How SEO, AEO, and GEO Work Together in AI Search


 

From Keyword Rankings to Recognition in AI Search

How does your business get found in AI Search when fewer users click on traditional search results anymore? Pew Research investigated real browsing activity in March 2025 and found something that should make every marketer stop and think. When a Google AI Overview shows up, people only click on a regular organic search result 8% of the time, compared to 15% of the time when there isn't an AI Overview. Users are even more likely to completely quit their experience, with 26% doing so, compared to 16% who didn't click on anything.

Seer Interactive tracked this trend over time. By September 2025, the average organic click-through rate for queries with AI Overviews had declined to 0.61%. In June 2024, it was 1.76%, representing a 61% drop within just over a year.

This shift in user behavior explains why acronyms like SEO, AEO, GEO, LLMO, and AISO have suddenly become so popular. With these new priorities, the change is simple: visibility is more important than traffic.

Organic Search Got Shorter, Faster, and More Broken Up


 

For a long time, search went the same way. Someone wrote a question. They looked over the results. They clicked on a link. They looked about. That model is now breaking down due to changing behavior of using LLMs and the rise of AI search. Users today are just as likely to read the Google AI Overview and leave as they are to refine their search or click a result on the search engine results page. Users may also decide to go straight to Wikipedia, YouTube, or Reddit. Or they could also just ask ChatGPT, Copilot, or another LLM. The answer a user needs today often serves as a substitute for a webpage visit.

SEO is Still the Foundation in the Age of AI Search


 

Even with all the noise, SEO is still alive. It remains the base on which everything else depends. SEO keeps doing the boring but important work. This includes ensuring search engines can crawl and index your site, organizing your content in a way that makes sense, building trust over time through links, mentions, and consistency.

Your pages aren't only for people to read anymore. They are machines to summarize, rephrase, and integrate trustworthy information. In the age of AI search, Google doesn't just rank material; it also finds meaning in it.

AEO Focuses on Getting Answers Instead of Clicks


 

AEO is an extension of SEO that changes the focus through Answer Engine Optimization. AEO doesn't question, "Will someone click this?" Instead, it asks, "Can this be used as the answer?"

That means you need to write content that:

  • Clearly defines ideas
  • Has headlines that are based on questions that people really ask
  • Gives clear, organized explanations
  • Uses lists, FAQs, and schema to make things clearer

AEO makes it more likely that you will show up in:

  • Featured snippets
  • AI Overviews
  • Responses from voice assistants
  • Knowledge panels

If SEO establishes your content, AEO ensures it surfaces in key places.

GEO Builds Brand Visibility Inside Generative AI Systems

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the newest layer and one that is often misunderstood. GEO does not replace SEO; it enhances its impact within Generative AI search.

GEO is all about how large language models find, assess, and link to material on the web. These technologies don't put pages in order like regular search engines do. Instead, they combine information from thousands of sources and present what they consider reliable and consistent.

Important signals for GEO are:

  • Brand mentions that are consistent across credible sites
  • Clear knowledge of the subject matter
  • Content that is original and not copied
  • Alignment across web content, PR, reviews, and social

Optimizing specific systems like ChatGPT or Copilot is not explicit. Instead, focus on brand presence so users already recognize your brand when they encounter AI-generated responses.

SEO, AEO, and GEO Are Not Ideas That Compete With Each Other

It's tempting to treat SEO, AEO, and GEO as separate strategies. Instead they should function together as layers within an AI search strategy:

  • SEO makes things easier to find and builds trust
  • AEO structures information so it can be extracted
  • GEO ensures your brand shows up in synthetic answers

Take away SEO, and the others have nothing to work with. If you don't use AEO, it will be harder to describe your content. If you don't use GEO, your competitors will be the default specialists of your industry in the eyes of the AI tools. This isn't a change away from SEO. This is the next evolution.

Why Traffic Alone Doesn't Tell the Whole Story Anymore

Currently, AI-driven experiences make up under 5% of all traffic and less than 3% of revenue for many client accounts. However, traffic volume is no longer the primary metric when examining AI search analytics. ChatGPT has grown at an unprecedented rate, and increasingly, users begin with AI and return to Google, rather than the reverse. This pattern disrupts the user journey, creating an indirect path that is difficult to track in analytics. Users may already trust your brand before clicking or may have already decided otherwise.

The Future of AI Search: Becoming the Trusted Source

The old question was simple: How do we get the click? The new question is more complex: How do we become the source in AI-driven search? In this environment, successful brands need to explain rather than over-optimize, build authority beyond their own website, and focus on themes, entities, and trust rather than simply keywords. In the modern AI search world, where fewer users click, the winning brands are not the loudest; they are the ones machines already trust.


Posted On : 27-01-2026

Author : Patrick Dean Hodgson

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