How GEO and Solid Content Marketing Increase Your Visibility
Generative Engine Optimisation, or GEO, is becoming an important part of content strategy as people increasingly use AI-powered search and assistants to find information. Traditional SEO is largely concerned with how pages are discovered and ranked in search results. GEO is broader: it looks at how content is discovered, interpreted, surfaced and cited inside AI-generated answers.
That does not mean SEO is obsolete, and it does not mean there is a single new “GEO formula”. In fact, Google explicitly says that its existing SEO fundamentals remain relevant for AI Overviews and AI Mode, and that there is no special schema, AI markup or machine-readable file required to appear in those experiences. OpenAI similarly says that websites can appear in ChatGPT search if they are accessible to its search crawler, OAI-SearchBot, although inclusion and placement are not guaranteed.
Content is still the source material
The basic principle has not changed: useful content has to exist before a search engine or AI system can surface it. Google’s current guidance places particular emphasis on useful, original, people-first content, rather than material created primarily to manipulate rankings. It also warns against producing large volumes of low-value AI-generated pages without meaningful original contribution. In other words, publishing more content is not automatically better. The quality, originality and usefulness of that content still matter, as Google for Developers explains.
For content marketers, this creates an opportunity. Original research, expert interviews, strong explainers, useful comparisons, case studies and clearly expressed subject-matter expertise all give search and AI systems substantive material to retrieve and reference. Microsoft’s own guidance for Bing’s AI Performance tools recommends improving depth, expertise, structure, clarity, evidence and freshness on pages that publishers want to appear in AI-generated answers.
From rankings to citations
One of the clearest changes is that visibility is no longer only about appearing in a list of links. AI systems increasingly synthesise answers from multiple sources and may cite or link to those sources directly.
Microsoft now describes GEO as the practice of understanding how content participates in AI-driven experiences, including answers, citations and grounding. Its Bing Webmaster Tools can show publishers which pages are being cited in AI-generated answers and which grounding queries triggered those citations. OpenAI’s ChatGPT search likewise presents citations and source links in answers when web search is used. That changes the question marketers need to ask. It is no longer only, “Can this page rank?” Increasingly, it is also, “Can this page become a useful source for an answer?”
Keywords still matter, but context matters more
Keywords have not disappeared. They remain useful for understanding demand, language and search intent. But AI search is less dependent on exact keyword matching than traditional search strategies once were.
Google explicitly says that site owners do not need to rewrite content in a special way for generative AI search or capture every possible long-tail variation. Its systems can understand synonyms and broader meaning. Google also says that AI search experiences are designed to help users explore more complex topics and questions, rather than merely match exact phrases.
For content marketers, that means the focus should move away from mechanically inserting phrases and towards answering real questions comprehensively. A page should make its subject clear, explain the issue well, provide evidence where relevant and give the reader something genuinely useful.
A strong page should make its subject immediately clear, answer the main question directly, and then add useful depth through evidence, examples, expert commentary, comparisons or original research. The aim is to create content that genuinely helps the reader understand the issue, rather than repeating generic information or mechanically inserting search terms. For GEO, the strongest content is therefore not simply keyword-optimised; it is clear, authoritative and useful enough to become a source that search and AI systems can understand and potentially surface.
Authority matters, but there is no universal GEO score
It is tempting to talk about “authority” as if there were a single score that determines whether an AI system will cite a website. There is not. OpenAI says ChatGPT search uses multiple factors intended to surface relevant and reliable information, while Google says its systems continue to prioritise helpful, reliable, people-first content. Neither publishes a universal GEO ranking formula.
What we can say with more confidence is that original reporting, clear expertise, accurate information, evidence, useful structure and current content are all consistent with the guidance being published by major search and AI platforms. Bing, for example, specifically recommends strengthening subject depth, using clear headings, supporting claims with evidence and keeping pages fresh and accurate.
That is one reason thought leadership can be particularly valuable. The best thought leadership does not simply repeat what is already known. Rather, it contributes a distinctive point of view, original evidence or informed expertise that other sources may not have.
Structure helps, but there are no magic GEO tricks
Technical SEO still matters because content has to be crawlable, indexable and understandable before it can be surfaced.
Google recommends allowing crawling, making important content available in text, using sensible internal links and ensuring that structured data accurately reflects what is visible on the page. At the same time, Google is explicit that there is no special schema.org markup for AI search, no requirement for an llms.txt file and no need to break content into artificial “chunks” simply to make it readable by AI.
Structured data remains useful for conventional search features and for helping search engines understand specific entities and content types, but it should be treated as part of a broader SEO strategy rather than as a secret GEO shortcut as Google for Developers explains.
Make your content accessible to AI search
This is one of the most practical parts of GEO and one of the easiest to overlook. OpenAI says that publishers who want their content to be eligible for inclusion in ChatGPT search should allow OAI-SearchBot to crawl their sites. It also distinguishes OAI-SearchBot, which is used for search, from GPTBot, which relates to model training. A publisher can therefore allow search crawling while separately controlling training access.
Technical teams should also check robots.txt settings, CDN rules, firewalls and bot protection. A page can contain excellent content and still fail to appear if legitimate crawlers cannot reach it.
GEO is becoming measurable
One of the biggest developments is that AI visibility is beginning to move from guesswork towards measurement. Microsoft’s Bing Webmaster Tools now reports citations, cited pages, grounding queries and citation trends across AI-generated experiences. In 2026, Microsoft also added broader AI visibility measures including topics, intents and citation share. Google has similarly introduced dedicated reporting for visibility in generative AI features within Search Console.
This matters because content teams can begin to see which pages are actually being used in AI-generated answers instead of relying solely on third-party GEO theories. The right approach is therefore not to chase every new GEO “hack”, but to measure what is happening, compare it with existing search and audience data and improve content based on real evidence.
Trust is still the real currency
Search behaviour is changing, but the fundamentals of good content are remarkably stable:
People want accurate information.
Search engines want useful pages.
AI systems need reliable source material to ground their answers.
That means the most durable content strategy still starts with understanding the audience, producing something genuinely worth reading and making sure the information is clear, current and accessible. GEO adds a new distribution environment to that work. It does not replace the work itself.
For brands, the opportunity is not simply to produce content that “ranks in AI”. It is to build a body of credible, distinctive knowledge that can be discovered across search, social platforms and AI assistants. That is why good thought leadership writers matter more, not less, in an AI-driven search environment. The strongest material usually comes from extracting real expertise from inside an organisation: interviewing subject-matter experts, identifying the argument that is actually distinctive, challenging vague claims and turning specialist knowledge into something clear, credible and useful. AI can help with research, transcription, structure and first drafts, but it cannot replace the editorial judgement involved in deciding what is genuinely worth saying.
AI-written content is not automatically bad for GEO, but generic AI content can be. Search and AI platforms are increasingly rewarding originality, usefulness and clear expertise rather than volume for its own sake. If AI is used simply to produce large amounts of derivative copy, the result is unlikely to add much value for either readers or generative search systems. The better approach is to use AI as part of the workflow while keeping original reporting, expert insight, fact-checking and human editorial judgement at the centre. In other words, AI can help create content faster, but it is the quality of the thinking behind that content that gives it a chance of being discovered, trusted and cited.
The goal is no longer only to appear in search results. Increasingly, it is to become part of the answer. So if you’d like to harness AI and your company’s insights for better search results, talk to us.
