People do not only Google anymore. They ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's own AI for recommendations and answers, and those tools reply with a short answer and a few sources. Getting your business to be one of those sources is a new skill, sometimes called AEO: Answer Engine Optimization. Here is what it actually means, in plain English.
SEO vs AEO: what is the difference?
SEO is about ranking in the list of links. AEO is about being the answer — the business or page an AI quotes when someone asks a question. They are not opposites. Good SEO still helps. In fact, when Google published its first official guide to AI search in 2026, its stance was blunt: as Search Engine Journal reported, Google calls AEO and GEO “still SEO.” Think of AEO as a new layer on top of the basics: making your content easy for an AI to read, trust, and cite.
What AI tools look for
- A clear answer, up top. Lead with the direct answer to the question, then explain. AI pulls the concise, obvious answer first.
- Evidence and specifics. Back up claims with real detail — your process, real examples, numbers you actually have. Vague marketing copy gets skipped.
- Structure. Clear headings, short sections, and lists make your content easy to extract.
- Credibility. Who wrote it, and why they would know, matters. Real business information, real authorship, and real reviews all help. This is what people mean by E-E-A-T: experience, expertise, authority, and trust.
- Freshness. AI favors content that is kept up to date. Old, untouched pages lose ground over time.
Practical things a business can do
- Add an FAQ section that answers the exact questions customers ask, in their own words.
- Write like a person explaining something, not like a brochure.
- Use structured data, also called schema, so machines can read your key details — hours, services, ratings, and FAQs. A developer can add this, and it is invisible to visitors.
- Keep your Google Business Profile and reviews strong. They feed AI answers, especially for local searches.
- Update your best pages regularly instead of writing them once and forgetting them.
How you will know it is working
The old scoreboard was clicks. The new one also includes mentions — being named or cited inside an AI answer, even when there is no click. Google has started adding reporting for AI and generative search visibility, and other tools are catching up.
For now, the simplest test costs nothing: ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google's AI what you do, or who is good in your area, and see whether your business shows up. If it does not, that is the gap to close.
The bottom line
AEO sounds technical, but the core of it is old-fashioned: be genuinely useful, be specific, be trustworthy, and make it easy to understand. Do that, and you are not just optimizing for AI. You are building the kind of website customers were always going to trust.