What is Generative Engine Optimization also commonly referred to as GEO? You’ve probably heard of SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and how it can help your business but you don’t know much about GEO because it’s a newer concept. In basic terms, Generative Engine Optimization is the process of optimizing a website or business for greater visibility on AI-powered search engines such as Google’s Gemini, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews, which are also known as Generative Engines. The driving force behind the popularity of Generative Engine Optimization is the explosive growth and wide acceptance of generative AI in the past couple of years. By understanding and implementing GEO, your business can stay ahead of its competition.
WHAT EXACTLY IS GENERATIVE ENGINE OPTIMIZATION?
OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November of 2022 and managed to generate about 100 million active users within 2 months, making it the fastest-growing consumer app in history. It’s this successful launch of generative AI and daily use by ordinary people that has led to the race for artificial intelligence (AI) supremacy by search engine giants such as Google and Bing. Google has implemented and continues to test out its AI Overviews and the Gemini chatbot, while Bing has Microsoft Copilot which can be accessed through Bing or as a standalone site. The growth of AI search users presents a significant opportunity for businesses to get clients through these Generative engines. Generative Engine Optimization focuses on optimizing the website and business for these AI-driven search engines. Optimization involves tailoring images, and website content such as copy to fit naturally in AI responses with an emphasis on relevance, context, and quality.
GEO VS SEO: WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE?
What are the similarities and differences between GEO and SEO? As much as the two might seem similar, there are a couple of differences in the way they output content and can be optimized for. Generative Engine Optimization focuses on making content that can be discovered by multiple AI search engines while Search Engine Optimization focuses on optimizing content for search engines such as Google and Bing.
Generative Search Engine Optimization
The main focus of GEO is the content structure because AI search engines want to give precise and accurate information for each query, instead of just giving out links for users to choose and click on. Making the AI bots’ crawling easier by structuring your content increases the likelihood of your content being generated and cited in its output, therefore creating links for your business on AI search engine results. The credibility of the website also plays a very strong role in whether your content is used for AI outputs or not. The credibility of a website is often determined by how often the website is cited by other credible media such as by receiving “Follow Links” or generating a lot of traffic. Putting citations on your website can also help verify your content authenticity as the AI bots can easily verify them instantly. Finally, having different types of media on your website such as images, graphs, videos, audio, and GIFs can make your website pages “content-rich”, which makes your content more engaging, therefore offering more value to the user and AI search engines.
Search Engine Optimization
SEO or Search Engine Optimization is meant to focus on appealing to search engines so that your website or content can rank high on a list of results that humans get to choose from depending on what they’re looking for. Unlike GEO which prioritizes language context, SEO can target specific short-tail and long-tail keywords with emphasis on search volume. With SEO, metrics such as click-through rates, how often the user stays on the page, and bounce rates are used, while GEO focuses on how often the content is used in AI responses. In as much as the use of AI-driven search engines has gone up, Search Engine Optimization still remains the most important and the main source of organic traffic for businesses that focus on getting clients organically.
IMPLEMENTING GENERATIVE ENGINE OPTIMIZATION FOR YOUR BUSINESS
As a business owner, you don’t have to choose between Generative Engine Optimization and Search Engine Optimization, instead, you should implement both because GEO is the future while SEO still generates the best and most results for organic marketing. At X Design Solutions, we’ve always implemented the E-E-A-T principles for all of our marketing campaigns, whether it’s GEO or SEO. E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. If your business can demonstrate the aforementioned, you should be able to get a good ROI on your investment for both GEO and SEO.
Experience
Experience in terms of GEO and SEO refers to the first-hand experience that the creator or website content owner has on a particular topic. For example, a doctor writing about his first-hand experience with patients and their symptoms is much more insightful than generic content from Wikipedia. This can include case studies and images from your actual experience and observations. By demonstrating that you have first-hand knowledge of the topic, You make it easier for both search engines and AI bots to trust you enough to include your links in their results outputs.
Expertise
Expertise in GEO and SEO optimization refers to the depth of knowledge on the topic. To demonstrate expertise, website owners or publishers need to professionally and correctly highlight their qualifications and credentials such as education, experience, and certifications. These qualifications can be highlighted differently depending on your type of business or industry. The ability to creatively incorporate your qualifications and credentials is what usually sets businesses apart in terms of successfully optimizing for SEO or GEO.
Authoritativeness
Authoritativeness for both GEO and SEO is measured by how much the content creator or website owner is known in their industry as the go-to source for information on a subject matter. For example, doctors that other doctors or authoritative websites cite are considered industry authority figures. Marketing-wise there are various campaigns that can be implemented to make your website authoritative. Just generating links or citations does not make your website authoritative, search engines also focus on the credibility of these websites and links, hence links have descriptors that are either “dofollow” or “nofollow”. “Dofollow” links are considered votes of confidence, while “nofollow” links are not. Organically gotten links and citations tend to be “dofollow” and usually have a positive impact on the website and its rankings for GEO and SEO.
Trustworthiness
One of the toughest aspects of optimizing for both GEO and SEO is building trust with search engines and AI generative engines because it takes a long time. In order to build trust, websites have to consistently put out accurate information, they have to be safe, and they have to be consistent. Your brand has to be associated with positive independent reviews and your social media also has to match your content.
Each business is different therefore the implementation of both GEO and SEO is going to be different. At X Design Solutions, we focus on each client individually and assess their market and competition before implementing a GEO and SEO plan. Contact us for a custom marketing plan for your business.
