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What is Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)?

Updated January 12, 2026GEO Expert Team

Summary

AEO is a set of practices designed to increase visibility in AI-generated answers and other direct-answer surfaces. It encompasses practices to increase brand visibility in AI-generated answers like ChatGPT and Google's AI experiences.

Detailed Answer

AEO is a set of practices designed to increase visibility in AI-generated answers (and other direct-answer surfaces). Semrush defines it as practices to increase brand visibility in AI-generated answers like ChatGPT and Google's AI experiences.

AEO best practices include:
1. Answer-first content formatting
2. Question-based headings
3. Structured data implementation
4. Featured snippet optimization
5. Voice search optimization
6. Entity and knowledge graph optimization

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