How to get your brand cited in AI Overviews and ChatGPT

What GEO means and what we actually know

Generative engine optimisation (GEO) is the work of making your brand and content more likely to be mentioned or cited in AI-generated answers, such as Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode, ChatGPT search, Perplexity and Microsoft Copilot. It overlaps heavily with SEO, because most of these systems retrieve web pages before they write an answer.

It is worth being honest about how much is known. The companies behind these tools publish little about how sources are chosen, and answers vary from one query to the next. Plenty of advice online is guesswork presented as fact. In this article I stick to what the platforms document and to practices that have held up in my own work.

What we do know is enough to act on. AI search tools need to find your pages, understand what your brand is, and trust that your content answers the question well. Each of those is something you can influence.

How Google's AI features choose sources

According to Google's documentation, there are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode beyond being indexed and eligible to appear in Search with a snippet. Google also says you do not need special markup, AI-specific text files or new machine-readable files to be included.

Google's recommendations are the ordinary ones:

• Allow crawling in robots.txt and make sure your CDN or host does not block Googlebot.
• Make content easy to find through internal links.
• Provide a good page experience.
• Keep important content in text, supported by relevant images and video.
• Make sure structured data matches the visible content.
• Keep Merchant Center and Business Profile information up to date where relevant.

Google also notes that AI features can use a technique sometimes called query fan-out, running several related searches to build an answer. In practice that means a page can be cited for a sub-question even if it does not rank first for the main query. Covering a topic thoroughly, including the follow-up questions people ask, gives you more chances to be pulled in.

Controls you have

The standard snippet controls apply. nosnippet, data-nosnippet and max-snippet limit what Google can show from your pages, and noindex removes a page from Search entirely. Google-Extended is a separate robots.txt token that controls use of your content for training and grounding in some other Google AI systems, but it does not affect Search, including AI Overviews.

ChatGPT, Perplexity and other AI search tools

Other AI search tools also rely on crawlers and search indexes, so they can only cite pages they are allowed to access. Check your robots.txt and firewall rules before anything else.

• ChatGPT search uses OpenAI's OAI-SearchBot to find pages it can show in search results. This is separate from GPTBot, which OpenAI uses for training data. You can block training and still allow search.
• Microsoft Copilot draws on Bing's index, so being well indexed in Bing matters. Bing Webmaster Tools and IndexNow help here.
• Perplexity uses its own crawler, PerplexityBot, alongside other sources.

In my experience many sites block AI crawlers by accident, through security plugins or CDN bot protection, and only find out when they wonder why they never appear. A quick log check or crawler test settles it. This is now part of every technical SEO checklist I run.

Entities: make it clear who you are

AI systems answer questions about brands by combining what they find about them across the web. If your brand is described consistently, it is easier to recognise, connect to the right topics and recommend.

• A clear About page that states what the company does, for whom and where, in plain sentences.
• Consistent naming of your company, products and founders across your site, social profiles and directories.
• Organization structured data on your home page, with your logo, contact details and sameAs links to official profiles.
• Author pages that show real expertise, for content where experience matters.
• Up-to-date profiles on platforms that matter in your industry, such as review sites, marketplaces or professional directories.

Structured data will not get you cited on its own, and Google says no special schema is needed for AI features. It does help search engines understand your entity, which supports everything else.

Citations and mentions beyond your own site

AI answers about "the best X for Y" usually reflect what many sources say, not just what your own site says. Being mentioned on credible third-party pages is one of the strongest levers you have, in my experience.

• Get included in reputable comparison articles, reviews and industry roundups.
• Earn coverage in trade media with data, expert commentary or useful tools.
• Encourage genuine customer reviews on platforms relevant to your market.
• Take part in communities and forums where your audience asks questions, without spamming.

This is close to classic digital PR and link building. The difference is that an unlinked brand mention still has value, because AI tools read text, not just links. Our link building guide covers how to earn these placements safely.

Structure content so it can be quoted

Content that gets cited tends to answer a question directly, early, and in a self-contained way. A model looking for a definition or a step-by-step answer will find it more easily if you write one.

• Answer the main question in the first one or two sentences of the page and of each section.
• Use descriptive H2 and H3 headings that match real questions.
• Use lists for steps and tables for comparisons, where they genuinely help.
• Include specific, verifiable details such as prices, dimensions, dates and definitions.
• State who wrote the content and when it was last updated.
• Keep facts consistent across pages, so different pages do not contradict each other.

None of this is new. It is good on-page SEO with more attention to clarity. The pages I see cited most often are the ones that are simply the clearest answer available.

Measuring AI visibility

You can measure AI visibility, but only partly, and you should treat the numbers as directional. There is no complete equivalent of rankings for AI answers yet.

A practical setup: pick 20 to 50 prompts your customers would realistically ask, check them monthly in the main tools, and record whether you are mentioned, cited with a link, or absent. Add an AI referral segment in analytics and watch conversions from it, not just visits.

Where to start

Start by making sure AI tools can reach and understand your site, then work on being the clearest source and the most mentioned brand in your niche.

1. Check robots.txt, firewall and CDN settings for Googlebot, Bingbot, OAI-SearchBot and PerplexityBot.
2. Fix indexing problems, because a page that is not indexed cannot be used.
3. Tighten your About page, Organization markup and brand naming.
4. Rewrite key pages so they answer questions directly and cover follow-up questions.
5. Build mentions on credible third-party sites.
6. Set up prompt tracking and an AI referral segment.

If you want help building a plan for this, our AI SEO service combines a technical check with content and mention work aimed at AI search.

Frequently asked questions