The battle to be name-dropped in AI summaries might be making the internet more human.
Now that the best way to win an AI’s trust is to have a long history of being cited by actual people, it is no longer about keywords, it is about word-of mouth.
Essentially, we must strive to make our websites as quotable to bots as William Shakespeare, Mark Twain, and Oscar Wilde are to humans.
For a laugh, here is Google’s AI overview of the importance of targeting AI overviews with Generative Engine Optimisation:
“GEO a digital marketing strategy designed to increase content visibility in AI-powered search results (e.g., ChatGPT, Gemini). Unlike traditional SEO which targets search rankings, GEO focuses on getting content cited by AI systems.”
It’s the way it tells them. But how does it all work?
First off, you don’t want to be top of a list, you want to be the answer to the question everyone’s asking – a bit like experts used to be.
Secondly, AI does not click clickbait – it is far too clever to fall for that. It wants something original and unique, almost like a discerning human.
Thirdly, it is also nerdy as hell – delve into that narrow niche, and be as ultra-specific as a train-spotter: one citation for a highly particular query could be all you need.
With AI overviews and platforms like Perplexity and ChatGPT answering over half of all queries directly, website traffic from search is dropping. So, if your brand is not the one name-dropped by AI, you are Captain Nobody to a chunk of the population. Why grow traffic when you can build authority by being cited as an expert source?
AI is a lazy git. The easier you make its life, the more likely it is that it will copy and paste your wisdom. In posh terms, content needs to be “Machine-Parsable.” – short, direct answers outdo complex dithering, and structured data in schema markups help point it in the right direction.
All this helps cut the guesswork. If your company’s key info is buried too deep, lazy bots simply make it up – and who wants an AI summary based on hallucinations?
Reassuringly, AI prioritises content with real human credentials and original research, almost like actual academics used to.
Does anyone really understand GEO? No. That’s the thing about “Black Box” algorithms. But isn’t that half the fun?
