The short answer
Generative engine optimization (GEO) is the work of making your business easy for AI assistants like ChatGPT, Gemini and Google's AI Overviews to find, understand and name in their answers. For a local business it mostly means three things: say clearly what you do and where, let AI search crawlers read your site, and be described on the sites AI trusts.
Where GEO comes from
The term comes from a 2023 research paper by Pranjal Aggarwal and colleagues from Princeton and other research institutions, presented at the KDD conference in 2024. They tested how changes to a web page affect whether AI search engines use it in their answers.
Three changes helped most: citing sources, adding quotations and adding statistics. Each made a page roughly 30–40% more visible in AI answers in their tests. Stuffing a page with keywords did the opposite: it scored below doing nothing at all. The lesson still holds: AI rewards pages that are specific, factual and easy to quote, not pages written for a keyword.
GEO vs SEO: what's the difference?
SEO is about ranking in a list of links. GEO is about being one of the few names inside the answer. They overlap more than the names suggest: Google says its AI Overviews and AI Mode are built on the same ranking systems as its normal search results, so good SEO is still the foundation.
| SEO | GEO | |
|---|---|---|
| Goal | A high position in the list of links | Being named or cited in the answer |
| Where | Google and Bing results | ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, Copilot, Perplexity |
| What usually decides it | Relevance, links, page quality | Clear facts about you, repeated on sites AI trusts |
| You measure | Rankings and clicks | How often you're named and cited, and who's named instead |
What AI answers about local businesses
In October 2026 we asked ChatGPT (OpenAI's GPT with web search) the questions customers ask about 97 local businesses in ten cities: New York, Austin, London, Manchester, Toronto, Sydney, Dublin, Dubai, Yerevan and Tbilisi. That's 959 answers. Many of these businesses are well known in their city.
The type of business made the biggest difference. AI named restaurants, cafés and hotels in 60% of answers, but law firms, dentists, accountants, estate agents and vets in only 30%. Eight businesses weren't named in a single answer, and six of them were professional or health services, including five of the nine dental clinics we checked.
Keep the limits in mind: one AI assistant, questions in English, one run per business, and businesses that are better known than most. A typical neighbourhood business is likely to do worse.
How AI assistants pick the businesses they name
When someone asks for a local business, AI assistants like ChatGPT search the web first, then write an answer from what they find. Three things decide whether you end up in it:
- Can it read your website? ChatGPT search uses its own crawler, OAI-SearchBot. If your robots.txt or firewall blocks it, your site can't be used in the answer.
- Does your website say clearly what you do and where? AI matches you to a question like “best dentist for implants in Manchester” by the words on your pages: services, city, neighbourhood.
- Do other sites AI trusts mention you? Guides, directories, review sites and local press. In most answers AI cites sites like these, not only the businesses' own websites.
A GEO checklist for business owners
- Say what you do and where, in plain text. Your services, city and neighbourhood on your homepage and service pages, as text, not only in images or PDFs.
- Let AI search crawlers in. Check that robots.txt and your firewall or CDN don't block OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Claude-SearchBot or Bingbot. Many sites block them by accident.
- Describe your business with structured data. LocalBusiness markup (or Restaurant, Dentist, LegalService…) with your name, address, phone, opening hours and links to your profiles.
- Keep your facts the same everywhere. Name, address, phone and opening hours should match on your website, Google Business Profile, directories and review sites.
- Be on the sites AI cites for your city. Find which guides, lists and directories AI uses for your kind of business, and work on being featured there.
- Answer the questions customers ask. A short FAQ with prices, availability, languages and who you're best for gives AI specific facts to quote.
- Measure, then check again. Ask the questions your customers ask, see whether you're named, change one thing at a time and check again a few weeks later.
What not to waste time on
- llms.txt files. Google says it doesn't use them, and no major AI assistant has said it reads them. Harmless, but not a fix.
- Keyword stuffing. In the original GEO research it made pages less visible, not more.
- Fake or paid mentions. Google warns that seeking inauthentic mentions across the web “isn't as helpful as it might seem”. Real reviews and real listings are what count.
- Rewriting everything for AI. You don't need special phrasing or tiny chunks of text. Clear pages for people work for AI too.
How to measure your AI visibility
Start with the questions your customers really ask, such as “best [your kind of business] in [your city]”, and look at who's named. Because AI answers change between runs, ask several questions, not one.
- A free check: stuckUP asks AI your customers' questions and shows how often you're named, which sources are cited, and what to fix on your website.
- Bing Webmaster Tools: its AI Performance report shows how often Copilot cites your pages.
- Google Search Console: the Generative AI report shows how often your pages appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode.
Questions
Is GEO the same as AEO?
Mostly. Both names are used for being named or cited in AI answers. AEO (answer engine optimization) is the older term and often means short, direct answers, like the ones voice assistants read out.
Does GEO replace SEO?
No. AI assistants search the web before they answer, and Google says its AI features are built on its normal ranking systems. A site that is easy to find and understand in search is also easier for AI to use.
Do I need an llms.txt file?
No. Google says it doesn't use llms.txt, and no major AI assistant has said it reads it. It does no harm, but it won't change whether you're recommended.
How long until AI notices my changes?
It varies. Changes to your own website can show up within weeks once search engines have crawled it again; being featured on other sites takes longer. Check again after a few weeks and compare.
Sources
- Aggarwal et al., GEO: Generative Engine Optimization (KDD 2024)
- Google Search Central: Optimizing your website for generative AI features on Google Search (May 2026)
- OpenAI: Overview of OpenAI crawlers (OAI-SearchBot)
- Bing Webmaster Blog: AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools (February 2026)
- stuckUP: How we measure AI visibility, the method behind our numbers
Narek Nikoghosyan · Founder and CEO
Narek Nikoghosyan is the founder and CEO of stuckUP, the AI visibility checker for local businesses.