AI Search Optimisation (AEO / GEO)
Get recommended by ChatGPT and Google's AI
More buyers now ask an AI assistant "who's a good dentist near me" or "best SEO agency for solicitors" before they ever click a search result. We make sure those assistants can find your business, understand what you do, and trust you enough to recommend you.
AI search optimisation, also called answer engine optimisation (AEO) or generative engine optimisation (GEO), is the work of making your business visible inside AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, Gemini, Perplexity and Microsoft Copilot. It combines technical access (letting AI search crawlers read your site), clear answer-first content, structured data, and consistent third-party evidence about your business across the web, because AI engines recommend what multiple trusted sources agree on.
AI assistants don't rank ten blue links. They put together an answer from sources they can read and trust, then name a handful of businesses. If your site blocks their crawlers, hides key facts in images or scripts, or says something different from your directory listings, you won't be one of them.
Our approach is evidence-based and technical. We check what each AI engine currently says about you and your competitors, fix what stops them reading your site, and build the consistent web of evidence (listings, reviews, mentions, clear pages) that these systems rely on.
What's included
What you get
AI visibility baseline
We test a fixed set of buyer prompts across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity and Copilot and record who gets named, so progress is measured rather than claimed.
Crawler access review
robots.txt, firewall and CDN rules checked so AI search crawlers (OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Bingbot) can reach your pages. Bot protection on many sites blocks them without anyone noticing.
Answer-first content
Key pages restructured so the direct answer comes first, followed by evidence: prices, process, credentials, FAQs. That makes your content easy to quote.
Entity & structured data
Organisation, service, person and FAQ schema that tells machines exactly who you are, what you offer, where you operate and who's behind the business.
Third-party evidence
Consistent business details across Companies House, directories, review platforms, professional registers and industry sites. This is what AI engines check you against.
Bing & IndexNow
ChatGPT search and Copilot draw heavily on Bing's index. We set up Bing Webmaster Tools and instant indexing so new pages are picked up fast.
How it works
The process
Baseline prompts
We agree 20–40 real buyer questions and record which businesses each AI engine recommends today.
Technical access
Fix crawler blocks, rendering issues, sitemaps, Bing indexing and structured data.
Content restructure
Answer-first rewrites of your most important pages, plus FAQ and comparison content where buyers need it.
Evidence building
Listings, reviews, profiles and mentions brought into line with your site.
Re-test monthly
Same prompts, same engines, documented changes. AI answers vary from one run to the next, so we track trends, not single screenshots.
Sector expertise
AI Search Optimisation for your industry
Related services: SEO · Web Design · Paid Media & PPC
FAQ
AI Search Optimisation: common questions
Is AEO different from SEO?
It's mostly SEO done properly, with extra attention to things AI systems weight heavily: direct answers, structured data, named experts, and consistency across third-party sources. A site that ranks well in Google has a head start, but it isn't guaranteed to be cited by AI.
Can you guarantee ChatGPT will recommend us?
No, and you should be wary of anyone who does. AI answers change from run to run and vary by user. What we can do is remove the barriers, strengthen the evidence, and measure your share of mentions over time against a fixed set of prompts.
Should we block AI crawlers to protect our content?
It depends which ones. Crawlers that power live AI search answers (OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, Claude-SearchBot, Claude-User, PerplexityBot) are how you get cited, so blocking them removes you from those answers. Model-training crawlers are a separate decision. We'll explain the trade-off and set your robots.txt to match.
What is llms.txt and do we need one?
llms.txt is a proposed plain-text file that gives AI tools a short summary of your site and links to key pages. It costs almost nothing to publish, but no major AI engine has confirmed it uses llms.txt for ranking or citations. We include it as cheap insurance, not as a strategy.
How do you measure results?
Monthly prompt testing across engines (share of answers that name you), referral traffic from AI platforms in GA4, branded search growth in Search Console, and, most importantly, enquiries that mention finding you through an AI assistant.
Free audit
Get a free AI Search Optimisation audit.
Tell us your website and what you want more of. Within one working day we'll send a short, honest review: what's stopping you getting enquiries from Google and AI search, and what we'd fix first. Free, no obligation, no hard sell.