GEO is a genuinely new idea, and because it is new there is a lot of confident nonsense being sold around it. Let us cut through that. This guide explains what GEO is, how it is different from the SEO you may already know, and the practical things that actually move the needle.
What GEO actually means
GEO stands for generative engine optimisation. In plain English, it means making your business easy for AI assistants to find, understand and recommend when someone asks a relevant question. The "generative engines" are the tools people increasingly ask instead of searching: ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, and the AI answers now built into Google and Bing.
The shift underneath it is simple. Search used to hand you ten links and let you choose. An assistant reads across many sources and hands you one answer, often naming just a few businesses. GEO is about being in that short, spoken answer rather than buried on page two of a list nobody scrolls anymore.
How GEO differs from SEO
People often assume GEO is just SEO with a new name. It is related, but the goal is different, and the difference matters.
- SEO tries to rank your page as a clickable link, high in a list of results, so a person clicks through to you.
- GEO tries to make your business the answer, or one of the few sources an assistant cites, when it replies in a sentence or two with no list to scroll.
They overlap, because both reward content that is clear, credible and well organised. But with SEO you are competing for a position in a list. With GEO you are competing to be understood and trusted enough to be spoken aloud as the recommendation. Good SEO helps your GEO, and neither replaces the other.
How assistants decide who to recommend
No one outside the AI companies knows the exact recipe, and it changes. But from how these systems work, and from watching results, the patterns are fairly consistent. They tend to favour businesses that are:
- Clearly described. What you do, who you serve and where, stated plainly, not hidden behind clever slogans.
- Consistent across the web. The same name, service and location on your site, your listings and your profiles, so the picture agrees with itself.
- Credible. Reviews, mentions and links from places the model already trusts.
- Well structured. Content organised around real questions and answers, which is exactly how people phrase things to an assistant.
- Specific. A precise "wedding photographer in Leeds specialising in small ceremonies" is easier to recommend confidently than a vague "we do photography".
In other words, you are not gaming a machine. You are making it easy for a system to describe you accurately and pick you with confidence.
Be wary of anyone promising to "guarantee your business in ChatGPT" or sell you a fixed slot. Nobody can guarantee that. These systems are not a directory you can pay into, they generate answers, and they change. Guaranteed placement is a red flag.
The other trap is stuffing your site with keywords or letting AI write thin, generic pages at scale. Assistants are trained to prefer genuinely useful, trustworthy content, and low-quality filler can do more harm than good. And do not let inaccurate claims about your business float around the web, because an assistant may repeat them back to a customer as fact.
What good looks like: where to start
You do not need a big budget to make real progress. A sensible starting point:
- Write, in one clear paragraph, exactly what you do, who for, and where. Use it consistently everywhere.
- Make sure your name, service and location match across your site and every listing and profile.
- Answer the real questions customers ask, in plain language, on your own site.
- Keep earning genuine reviews and mentions from credible places.
- Then test it, which is the step most people skip.
A better way to check where you stand
The simplest, cheapest GEO audit is to become your own customer. Open the assistants and ask what your customers would ask.
Do you come up? Are you described accurately? Then try the awkward version customers really use, misspellings, vague wording, "near me". Repeat across ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity, because they will not agree. That gives you an honest picture of where you stand today and what to fix, without spending a penny.
You can do a lot of the groundwork yourself, and the self-test above is a great first move. Where it gets harder is doing this properly and consistently, across many assistants and many questions, then keeping it up as the tools change month to month.
That is what whatsgeo.io and the team at Creative Sauce AI do: measure how AI assistants currently describe and recommend you, find the gaps, and improve your chances of being the answer. If AI search matters to how you get found, that is the conversation to have.
This is general guidance to help you think it through, not specific business or marketing advice for your situation. AI assistants and how they surface businesses change quickly, so treat any single result as a snapshot rather than a fixed ranking.
Common questions
What does GEO stand for?
Generative engine optimisation. It means making your business easy for AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and AI search to find, understand and recommend when someone asks a relevant question.
How is GEO different from SEO?
SEO aims to rank as a clickable link in a list. GEO aims to be the answer, or one of the few sources an assistant names, when it replies in a sentence or two. They overlap, but the goal is different.
Can I control what AI says about my business?
Not directly, and anyone promising guaranteed placement is overselling. What you can control is how clearly and consistently your business is described across the web, which is what these systems draw on. You improve your chances, you do not buy a slot.
How do I know if GEO is working?
Ask the assistants the questions your customers would ask and see whether you come up, and how you are described. Repeat it over time and watch whether you appear more often, more accurately, and for more of the right questions.