Answer engine optimization (AEO)

AEO is the older and broader label. It was used for optimizing to be the answer in featured snippets, knowledge panels and voice assistants before chat assistants existed, and it now commonly includes AI answers as well. Generative engine optimization came from a 2023 research paper and refers specifically to generated responses. In practice the two overlap heavily, and marketers use them interchangeably. Neither has a standard definition.

The useful distinction is the target. AEO asks whether a page supplies a clear, extractable answer to a question wherever answers are shown. GEO work, as PeakMetrics uses the term, is about measuring and improving how a brand appears in answers produced by AI assistants.

Typical advice includes writing a direct answer near the top of a page, using question-style headings, dating and sourcing facts, and marking up pages with structured data. These improve clarity for readers, and some may help systems extract answers. None carries a guarantee, and search engines and assistants do not publish how they pick sources.

Answers are a place where an organization is described without a click to its own site; see zero-click search. Communications teams own the reference pages those answers rely on, such as fact sheets and leadership pages. Checking what the answers say is a measurement task. The free AI Perceptions check samples assistant answers for a brand, and AI visibility describes the measure.

AEO has no agreed metrics and is not a separate technology. It sits alongside search engine optimization, since many answers are built from indexed pages.

Hidden text and tricks aimed at models tend to be discounted, so they are no part of the practice.