What is Generative Engine Optimization? Definition & Examples

When someone asks ChatGPT "What's the best project management tool for remote teams?", the AI doesn't show a list of links. It gives a direct answer, names specific brands, and explains why it recommends them. If your brand isn't in that answer, you're invisible to a fast-growing audience.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the practice of optimizing your content and online presence so that AI platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Claude cite and recommend your brand when users ask relevant questions.

This article explains what GEO means, how it works in practice, and gives you real-world examples of brands already winning with this approach.

GEO: A Clear Definition

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the process of structuring your digital content and managing your online presence to increase visibility in AI-generated responses. Instead of trying to rank on a search engine results page, the goal is to be cited, referenced, or recommended when AI platforms synthesize answers for their users.

The term was formalized in a 2024 research paper published at ACM SIGKDD by researchers from Princeton University, Georgia Tech, The Allen Institute of AI, and IIT Delhi. Their study tested nine optimization techniques and found that specific content strategies could increase visibility in generative engine responses by up to 40%.

Wikipedia defines GEO as "the practice of structuring digital content and managing online presence to improve visibility in responses generated by generative artificial intelligence systems." Related terms you might encounter include Answer Engine Optimization (AEO), AI Optimization (AIO), and Large Language Model Optimization (LLMO). They all describe the same core discipline.

GEO applies to every AI platform that generates answers from web content: ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity, Claude, Gemini, Grok, Microsoft Copilot, and others.

For a comprehensive overview of how GEO fits into your broader search strategy, see our Complete Guide to Generative Engine Optimization.

How GEO Works in Practice

To understand GEO, you need to understand how AI search engines produce their answers. The process is fundamentally different from Google's traditional 10 blue links.

Most AI search engines use a mechanism called Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG). Here's what happens when someone asks an AI a question:

1. The AI interprets the query and breaks it into sub-questions. A complex prompt like "What's the best CRM for a 50-person SaaS company?" might generate searches for "best CRM software 2026," "CRM features for SaaS," and "CRM pricing mid-market."
2. It searches the web in real time to find relevant content (ChatGPT uses Bing, Perplexity uses its own crawler, Gemini uses Google).
3. It evaluates sources based on authority, freshness, and relevance.
4. It synthesizes a response by combining information from multiple sources.
5. It cites those sources with varying transparency depending on the platform.

This is the critical insight: your content doesn't need to be in the AI's training data to appear in responses. If your page is crawlable, authoritative, and well-structured, it can be retrieved and cited in real time.

The AI then picks only 2 to 7 brands to mention per response. That's the fundamental difference from Google, where 10 results share the page. In AI search, if you're not in the shortlist, you don't exist.

For a deeper technical breakdown of RAG, query fanout, and citation mechanics, read our article on How AI Search Engines Work.

3 Real-World GEO Examples

GEO isn't theory. Brands are already seeing measurable results from optimizing for AI search. Here are three documented examples.

Tally: ChatGPT Became Their #1 Referral Source

Tally is a bootstrapped form builder tool. Without a massive marketing budget or enterprise sales team, they focused on creating clear, structured content that directly answered user questions about form building, surveys, and data collection.

The result: ChatGPT became their number one referral source, surpassing Google organic. When users ask ChatGPT about form builders, Tally consistently gets cited and recommended. As Search Engine Land reported, this happened because their content was "accessible, readable, and attributable," exactly the signals AI engines prioritize.

Zapier: Thousands of Integration Pages Optimized for AI

Zapier takes a programmatic GEO approach. They've created thousands of dedicated pages for specific integration pairs (e.g., "How to connect Slack to Google Sheets"). Each page provides clear, structured, step-by-step information that AI engines can easily extract and cite.

When someone asks an AI "How do I automate sending Slack messages from a Google Sheet?", Zapier's content is perfectly positioned to be cited because it addresses the exact micro-use case with detailed, extractable instructions. This strategy works because AI engines break complex queries into sub-queries, and Zapier has content that matches each one.

SaaS Client: 20+ Free Trial Signups Per Month from AI Citations

A case study from GEO agency Virayo documented a SaaS client that generated over 20 free trial signups per month directly from ChatGPT citations. The strategy focused on three pillars: content clustering around specific use cases, strong internal linking, and publishing content types that AI engines favor (comparisons, how-to guides, and data-backed analyses).

What made this work was not just creating content, but structuring it so AI could extract and cite specific claims. Short paragraphs, clear headers, and concrete data points gave the AI engine "citable fragments" to pull into its responses.

GEO vs SEO: The Key Shift

GEO doesn't replace SEO. It builds on top of it. Research from multiple sources confirms that the majority of AI citations still come from pages with strong traditional SEO fundamentals. 99% of AI Overview citations come from Google's organic top 10, and 87% of ChatGPT citations match top Bing results.

But the objective is different:

The simplest way to think about it: SEO gets you indexed. GEO gets you cited.

However, new research from GEO firm Brandlight suggests the overlap between top Google results and AI-cited sources has dropped from 70% to below 20%. This means that ranking well on Google alone no longer guarantees visibility in AI responses. The gap is growing as AI systems develop their own preferences for which sources to cite.

For a full comparison, read our dedicated article: GEO vs SEO: What's the Difference?

Why GEO Matters Right Now

The shift from traditional search to AI-powered discovery is accelerating faster than most marketers realize.

Users are switching. 58% of consumers have already replaced traditional search engines with AI tools for product discovery (Capgemini). 89% of B2B buyers use generative AI for research throughout their purchasing journey (Forrester).

The traffic converts better. AI search traffic converts at 14.2% vs. Google's 2.8%. That means each AI visitor is worth 4.4x more than a traditional organic visitor.

Zero-click is accelerating. 60% of Google searches end without a click. In Google's AI Mode, the zero-click rate hits 93%. The attention isn't disappearing. It's shifting to whoever gets cited in the AI response.

The window is closing. Only 23% of marketers currently invest in GEO measurement. Only 34% of companies have trained their teams in GEO. But Brandi AI's research shows that brands producing 12+ optimized content pieces achieve up to 200x faster visibility gains. The first-mover advantage is massive and shrinking.

The market is exploding. The GEO services market was valued at $848 million in 2025 and is projected to grow to $7.3 billion by 2031, a 34% CAGR.

How to Get Started with GEO

You don't need to overhaul your entire strategy overnight. Here are three practical first steps.

1. Audit Your Current AI Visibility

Open ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini. Type 10 to 15 prompts that your target customers would ask about your product category. Document which brands get cited, which sources are referenced, and whether your brand appears at all. This gives you a baseline and shows exactly where the gaps are.

2. Optimize Your Top Pages for Extractability

Pick your 5 highest-priority pages and restructure them for AI consumption. Open each page with a 40-80 word summary that directly answers the core query. Use H2 headings that mirror real user questions. Add specific statistics with named sources. Keep paragraphs to 2-3 sentences. AI engines extract fragments, not walls of text.

3. Build Third-Party Mentions

AI engines trust third-party sources more than your own website. New research from Ahrefs shows that web mentions outperform backlinks 3:1 for AI Overview presence. Prioritize getting featured in industry publications, contributing to Reddit discussions in relevant communities, and earning mentions in comparison articles and review sites.

For a detailed implementation plan, see our step-by-step GEO framework in the complete guide.

Continue exploring our AI Search Optimization series:

The Complete Guide to Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)
GEO vs SEO: What's the Difference?
What Is Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)?
GEO vs AEO: What's the Difference?
How Do AI Search Engines Work?