What are SEO, AEO, and GEO? How they differ and which one a small business website needs first

SEO (search engine optimization) is about getting your website indexed, ranked, and clicked in search results on Google and other search engines. AEO (answer engine optimization) is about getting your content used directly as the answer to a question, such as in a featured snippet or a voice assistant's reply. GEO (generative engine optimization) is about getting cited or mentioned by search products that compose their own answers, such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews. These aren't three separate projects. They rest on a single foundation: a website that machines can read, content that says things clearly, and information that's consistent and credible. So the order for a small business website is simple. Get the SEO basics right first, then go a step further on how AI reads and cites your pages.

This article explains what each term means, how AI summaries are actually affecting clicks, what Google officially says about generative AI search, and eight checks you can run yourself today. If you're still working out your budget, start with what web design costs. If your current website has more serious problems, see whether to redesign or rebuild. The mobile basics are covered in full in what responsive web design is.

A note on terminology: SEO and AEO are industry terms with no official definition. GEO comes from a research paper titled "GEO: Generative Engine Optimization," accepted at the KDD 2024 data mining conference (arXiv, GEO paper). For Google's position, we rely on the official Google Search Central documentation.

The difference is where results appear, not how the website is built

All three share the same groundwork. What changes is where your content ends up and how you measure whether it worked.

	SEO	AEO	GEO
Goal	Be found and clicked	Be used as the answer	Be cited or mentioned by generative search
Where it shows up	Standard search results	Featured snippets, voice answers	ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and AI Mode
How to measure it	Rankings, clicks, inquiries	Whether a snippet uses your content	Whether you're mentioned, and described accurately
Origin of the term	Industry term	Industry term	Introduced in a research paper, later adopted by the industry
Shared foundation	Readable website, clear content, consistent and credible information	Same	Same

Because the foundation is shared, any proposal that splits these into three separate fees deserves a follow-up question: what work is actually different?

Why rankings alone are no longer enough

The short answer: ranking first no longer guarantees a visit, and being cited inside an AI summary has become a new kind of visibility in its own right.

• People click on standard results noticeably less when an AI summary appears. Pew Research Center analyzed 68,879 Google searches made by 900 US adults in March 2025. On pages with an AI summary, users clicked a standard search result on 8% of visits, compared with 15% on pages without one. Only 1% clicked a link inside the summary itself (Pew Research Center, AI summaries and clicks).
• Even the top-ranking page loses clicks. SEO tool maker Ahrefs found in April 2025 that AI Overviews reduced clicks to the top-ranking page by 34.5%. An update published in February 2026, based on 300,000 keywords, put the drop in average click-through rate at 58% (Ahrefs, AI Overviews and CTR update). This is a correlation, and results will vary by industry, but the direction is clear.
• Queries are getting longer. Someone who once typed "bookkeeper Taipei" may now ask, "I just started a company in Taipei. Which bookkeeper has transparent fees and can handle everything online?" Only websites that clearly state who they are, whom they serve, and on what terms can answer that kind of question.

Google says optimizing for generative AI search is still SEO

Google's documentation, "Optimizing your website for generative AI features on Google Search," is direct. Here are the key points (Google Search Central, generative AI features guide):

• It's still SEO. Optimizing for generative AI search is optimizing for the search experience, so it remains SEO.
• No AI-specific files or markup. You don't need llms.txt (a website summary file intended for AI tools) or any other AI-only files or markup. Google Search doesn't use them.
• No special schema. Structured data (markup in the page that tells machines what type of content it holds) still helps with rich results in regular search, but generative AI features don't require any special schema.
• No need to break content into fragments. Google's systems can handle pages covering several topics, and the guide says there's no ideal page length.
• Indexing comes first. A page must be indexed and eligible to appear with a snippet in search results before it can show up in AI features.
• Nothing is guaranteed. Meeting every requirement doesn't guarantee crawling, indexing, or serving.
• A first-hand perspective matters. Google recommends content with a unique point of view, such as first-hand experience, over restating information that's already available elsewhere.

Research shows content that cites its evidence gets cited more

The GEO paper tested a range of writing approaches across a large set of queries and found that the right optimizations can boost visibility in generative engine answers by up to about 40% (arXiv, GEO paper abstract).

• Citing sources, adding quotations, and adding statistics performed best. The paper identifies these three as its top-performing methods (arXiv, GEO paper full text).
• Keyword stuffing barely helps. The same paper found that keyword stuffing, a common traditional SEO tactic, offered little to no improvement in generative engine answers and in some tests did worse than no optimization at all (arXiv, GEO paper full text).

For a small business, the most practical takeaway is to make your case studies concrete: what was done, how long it took, and what the results were.

How 留白設計 BLANK DESIGN handles SEO, AEO, and GEO

We build the foundation into the code instead of relying on plug-ins, then strengthen the content where needed.

• Basic SEO is part of every build, at no extra charge. Every website is custom-built. The text of each page sits directly in the page source, so search engines can read it without running complex scripts. Structured data is written for each page type and matches the text on screen.
• Content structure can be taken further. When clients want to go further, we offer GEO and AEO as an add-on service: reorganizing service descriptions, FAQs, and case studies so that each page gives the answer first and the details second.
• We only promise what we can deliver. No one can guarantee that a particular AI will recommend you. What we can do is make your website readable, clear, and consistent.

Case study　A website redesign for Lijia, an accounting and tax firm, which received inquiries from more than 20 companies within two months of launch

Eight things you can check yourself

None of these require special tools, and together they'll give you a rough idea of where the problems are.

1. Search for your company name in a private browsing window. Check that your own website appears on the first page and that the details are correct.
2. Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google the same question. For example, "Recommend a [your service] in [your city]." Note whether you appear and which websites get cited.
3. Make sure key content is text, not images. Try selecting it with your mouse. If you can't select it, search engines probably can't read it either.
4. Check that the first paragraph of each service page says who you are, whom you serve, and roughly what it costs.
5. Check that your name, phone number, address, and hours match across your website, Google Business Profile, and social media accounts.
6. Confirm that your website is indexed in Search Console (Google's free website management tool). Google's guide also says to make sure your website is eligible for generative AI features.
7. Show update dates on important pages. Dated prices and service details help both readers and search engines judge whether information is current.
8. Give your case studies real numbers and client names. "Improved conversions" says far less than "inquiries from more than 20 companies in two months."

When this isn't worth doing yet

In these situations, there's no need to spend money on GEO or AEO right now:

• Your website isn't indexed yet, or your basic details are wrong. Fix indexing and consistency first. Until then, any advanced optimization has nothing to stand on.
• Most of your work comes from referrals and you're already at capacity. Keeping your website accurate and clear is enough, with no need to chase more exposure.
• You expect guaranteed rankings or guaranteed AI recommendations. Google itself says indexing and serving aren't guaranteed, so treat any offer that promises results with skepticism.
• You only want to add an llms.txt file. Google Search doesn't use it, so it shouldn't be a priority.

FAQ

Do SEO, AEO, and GEO need to be done separately?

No. They share the same foundation, and Google states that optimizing for generative AI search is still SEO (Google Search Central, generative AI features guide). In practice, if you get the SEO basics right during the build and strengthen the content structure later as needed, you won't pay three times for the same work.

Does SEO still matter now that people use AI search?

Yes, it's a prerequisite. Google's AI features require a page to be indexed and eligible to appear with a snippet (Google Search Central, generative AI features guide). Without an SEO foundation, there's nothing for AI to cite.

Does my website need an llms.txt file?

Not necessarily. Google says you don't need llms.txt or similar files for AI, and Google Search doesn't use them (Google Search Central, generative AI features guide). Other services may read it, and it does no harm, but it isn't a priority.

Can anyone guarantee ChatGPT will recommend my company?

No one can. Generative search answers change depending on the question, the user, and the moment. What you can do is make sure your website's information is clear, consistent, and credible when it's read, which improves your chances of being cited and described accurately.

What to prepare

Having these ready lets the first conversation get straight to the point:

• Your current website address, plus links to your Google Business Profile and social media accounts.
• The two or three services you most want to be found for, and how clients usually describe what they need.
• Questions you've asked AI tools, with screenshots of what ChatGPT or Google showed you.
• Case studies and numbers you can share publicly, such as how long a project took and the types of clients you've served.
• Whether you have Search Console access. If not, that's fine: we can help you check.

When you're ready, book a free consultation. We'll review your website first, then tell you what to fix first.