What Is the Difference Between SEO, GEO, and AEO?

SEO targets ranking in traditional search results pages. GEO, generative engine optimization, targets showing up favorably within AI generated answers more broadly, including Google's AI Overviews. AEO, answer engine optimization, narrows further to specifically being the source an AI chat tool quotes directly in its response.

In practice, the three overlap far more than they diverge. A clearly written, well structured page that directly answers a specific question tends to perform across all three, since all three ultimately reward content that is easy to understand and trust, whether the reader is a person or a model.

A SEO content writer is written to satisfy all three at once rather than picking one target.