Both GEO and SEO are integral to cultivating a strong online presence and achieving organic growth.

SEO helps you rank higher in traditional search results. Whereas, GEO improves the chance your website is cited in AI summaries.

SEO stands for ‘search engine optimisation’ and GEO stands for ‘generative engine optimisation’. SEO strategy prioritises rankings, clicks, and backlinks but GEO values clarity, structure, and brand mentions. Employing a combination of both kinds of optimisation will ensure your business is reaching as many users as possible.

Benefits of Search Engine Optimisation

SEO allows users to directly access your website when they are looking for a specific product or service. By ranking high on search engines like Google, Bing, and Safari, your website is perceived as trustworthy and will receive more online traffic. A strong SEO strategy will make your website more accessible, easy to use, and it will appear on search engines under a range of relevant queries.

Benefits of Generative Engine Optimisation

In the modern day, instead of traditional search engines, many users are now using large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Claude. Users ask a specific question to the AI engine, and it pulls information from the internet to generate a response and relevant website links.

AI engines measure the authority of a source through cross-source mentions, clarity, and a clear structure.

Implementing SEO and GEO

It’s essential to build a solid SEO foundation before you start customising your content for GEO. Many LLMs source from search engines, and 40.58% of AI citations come from the top 10 Google search results. This means that improving SEO will help with GEO as well.

For SEO, implement keywords of highly searched terms, backlink to your own content and third-party content, and closely monitor your engagement metrics. Both SEO and GEO benefit from clear, direct writing that answers commonly asked questions with cited reliable sources.

To improve your GEO, first ensure your website’s robot.txt file allows for legitimate AI crawlers to access your content. Then ensure your writing is specific, legible, and that when sentences are taken out of context, they can still be understood.

Protect your reputation across other websites, as a negative review will impact whether the AI models see you as a reliable source. On the other hand, positive mentions on trustworthy sites will improve your verifiability.

Above all, human readers and AI engines value content, which is clearly structured, answers common questions, is relevant and uncomplicated.

At GIANT, we can offer expert SEO and GEO services tailored to your business. To learn more, email info@gogiant.co.uk or give us a call on 01604 250 900.