What is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) — and Why It Matters Now

The way people discover information online is shifting—fast.

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Not long ago, everything revolved around Google. Ranking on page one meant visibility. But today, more and more people are skipping traditional search altogether and asking tools like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity for answers. These AI engines don’t just pull links but they generate responses based on a mix of training data, live content, and trusted sources.

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That means if your website isn’t showing up in these answers—or worse, isn’t even understood by these engines—it’s invisible to a growing share of searchers.

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This is where Generative Engine Optimization, or GEO, comes in.

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What Is Generative Engine Optimization?

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is the process of helping your website get surfaced, mentioned, and cited by generative AI engines. It’s not about ranking in search results. It’s about becoming part of the answer.

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If you’ve ever seen a brand or article quoted in a ChatGPT response or cited by Perplexity, that’s GEO at work. These mentions aren’t random—they happen because the content is structured, understood, and connected in a way AI can use.

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Unlike traditional SEO, which focuses on ranking for specific keywords, GEO is about teaching AI engines how to recognize your site as relevant and reliable when users ask for help.

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Why GEO Matters Right Now

AI tools aren’t just experiments anymore. They’re becoming the default starting point for everything from product research to learning new skills. We’ve seen websites that never used to get any AI-driven traffic now receiving clicks directly from ChatGPT prompts and Perplexity answers.

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And while most websites are still focused only on Google, those investing in GEO are getting in front of the next wave of online visibility. There’s a real opportunity here: less competition, faster results, and a chance to be recommended by tools people are using daily.

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GEO doesn’t replace SEO. It builds on it. And for websites that want to stay ahead, it’s no longer optional.

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What Makes GEO Different from SEO?

With SEO, you're optimizing for crawlers and algorithms that look at page structure, backlinks, and keywords to decide rankings. GEO is different—it’s about optimizing for how AI understands your website as a whole.

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AI tools don’t just follow links. They look at how your content connects to concepts, entities, and other trusted sources. They summarize, synthesize, and paraphrase. So, the question becomes: are you showing up in the content they trust and cite? Are your pages structured in a way that an LLM can understand and include you?

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In a way, GEO is like teaching your website a new language. The language of AI.

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How Butter Approaches GEO

At Butter, we help websites become visible to AI by doing a few key things consistently—and doing them well.

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We start by running prompt tests to see how your website shows up when people ask common questions related to your space. If you’re not showing up, we look into why—and what needs to change. That could mean refining content structure, creating more AI-readable pages, or building out supporting articles that speak directly to how people search with AI.

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We also help build AI citations—mentions of your site on other trusted websites that generative engines are known to crawl. These aren't always traditional SEO backlinks, but they serve a similar purpose in helping AI decide what sources to trust.

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Another major focus is knowledge graph submissions. We work to make sure your website is properly represented in the structured data sources that many AI engines rely on to form answers. This includes Google’s Knowledge Graph, Wikidata, and other semantic databases.

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And each month, we deliver a clean, simple report that outlines everything done—from new citations and backlinks, to prompt visibility tracking and improvement suggestions. No fluff—just real updates with actionable insights.

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What GEO Success Looks Like

After just a few months of GEO work, we’ve seen websites begin to get referral traffic from ChatGPT and mentions in AI-generated answers. Sometimes it's a link in a Perplexity citation; other times it's a name-drop in a ChatGPT recommendation.

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These signals might seem small at first, but they’re leading indicators of where things are headed. They show that your site is being picked up, understood, and included by the next generation of search tools.

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And unlike traditional SEO, where competition is fierce and slow-moving, GEO gives websites a chance to break through faster, often without needing to outspend or out-rank legacy players.

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Can You Measure GEO?

Absolutely. Though it takes a different lens.

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Instead of just rankings, we look at things like:

• Are you getting cited in Perplexity answers?
• Are you being mentioned by ChatGPT or Claude when certain prompts are used?
• Is there referral traffic from AI tools in your analytics?
• Are you being included in AI summaries or snapshots?

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These are the signals that matter now—and they’re only growing in importance.

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GEO Is Here—And It’s Growing

The internet is evolving. AI isn’t just something people are experimenting with—it’s where they’re going for real answers, every day. If your website isn’t part of that conversation, you’re missing out on a growing segment of discovery that’s only going to get bigger.

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GEO gives your website a chance to be heard, cited, and recommended—before your competitors even know what it is.

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At Butter, we’re here to help make that happen.