You ask ChatGPT who replaces windows in Knoxville. It names three companies and gives a reason for each. Yours isn't one of them, even though you show up on Google's first page.
That gap, between ranking on Google and being named in an AI answer, is what generative engine optimization is about. Our guide to AI search for home service companies covers where those answers get their facts.
What does generative engine optimization mean?
Generative engine optimization (GEO) is making sure assistants like ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity, plus Google's AI Mode, can find your business, trust it and cite it when they write an answer. "Generative" means the assistant writes a new answer for each question rather than showing a list.
Each of these assistants can search the web while it writes:
- ChatGPT can search the web when a question needs current information, and it links to its sources.[2]
- When a question needs current information, Claude can search the live web and cite its sources.[3]
- Perplexity searches the internet in real time and numbers its citations.[4]
- Google's AI Mode, like AI Overviews, draws on pages from Google's own search index.[1]
How is GEO different from SEO?
The work overlaps, but the goal is different. SEO aims at a link a homeowner clicks. GEO aims at a sentence inside the answer that names your company.
| Question | SEO | GEO |
|---|---|---|
| What you want | A high spot in Google's results and on the map | Your company named, with the right facts, inside an AI answer |
| Who reads your pages | Googlebot, then the people who click | Googlebot plus each assistant's own search crawler |
| What gets read | Your site, your Business Profile, your reviews and links to you | The same, plus what other sites say about you |
| How you check it | Search Console and a search from your own town | Asking the questions yourself and reading the answers |
| Can anyone promise a result? | No | No |
In BrightLocal's study of 200k+ localized AI searches, Google Maps named a tracked business in 66% of searches; ChatGPT, AI Mode and AI Overviews named it in only 32–38%.
Source: BrightLocal local AI visibility study · (opens in a new tab)
Only about 38% of pages cited in Google's AI Overviews also rank in the top 10 for that search.
Source: Ahrefs AI Overview citations study · (opens in a new tab) · 863K SERPs
So showing up on Google Maps doesn't mean an AI answer will name you. And most pages that AI Overviews cite don't rank in Google's top 10 for that search.
Which assistants read your website, and how?
Each company sends its own crawler to read pages for its search answers. If your site blocks that crawler, your pages can drop out of that assistant's answers.
| Assistant | Its search crawler | What the company says |
|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | OAI-SearchBot | If you block it, your pages drop out of ChatGPT's search answers. A plain link to your site can still appear.[5] |
| Claude | Claude-SearchBot | Blocking it can make your site show up less often, and less accurately, in Claude's search results.[6] |
| Perplexity | PerplexityBot | It finds and links sites for Perplexity's answers, and isn't used to train AI models.[7] |
| Google AI Overviews and AI Mode | Googlebot | Googlebot's robots.txt rules control crawling, because AI is built into Search.[8] A Search Console setting decides whether your site is included in these features.[10] |
Check your robots.txt file for these names, then ask your web host about the firewall. OpenAI asks site owners to allow requests from its published IP ranges as well as its crawler.[5] This two-minute check shows how to look.
What does GEO change for a home service company?
It changes where your facts need to live. An assistant builds its answer from many sources, and your own website is only one of them.
Business websites supply 42% of the ~1.97M citations in local AI answers (ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, AI Overviews); Google Business Profile ~29%.
Source: BrightLocal local AI visibility study · (opens in a new tab)
That puts your website and your Google Business Profile first in line. I'd take it in this order:
- Let the assistants in. Allow the search crawlers in the table above, in robots.txt and in your firewall.
- Write your facts in plain sentences. Services, towns, price ranges, warranty and license, in words an assistant can quote.
- Match your listings. Your name, phone, hours and service area should read the same on your profile, Bing, Apple and the directories. This guide shows which listings matter.
- Earn real mentions. Local best-of lists, trade associations and manufacturers' installer directories are pages an assistant can find when it searches. Getting on best-of lists covers the honest way in.
- Ask the questions yourself. Once a month, put your customers' questions to each assistant and write down who's named and which pages it links.
A window installer's notes from one month
- Question: “Who replaces windows in older homes in Knoxville?”
- Answer: three competitors named. We're not in it.
- Pages it linked: two competitors' service pages, a local best-of list and a directory.
- What we changed: a new page on replacing windows in older homes, and our hours fixed on two directories.
- We also emailed the list's editor to ask how they choose.
- Next month: ask the same question and compare.
Illustrative example
Which GEO offers should you be wary of?
Be wary of anyone who promises you a spot in ChatGPT's answers. OpenAI says ChatGPT ranks search results on multiple factors and placement isn't guaranteed.[2]
Be wary of tools that say Google approved them. Google says it doesn't evaluate third-party services, and it names AEO and GEO tools among the ones to think critically about.[9]
And be wary of mass-produced pages that try to cover every way a question can be asked. Google says doing that to manipulate its AI answers breaks its scaled content abuse policy.[1]
If an assistant names competitors and not you, why ChatGPT recommends your competitors walks through the usual reasons.
Where do AEO and LLMO fit in?
They're three names for overlapping work. Answer engine optimization (AEO) is getting your business into the direct answers Google and AI assistants give, not only the list of links under them.
Large language model optimization (LLMO) is the same work seen from the model's side. Plain, consistent facts about your services, prices, service area and reviews, on your own site and on the sites the models read.
We do all three together with local SEO, because AI answers lean on the same Google, Maps and listing data. Our AI search optimization plans start at $750/mo, month to month. Every month we run the same buyer questions across the AI assistants we test (currently ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity).
What GEO can't do
GEO can't make an assistant name you, and nobody outside these companies knows exactly how they choose. It can remove the reasons an assistant would pass you over: a blocked crawler, a thin page, facts that don't match.
To see where you stand first, our AI search visibility audit records what assistants say when your customers' questions are put to them. If you'd rather check by hand, this step-by-step audit walks you through it, and the AI visibility benchmark is our open method. Roofers can start with how the three names compare for a roofing company.