AI SEO

AI SEO is regular SEO plus a second goal. The first goal is still to rank in Google and Bing. The second is to be the business an AI engine names when someone asks it who to call. Many people use the phrase to mean the whole of modern search work.

The emphasis in AI SEO is on how the two fit together. The page-level wording is covered under answer engine optimization (AEO), and the source-trust side under generative engine optimization (GEO). If you are comparing providers, AI SEO is the term to use for the combined program.

What stays the same.

• Fast pages, clean addresses, sitemaps and canonical tags.
• Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools set up and watched.
• Accurate listings and answered reviews.
• Content that answers real questions.

What is new.

• Letting AI crawlers in, and adding an llms.txt file.
• Structured data detailed enough for a machine to quote.
• Bing matters more, because ChatGPT search and Copilot lean on its index.
• Measuring whether you are named, not only where you rank.

• Technical SEO. Indexing, speed, redirects and sitemaps, fixed and verified in Google and Bing.
• Listings and reviews. Google Business Profile, Bing Places, Apple Business Connect and Yelp, kept consistent, with every review answered.
• Pages. Answer-first pages for the questions customers ask, with structured data.
• AI access. robots.txt, llms.txt and instant indexing through IndexNow so new pages reach Bing and Copilot the same day.
• A short monthly report covering both sides: clicks and positions, and whether the engines named you.

Two scoreboards, side by side. For rankings we read clicks, impressions and average position straight from Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools. For AI answers we run the same question list every week and log whether you were named.

Every week we write down six to ten questions a real customer would type and ask each one in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Claude, in a logged-out, temporary or incognito chat so personal history does not skew the answer. We record three things: was the business named, which of its pages was cited, and who was named instead. That log is the scoreboard, next to clicks, impressions and positions from Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools. Answers change from day to day, so each row carries a date. You see the same table every month. That is how we measure our own site; for clients, the Visible plan checks ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google every month, and the Grow plan adds Copilot and tracks who gets named instead. The full method is on our search page, and the free visibility check is the first run of it for your business.

We run this on our own site and on the Carson River Resort site, and we can walk you through it before you pay.

AI SEO shows up on both scoreboards. For a year, an international trading company paid a search provider every month, and its site had never been registered with Google Search Console or Bing Webmaster Tools. We took over search on September 20, 2026. We don’t publish the company’s name. Its first month against the month before:

• 3.8× more Google AI answers. Its pages appeared in Google’s AI answers 1,204 times in the first month, up from 314.
• Nine places higher on Google. Average position 15.5, up from 24.4.
• Three new guides, 678 AI answers. They appeared in AI answers 437, 145 and 96 times in their first weeks.
• 41 Copilot citations in one week. Microsoft Copilot cited a single guide 41 times.

The ranking and the AI numbers moved together, which is why we report them together. Read the case study.

Ask any AI SEO provider four things. What do you report each month? Can you show me the same program on your own site? Do you log whether AI engines name your clients, with dates? Do you guarantee a first-place ranking? (If yes, walk away.) Ours: a monthly written report on both scoreboards, yes, yes and no. Then start with the free visibility check or see packages and prices.

For the guide to doing it yourself, read how to get recommended by AI search. Local version: AI SEO in Alameda. The overview is on SEO & AI search.