Answer engine optimization
Samy Ben SadokFounder, GEO ToolboxWhen your buyer asks the question, one block of text gets picked as the answer. We make that block yours.
Featured snippets, People Also Ask, AI Overview answer slots, voice answers — one extracted passage wins each question. I built GEO Toolbox — the platform used to measure AI visibility — and my team and I restructure your pages to win those slots, then report the presence monthly.
20-min intro call · no obligation · founder-led delivery.
- On-time or we refund the milestone
- You own every page & dataset
- Reporting is raw slot data, no spin
The category, defined honestly
What AEO is — and what it isn't.
- 01
AEO is winning the extracted answer.
Featured snippets, People Also Ask, the answer slot inside an AI Overview, the answer a voice assistant reads aloud — one passage gets picked and shown as the answer. Answer engine optimization is the work of structuring your pages so that passage is yours for the questions your buyers ask.
- 02
It is not classic SEO — it sits above it.
SEO competes for ten ranked links; AEO competes for the single slot above them. The overlap is real — you usually need page-one relevance before an engine will extract you — but the scoreboard is different: answer-slot presence per question, not just position.
- 03
It is not GEO either.
Generative engine optimization targets the composed answer an AI writes across several cited sources — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot. AEO targets the single extracted block. The two jobs meet inside AI Overviews, which both cite sources and extract blocks; we run both, measured separately.
Want the deeper theory first? Read the guides: what AEO is, AEO best practices, GEO vs AEO vs SEO, or the glossary definition. This page is the done-for-you service.
The proof, from our own test domain
One fresh, zero-authority domain. The receipts, by source.
These are the numbers, not a promise — the exact figures, stamped, and updated as they move. The Google ranking figures came from about 7 weeks of publishing on a domain that drove near-zero traffic before. The two AI-answer figures are kept apart on purpose: one is Google's own count of our links inside AI Overviews and AI Mode, the other a separate 30-day Bing sample.
- Keywords ranked in Google
- 20,541
- Google Search Console · 28-day window
- On Google's first page (top 10)
- 9,639
- Google Search Console · 28-day window
- Appearances inside Google's AI answers
- 91,400
- Google Search Console · AI Overviews + AI Mode · 28-day window15× in 28 days
- AI-citation appearances in Bing
- ~108,300
- Bing WMT · Microsoft Copilot and partners · 30-day sample30-day sample
- Google impressions per day
- ~20,610
- Google Search Console · 28-day avg
Queries ranked in Google
Search Console API · unique queries / month · *month to date
Queries on Google's first page
Search Console API · avg. position ≤ 10 · *month to date
| Month | Queries ranked | Top 10 | Top 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 2026 | 27 | 17 | 2 |
| Jun 2026 | 3,014 | 576 | 110 |
| Jul 2026 | 8,664 | 3,000 | 444 |
| Aug 2026 (month to date) | 21,117 | 10,361 | 2,858 |
As of 28 Aug 2026. The keyword, first-page, and monthly-chart figures are exact unique-query counts from the Google Search Console API, refreshed automatically every 48 hours (keywords over a trailing 28-day window, chart by calendar month). Impressions per day is a Google-only 28-day average from Search Console.
The 91,400 figure is Google's own — impressions from the Search Console “Generative AI features” report (AI Overviews + AI Mode), trailing 28 days to 28 Aug 2026, up from 5,910 in the previous 28 days. It counts times a geotoolbox.ai link was shown inside an AI answer, not clicks and not unique citations. That report is still in beta and has no API, so it is read by hand.
The ~108,300 AI-citation figure is a 30-day sample from Bing Webmaster Tools' AI Performance report (Microsoft Copilot and partners), as of 28 Aug 2026 — a count of citation appearances, not unique citations, and not attributable to ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google.
What you get, and how it runs
Three outcomes. Audit, build, track.
No black box, no list of busywork tasks. Each stage is one outcome you can check, and each one produces an artifact you can hold — a baseline, a restructured page, a monthly report — so you always know what the money bought.
- 01Audit
A map of the answer slots in your market — and who owns each one today.
Week one: which of your buyers' questions resolve in a featured snippet, People Also Ask box or AI Overview answer slot, and whose text sits in each one right now — yours, or a competitor's. You start from a measured gap, not a hunch.
answer-slot baseline
- 02Build
Your pages restructured into blocks an engine can lift verbatim.
Question-shaped headings, direct answers in the first sentences, clean structure and schema — the format answer engines extract. The focus is the questions that sit closest to a purchase, not trivia — while your classic Google rankings hold.
extractable priority pages
- 03Track
Monthly slot reports: which questions, which surfaces, what changed.
AI Overview presence from our own tracker; snippet and People Also Ask slots from standard SERP tracking. Slots won, slots lost, per question, with deltas. If a month is flat, the report says flat. Same numbers, both of us.
monthly slot report
How to start
Start with the diagnostic. Scale when the numbers say to.
Two one-off purchases and one ongoing engagement. Start with the Report — you never commit to a retainer before you've seen the opportunity in your own numbers.
This is for you if
- Your buyers research before they buy — a considered, higher-value purchase.
- You have a real site with something true and specific to say.
- You want proof from a tracker, not a monthly vibe check.
This isn't for you if
- You need leads this week — answer slots take weeks to win, not days.
- You sell pure impulse buys nobody researches first.
- You can't ship changes to your pages, or won't.
AI + SEO Visibility Report
One-offOne-off
The full baseline: the answer slots in your market, who owns them, and the pages worth building.
A one-off diagnostic that maps the buying-intent questions in your market, whose text owns each answer slot today, and the specific pages to restructure or build.
30-Day AI Visibility Sprint
One-offOne-off · scoped to project size
Thirty days of building: fixes shipped, priority pages restructured to be extracted.
Technical fixes, your priority pages restructured into extractable answers with the schema and structure engines look for. Scope and price depend on your site's size — we set both on the call. The Sprint counts as month one if you continue on a retainer within 30 days.
Ongoing GEO + SEO Growth
Retainer90-day initial commitment
The compounding version: new answer-ready pages, new questions, tracked every month.
Continuous AEO, GEO and SEO work — new extractable pages, more buying-intent questions taken one by one, and the monthly report. Then month to month.
Priority Growth
Retainer90-day initial commitment
Everything in Growth, at a faster cadence — weekly builds, more pages taken each month.
For teams treating AI answers as a primary channel: weekly cadence, more priority pages restructured to be extracted per month, and multi-market tracking. One brand, maximum push.
Scale Retainer
RetainerMulti-brand / enterprise · scoped on a call
Multi-brand or enterprise — weekly cadence, multi-market, priority build capacity.
For agencies, portfolios, or companies past $20M revenue running several brands. Weekly cadence, multi-market tracking, and priority build capacity across brands — scoped on a call.
The Report fee is credited toward a Sprint or retainer if you continue within 14 days.
The $1,250 Report is a fixed price, payable by card — buy it above and you'll go straight to secure checkout. The Sprint and retainer are scoped to your project on the call. Looking for the umbrella service? See done-for-you AI SEO — or generative engine optimization if your market's questions end in a composed AI answer, not a snippet. For custom AI agents and tooling, see AI automation & agent development.
On-time delivery guarantee
If we miss a milestone after you've given on-time access and feedback, we refund that milestone's fee. We never guarantee rankings or citations — no honest person can — only that we deliver on time or pay for missing.
You own everything
Every page, dashboard and dataset is yours. If we stop working together, you keep the work, the tracker baseline, and the pages — nothing is held hostage.
Start with the Report
If the opportunity doesn't justify implementation, you keep the research and owe no retainer. The Report has to earn the Sprint before the Sprint earns the retainer.
FAQ
The questions we get about AEO
- 01What exactly is answer engine optimization?The work of winning the extracted answer: the featured snippet, the People Also Ask box, the answer slot inside an AI Overview, the answer a voice assistant reads aloud. An engine picks one passage to show as the answer to a question — AEO structures your pages so that passage is yours. Full definition in the glossary: geotoolbox.ai/glossary/answer-engine-optimization.
- 02How is AEO different from SEO?SEO competes for ten ranked links a human might click; AEO competes for the single answer slot above them. You usually need page-one relevance before an engine will extract you — so the work overlaps — but the scoreboard is different: answer-slot presence per question. A client guide we worked on sat at organic position 5–6 in the US while featured in Google's AI Overview — the slot, not the rank, is what the buyer reads.
- 03How is AEO different from GEO?GEO targets the composed answer an AI writes across several cited sources — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot. AEO targets the single block an engine lifts verbatim — snippets, People Also Ask, the AI Overview answer slot, voice. If your market's questions get a one-passage answer, AEO is the lever; if they get a synthesized multi-source answer, GEO is; AI Overviews reward both. We run them as separate, separately measured services.
- 04How do you measure AEO?AI Overview presence with the cross-engine tracker I built (geotoolbox.ai); featured snippet and People Also Ask slots with standard SERP tracking. Your monthly report lists each target question, the surface, who owns the slot, and the deltas. A log, not an estimate.
- 05How long until I win answer slots?Slots turn over faster than rankings — a page that already ranks can win a snippet with a restructure — but nothing honest happens in days. Plan on first tracked movement in 4–8 weeks; our own zero-authority test domain took about 7 weeks to meaningful visibility, and an established site moves faster. Week one you get the baseline.
- 06Why hire the founder instead of an agency?I built GEO Toolbox — the platform used to measure AI visibility — and I lead the work on your account, with a small senior team on delivery. Not a strategist handing off to a junior: the founder who built the measurement tool, in the code of your pages.
Every question in your market already has an answer slot.
Someone's text is in it. Make it yours.
Book a call. I'll read your answer-slot baseline with you and tell you straight whether AEO is worth doing for your market — founder to founder, no handoff.