AI search optimization
Understand how ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI Overviews pick their sources, and become one.
AI search optimization is the practice of improving your visibility in AI search engines such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI Overviews, so that these systems name your brand and cite your pages as a source. The field also goes by LLM SEO or GEO; the core is always the same: understand how these systems choose sources, and shape your site and brand accordingly.
On this page we explain how that source selection works, why every platform reacts differently and which building blocks make the difference. All of it comes from our own measurement practice: every month we track per model who gets named and cited in our clients' markets.
How AI search engines choose their sources
An AI search engine answers a question in three steps: it interprets what you mean, retrieves candidate sources through a search index, and writes an answer based on the sources that address the question most clearly. Sites drop out at every step. If you are not in the index, you are not in the game. If you are found but only answer the question halfway down the page, you rarely get cited.
Beyond pages, models also weigh your brand as a whole: an entity with a name, a specialism and a reputation confirmed in several places. The more unambiguous those three are, the smaller the risk that a model confuses you with someone else or leaves you out through doubt. For AI search engines, authority is mostly consistency.
Every platform chooses differently
ChatGPT blends model knowledge with live search and regularly names brands without a link. Perplexity researches almost every question live and attaches citations to every answer; strong answer pages score there fastest. Google AI Overviews builds on the regular Google index, so your existing rankings weigh heavily. Claude searches the web for current questions and, like Perplexity, cites its sources.
Those differences are not theory, we see them in every report: the same brand scores very differently per platform. ANSWRD reaches 21 percent visibility in Perplexity and ranks number one in Google AI Overviews at 14 percent, while Hogedruk.be has its strongest channel in ChatGPT and Uitgeverij Wilde Haren peaks in AI Overviews at 27 percent. Optimising for a single platform is therefore always half a strategy.
Wondering what this means for your site?
Ask usThe building blocks: llms.txt, structured data, entities and answer-first content
Four building blocks together decide whether AI search engines can find, understand and cite you.
- Answer-first content: one question per page, answered in the first paragraph, nuance afterwards
- Structured data: schema markup that tells machines who you are, what you offer and which questions you answer
- Entities: the same brand name, description and facts across your site, your profiles and external sources
- llms.txt: a reading guide for AI systems listing your offering and your most important pages
Beneath those four sits the technical base that applies to Google as well: speed, clean indexation and crawlability, including access for AI bots in your robots.txt. In our engagements that foundation always comes first.
Measurement is half the work
AI answers shift by the day and by the phrasing, so loose spot checks tell you little. We measure structurally instead, with tools like Promptwatch: fixed prompt sets per market, repeated per model, compared monthly. That reveals which share of the answers you take, which domains are winning citations at your expense and where a new page had immediate effect.
That measurement loop is what makes optimization steerable. At ANSWRD it produced the strongest rise in citation share of all our running engagements, while organic traffic from Google grew sevenfold. Without the measurement, nobody could have said which intervention caused it.
What determines the cost of AI search optimization?
The investment follows from the measurement: how many questions in your market are still unclaimed, how much technical repair your site needs and how much content it takes to cover the question space. A site with a healthy technical base and existing authority starts from a different point than one that still has to build both.
We charge a fixed amount per month, with no lock-in and no long-term obligation. After an initial conversation we dig into your situation, and you receive a proposal with a concrete number and the priorities for the first six months.
Frequently asked questions
Yes. LLM SEO, GEO, AEO and AI search optimization all describe the same craft: making large language models name your brand and cite your pages. The terms vary by field and by country; the work behind them does not.
For most Dutch and Belgian markets: ChatGPT for its reach, Google AI Overviews because they sit above the regular results, and Perplexity and Claude as the fastest-growing sources of click-throughs. The mix differs per audience, which is why we measure per model before setting priorities.
Usually not. Targeted repair work is often enough: admitting AI bots, adding structured data, rewriting headings and first paragraphs to answer-first. A rebuild only comes into view when the technical base is so weak that every improvement breaks on it, and the measurement shows that well in advance.
It is a text file at the root of your domain that gives AI systems a summary of who you are and which pages are worth reading. Think of it as a sitemap in plain language. Not every model uses it yet, but it takes an hour to set up and makes your site more predictably readable.
Monthly, with the same prompt set, so trends become visible through the daily noise. AI answers fluctuate by nature; only after several measurements can you tell whether a shift is policy or coincidence. Our clients receive that measurement every month next to their Google numbers.
We usually schedule an intro call within a few days, and after sign-off on the proposal the work typically starts within two to three weeks. Send your request through the form below; we reply within one working day.
Related pages
Which AI search engine knows your brand already?
Get in touch and tell us which AI search engines matter in your market and where your brand stands today. We dig into your visibility per model and come back with insights and a concrete game plan with next steps. We reply within one working day.