So what’s the difference between GEO and SEO? Many agencies will tell you they optimize for AI. They’re experts in GEO or AEO. In 2026, most companies that do SEO are also doing GEO and AEO. The differences are really pretty minor. Agencies that try to sell you an SEO package based on their AI optimization skills should be avoided or at the very least their recommendations taken with a grain of salt.
GEO – Generative Engine Optimization
AI bots process the content on your website a little differently than search engines. AI bots will crawl the live web, looking for citations and other sources of information. After these bots finish crawling sources on the web and search engines, they display a summary of results. AI bots don’t actually index content in the way that search engines do. GEO, or generative engine optimization, focuses on making your content searchable by AI bots. Popular bots include:
- ChatGPT
- Perplexity
- Google Gemini
- Google AI Overview / Mode (embedded in Search)
- ChatGPT Instant Shopping (late 2025)
GEO also focuses a little bit more on building out offsite citations and also links. GEO techniques are typically part digital PR and part local SEO. These tactics have existed for decades, so they’re not really inventing anything. Just be aware that when you hire a company for GEO that you’re hiring them to do more traditional tactics like digital PR and citation building. These tactics have existed as part of SEO for many years, way before ChatGPT.
AI Bot Management & Measurement
One major overlooked tactic for GEO is bot management. If your GEO agency isn’t talking about bot visibility and monitoring how AI bots are entering your website, then its time to move on. Vanity metrics like AI authority scores and mentions are OK, but knowing how frequently and how successful these LLM bots are at reaching your content is key. Tools like CloudFlare have rolled out deeper insights into bots and how they access your website.
With cutting edge DNS monitoring tools, its clear to see how many and how often the LLM bots access your website. This may be one of the best ways to truly measure content popularity in major AI search tools.
Do I Need GEO or AEO Software?
Software companies are pitching automation tools or deeper AI analytics. With ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews only accounting for 3-5% of all clicks to your website, these tools have limited value for most brands. For now, most GEO SEO tools provided by major software vendors like SEM Rush or Ahrefs are more than enough for basic measurement. They still lack accurate niche tracking that smaller businesses require for hyper-local searched phrases. That $800 a month you spend on ChatGPT metrics is probably better spent on other tactics, ad spend, or improvements to your website. There are plenty of free options available using GA4, and if you run into any issues tracking you can always hire an expert to help out.
How Is Search Engine Optimization Different?
In reality, wether you’re doing SEO or GEO you’re optimizing for the same bots. Google bots crawl your website content and index that content in data centers around the world. Tools like ChatGPT bots will crawl your content in real time and display a summary of that content based on other sources and citations from around the web. Most of the citations used by AI bots are directly from Google search engines. So if you’re already ranking pretty well in Google Search in your target market, there’s a good chance you’re also getting mentioned by popular AI search tools.
Myth vs Reality
Google has publicly said optimizing for GEO is the same as SEO. You don’t need LLM.txt for anything. When hiring a firm to help with GEO, its best to listen to the experts that have been doing SEO for many years instead of agencies looking to pitch AI to close a contract.
Resources
JAN 2026 Podcast: Google helps bust myths on GEO, AIO, AEO, etc.
Tips for hiring an SEO from Google