Generative Engine Optimization: Growth Strategies and Metrics For the AI Era

GEO, short for Generative Engine Optimization (also known as AEO or LLMO), is about getting your brand noticed—and accurately represented—in AI-generated answers. That includes results from Google’s AI Overviews, and AI assistants like ChatGPT, and Gemini. The goal is to make sure your brand shows up when AI tools answer user questions, even if no one clicks a link.

As AI tools become more common, they’re changing how people search, delivering direct, personalized answers, often without sending users to other websites.

That means digital marketing is shifting—from chasing clicks to building brand visibility and trust right inside the AI’s answer.

Think of it this way: traditional SEO was like competing to have the best storefront on a busy street. GEO is like making sure the local tour guide knows about your business and recommends it to visitors.

In this guide, you’ll learn how to get your brand noticed in the era of AI-powered search and how to track your AI visibility.

16% of all US searches now show AI Overviews (more than doubled since March 2025). That’s roughly 1 in 6 searches where Google answers search queries directly on the search page through AI Overviews instead of directing them to websites. 97% of those queries are informational, which is one of SEO’s main focuses.

Screenshot of a Google search for "what is seo" showing an AI Overview at the top. The AI-generated answer defines SEO and is highlighted to show where the information comes from.

Two: when an AI Overview appears, the top search result sees a 34.5% drop in clicks—a built-in change that can cause a big traffic hit for any site on the web.

A bar chart titled "Position #1 CTR for Informational Keywords" comparing March 2024 and March 2025. The chart shows that the average click-through rate for the top search result dropped from 0.056 to 0.031 after the introduction of AI Overviews.

Three: all major AI assistants can search the web, making them a new alternative to Google. The problem is, like AI Overviews, they answer the question instantly and don’t always link to the products or services they mention (and people don’t always click).

But before you panic about completely overhauling your marketing strategy, here’s the good news:

AI still relies on traditional search. AI assistants use something called RAG (Retrieval-Augmented Generation), which means they actively search Google, Bing, and other search engines to find current information. So if you’re already ranking well in traditional search, you’re already in the running for AI citations and mentions.

Higher conversion rates may be the silver lining. I’ve seen numerous reports on LinkedIn and experienced this ourselves at Ahrefs—AI-driven traffic converts better (23 times in our case) than traditional search traffic. While the volume is smaller, the quality appears to be higher.

Google says don’t panic. Gary Illyes stated that specialized “AI SEO” isn’t necessary to rank in AI Overviews or the new AI Mode. Good content and solid SEO fundamentals still matter most. You don’t need to throw out everything you know about search marketing.

AI search is changing the game, but it’s building on the same foundation you’re already working with.

In fact, you can gain AI visibility through “traditional” SEO, and vice versa. Ahrefs’ content and product pages have been mentioned 7,470 times across 2,309 pages, without any effort to optimize them for AI visibility. It makes sense when you think about it: every new type of search is built on existing forms of content.

Screenshot of the Ahrefs Site Explorer overview for ahrefs.com. The "AI citations" section is highlighted, showing the number of times the site has been cited by AI assistants like Google AI Overview, ChatGPT, and Perplexity.

There are some differences, though.

SEO fundamentals with tactics borrowed from other marketing disciplines. Here’s your action plan:

1. Get mentioned across the web

This may surprise you: most mentions of your brand will likely come from other websites, not your own.

When I looked at the top sources for Ahrefs’ brand mentions in AI responses, third-party sites dominated. For example, in Google’s AI Overviews, the top pages mentioning Ahrefs didn’t include ahrefs.com at all.

Perplexity was the only assistant that listed our page as one of the top sources mentioning our brand, but not as the main source.

A screenshot of a Perplexity report in Ahrefs showing top pages that mention Ahrefs. The ahrefs.com domain is highlighted, showing it is a source of mentions but not the primary one.

This means you need to focus on getting mentioned across the web through:

Industry rankings and lists: get included in “best of” lists and industry roundups.
PR and media coverage: traditional PR becomes even more valuable in the AI era.
Reviews and case studies: encourage customers to mention your brand in reviews.

The big difference from traditional link building is that these mentions don’t need to be linked. AI can pick up unlinked brand references just as easily, as our research on Google AI Overviews shows.

To find sites that often appear in AI answers, just plug their domain in Ahrefs’ Site Explorer and look at the AI citation count in the Overview report:

Screenshot of the Ahrefs Site Explorer dashboard for ahrefs.com. The "AI citations" and "Domain Rating (DR)" metrics are highlighted in orange boxes, showing their prominence in the overview.

If you’re choosing between two sites with similar AI citations, consider:

Domain Rating (DR): Still a solid measure of trustworthiness and popularity. It’s the number right next to AI Citations in Site Explorer.
Branded search volume: Sites people actively search for often have more influence in AI citations. In Site Explorer, open the Overview report, scroll down a bit to the Entities graph, and select only the site’s brand name.

In a bit, I’ll explain how to find and close your AI visibility gap.

2. Create the type of content that does well in AI search

Not all content performs equally well in AI search. Our analysis of pages receiving AI traffic reveals clear patterns about what content types AI assistants prefer to cite.

The general trends across all sites:

Based on broad analysis, certain content types consistently earn the greatest proportion of AI traffic:

“Best” content: 7.06% of AI traffic goes to pages with “best” in the title.
“Top” lists: 5.5% of AI traffic.
“Vs” comparisons: 4.88% of AI traffic.
How-to guides: 6.35% of AI traffic.
Product-focused pages: “Contact” (6.8%), “products” (6.43%), “product” (4.71%), and “services” (4.53%) pages.

But here’s the thing: every brand and industry is different. So I dug deeper into the last 3 months of our own data to see what type of content generates the most traffic for Ahrefs. I’d strongly recommend doing the same for your site.

Content category	Total views	Engagement	Strategic insight
How-to guides	7315	184 sec time on page	Bread-and-butter traffic drivers; AI assistants favor clear, actionable guides.
Data studies	6134	207 sec time on page	High engagement; authoritative research performs well in AI results and invites further clicks.
Homepage	2875	0.53 bounce rate (low)	Captures navigational queries; AI assistants surface brand entry points.
Listicles (tools)	976	0.84 bounce rate (high)	Strong time on page; useful for tool discovery via AI assistants, but high bounce suggests single-visit utility.
Definition	747	173 sec time on page	Fulfills direct informational queries; AI assistants use these for concise answers.
Listicles	585	0.79 bounce rate (high)	Good at attracting curiosity clicks from AI summaries.
Product	530	0.24 bounce rate (low)	Low bounce rate; AI assistants can drive qualified visitors directly to product-related pages.
Opinion / thought leadership	282	214 sec time on page	Engaging for deeper reads; niche but valuable for brand authority in AI contexts.

I think the sweet spot is creating a content mix that covers different user intentions. Some people want quick updates on trends, others want comprehensive tutorials they can bookmark, and some are looking for hard data to back up their decisions. If you only create one type of content, you’re probably missing out on citations from the other user groups.

So, start by auditing your existing content to see which of these categories you already have, then take a look at your own analytics to spot patterns. What content gets the most engagement from your audience? That’s probably where you should double down, but don’t ignore the other categories entirely.

You can find this data in Ahrefs’ Web Analytics (free in AWT). Just click on AI Search to see how visitors from this channel interact with your site.

A screenshot of the Ahrefs Web Analytics dashboard. An arrow points to "AI search" in the list of traffic sources, showing how to isolate and analyze traffic coming from AI assistants.

And here’s an extra tip: keep your core content fresh and up-to-date. We found that compared to traditional search results, AI assistants prefer citing fresher content.

A bar chart comparing the "Average age of cited content" between organic search results and AI assistants. The chart shows that AI assistants (red bars) tend to cite more recently published and updated content than traditional organic search (blue bars).

3. Create a great experience on your homepage and product landing pages

Did you know that over 80% of ahrefs.com referral traffic from AI search goes to just three content types? Those are free tools (mentioned before), product pages, and our homepage.

A pie chart titled "Percentage of visitors by page type from AI Assistants." The chart shows that the largest shares of AI traffic go to Free Tools (36.45%), Product pages (23.12%), and the Homepage (20.41%).

AI-generated traffic to your site will likely follow similar patterns. Since AI tools tend to guide users to a few key pages, it’s important to make sure those pages offer a great experience.

Make what you do and why you’re valuable immediately obvious.
Use headers, bullet points, and clear sections.
Make it easy for both humans and AI to find your contact details.
Create clear, factual product/service descriptions that AI can easily parse and cite.

4. Structure content for AI comprehension

AI models love structure and clarity. Here are a few simple rules for making your content AI-friendly.

Use clear formatting:

Hierarchical headings (H1, H2, H3).
Bullet points for lists.
Short, factual statements.

Implement technical optimizations:

Add structured data (schema markup) for FAQs and product information.
Ensure fast page loading speeds.
Make your site mobile-friendly.
Don’t block AI bots from accessing your content.
Avoid too much JavaScript (at the time of writing, most AI crawlers don’t render JavaScript).

Write for clarity:

Use simple, direct language.
Break up long paragraphs.
Include specific facts and figures AI can cite.
Answer common questions explicitly.

4. Go multi-platform

Our study on the most cited domains by AI revealed two platforms that can give you the highest reach for AI citations:

A bar chart titled "Mention Share of Top domains across models," showing which websites are most cited by AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and Perplexity. Wikipedia, YouTube, and Reddit are the top three, with YouTube and Reddit highlighted in a box.

To start optimizing for Reddit, focus on threads that already have visibility in Google Search.

Go to Ahrefs’ Site Explorer, enter “reddit.com”, and open the Organic keywords report.
Use filters: positions 1-10, keyword includes (enter phrases related to your site). You can select a preferred location, too.
Look for relevant keywords with a lot of traffic.
Add thoughtful, useful answers to these high-traffic threads.

Screenshot of Ahrefs Site Explorer showing how to find high-traffic Reddit threads. The 'Organic keywords' report is filtered to show keywords containing "seo" for which reddit.com ranks in the top 10 on Google.

As for optimizing for YouTube, we’ve put together a complete guide that walks you through our video SEO strategy—the same one that helped us earn over 5.7 million organic views and 642,000 watch hours in 2024 alone.

5. Find your AI mention and citation gaps

One of the fastest ways to improve your GEO strategy is to see where competitors are succeeding in AI responses while you’re missing out.

I’ll show you how to do that with Ahrefs’ Brand Radar. It’s one of the fastest-growing tools in AI brand visibility, with 100M+ prompts, 5 AI indexes, and requires zero setup.

Finding your AI mention gap (competitors mentioned, but not you)

To find pages that mention your competitors but not you (your AI mention gap), add your competitors to Brand Radar, hover on any AI chart, and click on “Others only”.

Next, click on the Cited pages report to see websites you could reach out to to close your AI mention gap.

Finding your AI citation gap (competitors cited in AI answers, but not you)

Start by clearing all the top-level filters in Brand Radar.
Go to the Cited pages report.
Apply the competitor filter at the bottom like I’ve shown in the screenshot:

This gives you a list of pages showing how many AI responses mentioned your competitors and the total search volume of those queries. Now you know exactly which content topics and pages to target with your own superior content.