AI Search & Answer Engine Optimization (GEO)

Improve how assistants retrieve, summarize, and cite your pages.

For traditional SEO: Use marketing-seo-complete instead.

Quick start (30–60 min)

1. Build a query bank (30–100 queries): problems, comparisons, “best”, “vs”, integrations, and pricing questions.
2. Confirm assistants can fetch content (robots/WAF/SSR): use assets/audits/crawler-access-audit.md.
3. Run a baseline visibility audit: use assets/audits/search-visibility-audit.md and assets/audits/ai-search-content-audit.md.
4. Ship one high-leverage page update: use assets/content/ai-search-content-brief.md + assets/content/answer-focused-article-template.md.
5. Set up measurement + retest cadence: use references/measurement-analytics.md and assets/testing/ai-search-testing-protocol.md.

Core workflow

1) Decide scope (avoid wasted work)

• Confirm discovery channel: check whether your ICP uses assistants for research and comparisons.
• Pick one primary platform first (Google AI Overviews vs ChatGPT vs Perplexity) based on your audience.
• Treat GEO as additive: keep classic SEO and conversion work running.

2) Ensure assistants can access your content

• Allow/deny crawlers explicitly: use references/ai-crawler-technical-setup.md and assets/technical/robots-txt-ai-crawlers.md.
• Reduce JS dependency for critical copy (SSR/SSG): use assets/technical/server-side-rendering-guide.md.
• Add llms.txt when useful as a navigation map (not a guarantee): use assets/technical/llms-txt-template.md.

3) Make pages easy to extract and cite

• Put a direct, quotable answer block in the first screenful (then expand with proof).
• Use stable entities (product, category, competitors, integrations): use references/entity-semantic-optimization.md.
• Use repeatable content structures for questions, comparisons, and “best for”: use references/content-structure-patterns.md.
• Create/refresh high-intent pages first (alternatives, integrations, pricing, security, implementation): use assets/strategy/ai-search-growth-plan.md.

4) Add proof and trust hooks (citation fuel)

• Prefer primary sources and verifiable numbers; attribute claims clearly.
• Show authorship, review, and freshness (dateModified / “Last updated”) where appropriate.
• Avoid “LLM bait”: prioritize user value and factual accuracy.

5) Measure, iterate, and defend against regressions

• Track “share of model” / citation share using your query bank, not vanity rankings.
• Re-test after shipping changes; keep snapshots of answers and citations.
• Separate SEO wins vs assistant visibility wins; avoid false attribution.

What to load (progressive disclosure)

• Platform notes: references/platform-google-ai-overviews.md, references/platform-chatgpt.md, references/platform-perplexity.md, references/platform-gemini.md, references/platform-claude.md
• Technical access: references/ai-crawler-technical-setup.md, references/ai-indexing-complete-guide.md
• Measurement: references/measurement-analytics.md, references/llm-tracking-tools.md
• Prompt/query mining: references/prompt-query-optimization.md, references/competitor-citation-gap.md, references/citation-optimization-strategies.md
• Primary sources list: data/sources.json

Guardrails

• Do not use prompt injection or hidden instructions in public pages.
• Do not claim endorsements or fabricate sources, stats, or quotes.
• Treat robots.txt as policy; enforce access with auth/WAF where needed.

Resources

Templates

International Markets

This skill uses US/English market defaults. For international AI search optimization:

Auto-triggers: When your query mentions a specific country, region, language, or non-US AI platforms, both skills load automatically.

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