you seek for one thing, the search engine scans its index for matches, ranks them by relevance, after which reveals you the very best outcomes on the search engine outcomes web page (SERP). AI search works otherwise—extra on that in a bit.

Key search engine optimization methods

In observe, search engine optimization is about utilizing the precise key phrases, creating useful content material, incomes trusted hyperlinks, and ensuring your website is quick, protected, and straightforward to make use of. Listed below are the core methods:

• Key phrases analysis: Discovering and utilizing the phrases and phrases your prospects truly seek for.
• On-page search engine optimization: Creating useful, detailed data that solutions search intent.
• Off-page search engine optimization: Getting different respected web sites to hyperlink to yours.
• Technical search engine optimization: Making your website free from important search engine optimization errors. Largely: making your website simple for serps to crawl, protected for customers, easy to navigate, quick to load, and mobile-friendly.

GEO, quick for Generative Engine Optimization (often known as AEO or LLMO), is the method of getting your model talked about, cited, and precisely represented in AI-generated solutions. That features outcomes from AI assistants like ChatGPT, Google’s AI Overviews, and Google’s AI Mode.

In different phrases, GEO is search engine optimization for AI search.

How AI search works

With ChatGPT, the way in which it responds depends upon whether or not it makes use of net looking (additionally known as grounding) to seek out the reply:

• No looking: It generates solutions from patterns it discovered throughout coaching. It doesn’t pull from a stay product database, simply from its frozen information (as much as August 2023).
• With looking: It searches the net, picks helpful pages, and summarizes them so the reply relies on contemporary data.

Key GEO techniques

All of those are coated intimately in our GEO information, however right here’s the fast model:

• Third-party mentions: Get your model talked about throughout trade websites, “better of” lists, and assessment platforms (most AI citations come from different websites, not yours).
• AI-preferred content material: Create how-to guides, comparability pages (“X vs Y”), information research, and “better of” lists – these get the very best AI visitors.
• Info and statistics: Embody particular, verifiable numbers and information that AI can confidently cite.
• Multi-platform presence: Construct visibility on YouTube (2nd most cited by AI Overviews) and Reddit (third most cited).
• Structured Info: Use clear headings, Q&A codecs, bullet factors, and schema markup for machine readability.
• Recent content material: Preserve data up to date frequently – AI prefers citing newer content material over older pages.

The important thing distinction between search engine optimization and GEO comes from how the search expertise works. With AI solutions, customers don’t must click on hyperlinks as typically, however once they do, it’s often as a result of they need a deeper understanding or are able to strive the product the AI beneficial. That in flip creates a special set of metrics to monitor.

In search engine optimization, your web site seems as a hyperlink in search outcomes.

In GEO, your data or model seems instantly contained in the AI’s reply.

If hyperlinks seem in AI-generated solutions, they’re far much less seen (and redundant from the angle of customers who needed a fast reply). In AI Overviews, they’ll seem contextually with a small hyperlink icon subsequent to a time period, on the right-hand panel, or on the very backside.

In search engine optimization, the person journey sometimes seems to be like this: they seek for one thing, see your hyperlink, click on to your web site, and browse your content material.

In GEO, the journey is totally different: the person asks a query, the AI gives a solution utilizing your data, and the person could by no means go to your website in any respect, a minimum of in a roundabout way from the AI reply (that is known as a ‘zero-click’ search).

PEW Analysis Middle lately studied how searches work together with Google’s AI Overviews, proving the “zero click on” phenomenon.

They discovered that customers click on on search outcomes solely 8% of the time when AI summaries seem vs 15% with out them – that’s practically 50% fewer clicks. Only one% of customers click on on sources cited within the AI abstract itself. What’s extra, 26% of customers finish their session fully after seeing an AI abstract (vs 16% for conventional search).

Success in search engine optimization is measured with metrics like key phrase rankings, backlinks, natural visitors, and natural share of voice. That is a part of the “click on economics,” as a result of your outcomes depend upon convincing folks to click on by means of to your website.

In contrast, success in GEO is measured with metrics like model mentions in AI solutions, citations when your content material is referenced, AI referral visitors, and AI share of voice. That is “visibility economics,” the place the extra typically your model seems in AI responses, the extra possible customers are to belief and select you, even when they by no means click on.

Right here’s what a GEO dashboard seems to be like, a screenshot from Ahrefs’ Model Radar. The core distinction is that there are not any key phrase rankings. As an alternative, you see how standard a model is inside a selected AI’s responses, and the way that reputation modifications over time.

One other key distinction is the place mentions come from. In search engine optimization, your individual website is the first asset—you optimize your pages to rank as hyperlinks in search outcomes. In GEO, nonetheless, most model mentions in AI responses originate from third‑social gathering websites relatively than your individual area. Because of this, GEO could grow to be a extra interdisciplinary effort than search engine optimization (requiring, for instance, PR and influencer advertising).

Trade rankings, “better of” lists, assessment platforms, PR protection, and buyer case research typically dominate as the highest sources AI assistants depend on. For instance, in Google’s AI Overviews, the highest pages mentioning Ahrefs didn’t embrace ahrefs.com at all.

These mentions don’t even must be linked. AI can decide up unlinked references simply as simply. This makes broad visibility throughout the net extra necessary than ever.

To search out websites that always seem in AI solutions, simply plug their area in Ahrefs’ Website Explorer and take a look at the AI quotation rely within the Overview report:

Visitors from AI search seems to be totally different from conventional natural search. Guests from AI are inclined to view fewer pages (4 vs. 5.2) however spend barely extra time on them (86s vs. 78s). In addition they have a better bounce fee (67.8% vs. 63.7%), suggesting they arrive with a transparent, particular aim (supply).

AI search additionally drives customers to homepages, product pages, and instruments extra typically than natural search, whereas natural search brings extra visitors to worldwide pages.

Most significantly, AI visitors can convert at a a lot increased fee. Within the case of Ahrefs, it was 23x greater than natural search; regardless of being simply 0.5% of visitors, it generates over 12% of signups.

That stated, conversion charges will fluctuate by website. As this current examine from Amsive reveals, not each web site sees the identical uplift from LLM-driven visitors.

Regardless of their variations, search engine optimization and GEO share necessary frequent floor primarily based on content material high quality and model authority.

Each search engine optimization and GEO depend upon having helpful content material, which builds topical authority. On the finish of the day, serps and AI instruments are designed to convey folks the knowledge they’re on the lookout for. The important thing distinction is in how the reply is delivered: serps level you to hyperlinks, whereas AI typically provides you the reply instantly.

Living proof, Ahrefs’ content material and product pages have been talked about 7,470 occasions throughout 2,309 pages with none particular effort to optimize for AI. That’s as a result of new search applied sciences nonetheless depend on the identical basis: high quality, helpful content material.

Each methods concentrate on understanding what individuals are actually on the lookout for and offering the very best reply (the search intent).

Whether or not somebody searches Google for “finest undertaking administration software program” or asks ChatGPT one thing extra particular like “What’s the very best undertaking administration software for a crew of 30 beneath $50?”, the intent doesn’t change. They’re on the lookout for the highest choices, the explanations behind these suggestions, and a transparent comparability to assist them determine.

Google Search and AI assistants each depend on outdoors content material; they don’t generate solutions out of skinny air. Which means they face the identical problem: deciding which sources to belief. That is the place your popularity as an professional turns into precious for each search engine optimization and GEO.

Similar to in conventional search engine optimization, model authority is a significant component in GEO. Branded mentions throughout the net present a powerful connection to visibility in AI Overviews (correlation of 0.664). Moreover, manufacturers within the high 25% for net mentions earn over 10x extra AI Overview placements than the following tier down.

And that’s not simply true for AI Overviews. AI Assistants additionally lean closely on well-known sources. The primary distinction is that they have an inclination to quote a barely totally different set of websites.

Merely put, the extra folks discuss your model on-line, the extra possible AI is to characteristic you.

Search engines like google and yahoo and AI assistants nonetheless depend on crawlers to fetch and course of pages. AI struggles with heavy JavaScript, however it sometimes respects robots.txt guidelines. If they’ll’t entry or interpret your content material appropriately, neither search engine optimization nor GEO will work.

Consider search engine optimization as your basis and GEO because the improve. You want search engine optimization first as a result of it’s established, drives most net visitors, and gives the bottom that AI programs typically be taught from. 

However GEO issues too, as a result of AI search is rising, and the “zero-click” pattern is accelerating as extra AI Overviews roll out. What’s extra, Adobe’s current examine discovered that three in 10 U.S. respondents belief ChatGPT greater than different serps, and 36% of the folks surveyed found a brand new product or model by means of ChatGPT.

For those who’re curious in regards to the world visitors shift, try our AI vs. Search Visitors Evaluation dashboard, which pulls information from over 50,000 websites. As an example, from January to August 2025, Google held a 41.13% visitors share, whereas ChatGPT accounted for 0.21%.

Closing ideas

Anxious you’re falling behind? Don’t panic. search engine optimization dies yearly and lives without end. The identical qualities that make content material sturdy for search engine optimization additionally work for GEO. By including GEO methods to your search engine optimization efforts and keeping track of your AI visibility, you’ll be well-positioned for at the moment and ready for what’s subsequent.

Obtained questions or feedback? Let me know on LinkedIn.