Response engine optimization (AEO) best practices cannot be ignored by marketing teams

A few months ago I had something of a professional identity crisis. And all thanks to Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) and AEO best practices.

Before 2024, I spent the better part of a decade focused on getting to the top of search engine results pages – and honestly, I was great at it. I knew the ins and outs of keywords, schema, and even technical SEO aspects like site speed.

But with the advent of AI, these capabilities slowly became less urgent, for lack of a better word. (Indication of marketer’s existential panic.)

Search and consumer behavior have changed dramatically. While traditional search engines still dominate, people are increasingly turning to AI tools like ChatGPT to answer their questions. With 79% of those who already use AI for search believing it offers a better experience than traditional search engines, even Google has introduced AI overviews to stay competitive.

But what about all my SEO fame? This change requires a new approach. Unfortunately, AEO is a mystery to businesses and marketers in general. HubSpot is no exception, but we find our way.

We’ve been researching and experimenting with how we produce and format content for AI and loop marketing for almost a year. In this article, I will share some of the key AEO best practices we discovered.

Table of contents

TLDR

Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is the process of making your content easy for AI-powered systems – like Google AI Overviews and ChatGPT – to find, understand, and cite. Unlike traditional SEO, AEO focuses on direct answers, structured data, and authority signals that help your brand appear in zero-click results and AI summaries.

Start by mapping user questions, structuring content for quick answers, adding the right schema markup for AEO, and tracking your visibility with tools like HubSpot’s AI Search Grader. Are you ready to see where you stand? Try it for free.

What is Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)?

At its core, answer engine optimization is the strategic practice of structuring your content so that AI-powered systems can easily extract, understand, and present it as reliable answers.

Many in the industry also refer to related terms like Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) or Large Language Model Optimization (LLMO), but “AEO” emphasizes this Answer.

When someone asks ChatGPT for marketing advice, asks Google for a quick definition, or talks to Alexa about local services, AEO determines whether your brand is mentioned in the response.

How is AEO different from SEO?

Special feature	Traditional SEO	Response Engine Optimization (AEO)
Goal	Rank high in SERPs and increase website traffic	Get cited in AI answers and gain zero-click visibility
Content focus	Wide, long format, targeted to keyword groups	Concise, direct Q&A style answers (short + detailed)
Signals	backlinks, keyword metrics, domain authority,	Mentions, semantic markup, freshness, structured data
Metrics	Impressions, clicks, CTR, conversions, visits	Citation rate, share of AI vote, AI impressions, brand mentions
Time horizon	Medium to long term, with sustainable growth	Some quicker successes (snippets), but need to be continuously adjusted

When people use a search engine, they get back what the tool thinks is best resources to answer your question. For example, if I asked the very scientific question “What are the best action movies of all time?” this would provide me with a lot of different resources (websites, videos, even forum answers) that I believe could provide the information I’m looking for.

That’s why the goal of TTraditional SEO is to increase rankings, clicks and therefore website traffic.

As a marketer, this means targeting keywords, building backlinks, securing a spot on page one if not position one, and tracking impressions, click-through rates, and organic sessions. (All the good things I used to tackle.)

Read: 8 SEO Challenges for Brands (HubSpot Blog Data)

Answer machines not only provide possible resources to users; They try to give exactly the answer they want.

For example, when I ask ChatGPT about the best action movies of all time, I get a list compiled from many sources, not just linking to a few sites to watch.

For this reason, AEO’s goal is to cite and include quotes in these answers.

As a marketer, you need to structure your content for extraction, use schema markup to clarify meaning, and build authority so that language models trust and reference your expertise. And you can track success by the number of zero-click responses, AI summaries, and voice responses, even if users never visit your site.

The strategic difference is visibility without traffic. A well-optimized answer can be cited thousands of times in ChatGPT conversations or Google AI overviews without generating a single session in your analytics. This challenges traditional attribution models but expands your brand’s reach into entirely new contexts where purchasing decisions increasingly begin.

In short: SEO drives traffic. AEO has the answer.

Read: The Essential SEO Tutorial for Succeeding in the Age of AI-Driven Search

Why response engine optimization is more important now than ever

The internet is moving from a click-based to a response-based economy, and your brand can easily be overlooked if you ignore AEO. Don’t you believe me?

This is reported by Google almost 60% of searches Now exit without a click as users get what they need directly from AI overviews, featured snippets or knowledge panels. Additionally, generative AI is embedded into all major platforms (e.g. Microsoft Copilot, Perplexity and Gemini) and voice assistants respond to queries in seconds, often relying on a single source.

ChatGPT alone has has nearly doubled its average weekly user count to 800 million From February to August this year, it is clear that this trend is not slowing down.

A brand’s visibility now depends on it being cited and summarized by these systems, not just on ranking well in search. But that doesn’t mean you can neglect SEO.

AI engine optimization actually complements SEO and inbound marketing. it doesn’t replace them. AEO relies on many SEO fundamentals—strong content, domain credibility, internal linking—but realigns priorities so that content is machine-friendly, structured, and ready to be quoted or excerpted.

While traditional SEO is still essential for driving traffic, AEO determines whether your brand appears in top answers. So think of it as a new layer to your existing content strategy, rather than a separate thing competing for resources.

Best practices for response engine optimization

Effective AEO requires systematic implementation across all your content operations. Each approach includes specific workflows, clear responsibilities, and actionable checklists to help your team complete the work with confidence.

1. Match questions and user intent to AEO content.

AEO is extremely question and answer oriented.

So, start by creating a comprehensive question inventory that captures what your audience typically asks at each stage of their journey.

Engage with sales and customer service to understand the questions prospects and customers commonly ask. Then search the Google “People Also Ask” (PAA) fields for your core topics. These reveal what answers users want and what Google’s algorithm considers relevant.

Once captured, review your existing content Identify gaps or opportunities to update content. Additionally, research them on both search engines and AI tools to see how your competitors are currently performing for them.

From there, segment the questions by funnel stage and buyer persona. Here are some general guidelines you can follow:

• Questions in the awareness phase require instructive, colloquial answers.
• Questions in the consideration phase require comparisons, frameworks, and proof points.
• Questions in the decision phase require details about implementation, pricing, and support.

Pro tip: Track this inventory in a shared spreadsheet or your CRM, noting which questions you’ve answered, which are in progress, and which represent content gaps that your competitors might fill first.

2. Structure the content for direct answers and extractions.

When you search on Google, the AI ​​doesn’t read your entire article in a linear fashion. Instead, it identifies answer-like structures (short paragraphs after questions, numbered steps, comparison tables) and decides whether that content directly addresses the user’s query.

Large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT do something similar in training and retrieval, prioritizing content that presents information in clear, modular blocks that they can confidently cite.

To optimize this behavior, start each key section with a 40-60 word direct answer that fully answers the question, similar to how you would normally search for “featured snippets” in Google (more on this later).

When someone asks, “What is inbound marketing?” Define it completely in two or three sentences in your first paragraph, with no fluff, preamble, or jokes (as much as that pains me), just the answer. Then add supporting details, examples, and context for readers who want depth.

Additionally, use searchable formatting such as bullet points, numbered lists, and tables, and keep paragraphs under four sentences whenever possible. This isn’t about dumbing down your content, it’s about making valuable information accessible to both quick readers and analytics algorithms.

If you have the resources, adopt reusable content block patterns that response engines recognize. Think definition blocks for terminology, step-by-step blocks for processes, pros and cons blocks for assessments, and example blocks for illustration.

Here’s an example from one of my HubSpot articles on organic marketing:

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These patterns act as semantic signals that help the AI ​​recognize what type of information you are providing and how exactly to extract it.

Pro tip: Content Hub can help you use these patterns as a template, streamline content descriptions, and maintain editorial control at scale as your team produces more AEO-optimized content. This also applies to the schema.

3. Implement a schema that reads response machines.

Schema markup is structured data that you add to your HTML to explicitly tell search engines and AI systems what your content represents.

It’s the difference between assuming your site is a how-to guide and Google knowing sure there are five specific steps, an estimated completion time, and the tools required.

Focus on these core schema types for AEO impact:

• Use FAQ page schema on pages with question-answer pairs. This helps Google display your content in rich search results and provides LLMs with clear question-answer mappings to extract.
• Apply HowTo scheme on the teaching content, the marking of each step, its position in the sequence and any images or warnings.
• Mark editorial content with Item schemaincluding heading, publication date, author and organization. This sends signals of freshness and authority.
• Add Speakable schema to important sections that voice assistants should prioritize when reading out answers.
• Finally, implement Organizational scheme Sitewide to clarify your brand identity, logo and social profiles for consistent company recognition.

CMS SEO tools Platforms like HubSpot allow you to create schemas for different content types, so your team doesn’t have to manually code each post. If you’re a HubSpot user, set up templates for your most common content types – blog posts, guides, FAQs, and product pages – and the schema is automatically applied with clean, crawlable HTML.

4. Win featured snippets and “People Also Ask”.

Featured Snippets and People Also Ask fields are Google’s most visible response formats and serve as training data for how AI overviews select and present information.

If your content appears in a featured snippet, you have essentially been selected by Google as an authoritative answer, which definitely increases your chances of being cited by AI summaries and language models that crawl the web.

To win featured snippets, keep these guidelines in mind when creating content:

• Format your answers to match the snippet type in Google. If the existing snippet is a numbered list, structure your answer as a numbered list. If it’s a paragraph, start with a concise paragraph response. If it’s a table, present your information in a comparison table with clear rows and columns.
• Mirror the wording of the question in your H2 or H3 header. If the PAA question “How do you calculate ROI?” is, your header should correspond exactly to this wording.
• Place your answer at the top of the page. Ideally this is within the first two scrolls. Google prioritizes content that is easily accessible and clearly structured.
• Use the inverted pyramid approach: Answer first, then provide context, examples, and related information for users who want to dig deeper.

Pro tip: To systematically capture more features, collect “People Also Ask” questions on your target topics every quarter. Open an incognito browser, search your core keywords, and document each PAA question that appears. Notice which questions you already answer well, which you answer poorly, and which don’t address you at all.

Prioritize updating existing high-authority pages to address new PAA questions rather than creating entirely new content. Google prefers established pages for featured snippets, so improving already ranked pages often leads to faster results.

5. Prioritize credibility.

Current research results show that content, including quotes, citations and statistics, is 30-40% more visible in AI search results. This highlights the importance of supporting claims with credible sources and maintaining high editorial standards. However, strengthen your content by:

• Format your content for easy skimming. Think bullet points, schemes, etc.
• Back up all claims with facts. Including data-backed insights and expert quotes to increase trustworthiness and demonstrate expertise. (Even better if it is Original data or research.)
• Use trusted resources. Leverage authoritative publications preferred by AI models while maintaining the originality of your analysis.
• Regularly update existing content with new data and insights. This maintains relevance and helps already well-rated sites stay at the top.

6. Build a strong, positive online presence across multiple channels.

Social proof works. I mean, it’s marketing 101. The more people rave about or buy something, the more likely others are to believe it’s true. AI and LLMs work similarly. They learn what to trust based on which sources appear frequently in authoritative contexts.

In other words, LLMs are more likely to treat your content as credible and noteworthy if your brand is cited in reputable industry publications, discussed in high-quality forums, and mentioned in academic or government sources.

However, off-site authority is not just about backlinks for SEO. It’s about proving that your brand is a reputable subject matter expert in many different online areas. Think about other publications, forums, review sites, and social media platforms.

With this knowledge, you want to develop a multichannel sales strategy that prioritizes platforms where your audience and AI training data overlap. That could mean:

• Publishing thought leadership on LinkedIn. As a professional platform, this helps you reach others in your industry and increase leadership visibility.
• Creating educational video content for YouTube. Video transcripts are crawled by AI systems and are often more detailed than blog posts.
• Authentic participation in relevant Reddit communities and Quora discussions. These platforms are increasingly being cited by AI as a source of real user sentiment and practical advice.
• Present byline articles in industry publications with high editorial standards. These third-party recommendations signal far more authority than content published exclusively on your domain or in smaller publications.
• Creating original research and data visualizations. When you publish a survey, benchmark report, or data-driven insights, you create link-worthy assets that will be cited across the web. Each citation strengthens your authority and increases the likelihood that AI models will uncover your data when answering related questions.
• Establishing a distribution rhythm and repurposing the workflow. A single research can become a LinkedIn post, a YouTube video, a contributed article, a Reddit discussion, and a Quora answer, each tailored to the platform and audience.
• Assigning a content distribution owner. This person is responsible for customizing core resources and tracking where they are shared. Include PR aspects and thought leadership opportunities in your planning; Lectures, podcast interviews, and media mentions all contribute to the signals of authority that LLMs evaluate.

Diversification across multiple channels is built into the loop marketing playbook in the Amplify phase. Find out more about it here.

Pro tip: Content Remix can help you with this repurposing with one click.

Plus, Automation of the Marketing Hub can help orchestrate this distribution at scale, scheduling posts across platforms, tracking engagement, and measuring which channels generate the most authority signals and drive traffic back to your own content.

7. Optimize voice responses from all assistants.

Voice assistants like Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant select answers differently than visual search results and LLMs.

You need concise, factually clear and structured content that can be spoken aloud in 15-30 seconds and is formatted for natural language understanding.

When someone asks their smart speaker a question, the assistant typically cites a single source. You want this to be yours. Here’s how you can do that:

• Write answers in an oral language. Avoid technical jargon, long clauses and ambiguous pronouns. A voice assistant that reads out loud “It enables seamless integration” will confuse the listener as to what “it” means. Instead, repeat the subject: “HubSpot’s API enables seamless integration.”
• Use Speakable schema markup. This tells the assistants: “This paragraph is concise, self-contained and ready to be read aloud.”

• Test voice queries on Alexa, Siri, and Google Assistant to check your visibility.
• Create a naming convention for language-optimized content blocks in your CMS. Highlight frequently asked questions, definitions, and key insights with Speakable markup. This means your team knows which sections have been language optimized.

Read: “How and Why to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search”

8. Ensure local optimization for Google AI mode and language.

Local businesses face a unique AEO challenge: for searches that appear to be non-local, local entities often appear in AI-generated answers.

For example, if someone asks about the “best coffee shop for remote work,” Google AI Overviews and voice assistants often respond with specific nearby options, pulling data from the Google Business profile and local landing pages.

You are invisible in those high-intent moments when your local data is incomplete or inconsistent.

Cover your bases by:

• Optimizing your Google business profile. This means you need to make sure your business name, address, and phone number exactly match your website. Add full business hours, including holidays and special events. Upload high-quality photos of your location, products and team. Select all relevant categories. Google uses these to match your business with voice queries. Write a keyword-rich business description that includes the services and questions your customers are actually looking for.
• Creating a strategy for getting reviews. Ask happy customers to leave Google reviews and respond promptly to every review, positive or negative. Review scope and recency are strong ranking signals for local AI results, and LLMs sometimes mention review topics when recommending companies.
• Create local landing pages for each service area. This was one of the first strategies I used to achieve great success with a client years ago, and it’s still effective. Even if you’re a single-location business, dedicated pages for “Marketing Consulting in Austin” or “HVAC Repair in Brooklyn” provide AI systems with clear geographic and service signals to extract. Use consistent name, address, and phone number (NAP) formatting across all pages.

• Ensure your local business data is accurate and consistent across all sources. This means on major platforms like Google Business Profile, Apple Maps, Bing Places, your website, and even Mapquest (yes, they still exist!). Voice queries such as “What time does (company name) close?” or “Is (company name) open today?” from structured sources. Inconsistent data confuses both customers and AI systems and dilutes your local authority. With this in mind, establish a quarterly audit plan to review and update this information as your business evolves.

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How does loop marketing fit into AEO?

Loop marketing and AI engine optimization are natural partners in a modern content strategy. Traditional funnel marketing assumes that buyers follow a linear path from awareness to purchase, interacting in the same places, asking the same questions, and visiting the same pages.

But today’s buyers don’t move in a straight line, and they certainly don’t all take the same path.

Loop marketing recognizes this reality by designing for ongoing engagement across multiple channels rather than a one-time conversion in a specific location.

You create content that serves customers before, during and after the sale. Answering new questions as they arise, supporting expanded use cases, and driving advocacy that impacts awareness. You meet them on social media, forums, podcasts, through AI assistants and a variety of other platforms.

When a satisfied customer asks ChatGPT, “How can I get more value from my marketing automation?” and your knowledge base article is cited, you’ll stay top of mind without having to wait for someone to remember your domain and navigate to it manually.

When potential customers compare options again and Google AI Overviews summarizes your competitor comparison guide, you’ve re-entered their considerations.

When new users ask voice assistants how to get started and your onboarding content is recommended, you’ve increased customer success beyond the capacity of your support team.

A critical part of loop marketing, AEO meets modern shoppers where they are.

AEO technical checklist

Like SEO, AEO also covers the technical setup and performance of your website and content. However, it is good to have some knowledge of code or to work with a developer on some of the items on this checklist.

These tasks ensure that response engines can reliably crawl, analyze, and extract your content. Fundamental work must be done before advanced AEO tactics deliver results.

Check server-side rendering for all critical content.

If your answers, headings, or critical text are only loaded via JavaScript (JS), many crawlers won’t show them. Make sure your HTML contains actual content when the page first loads, not just empty divs waiting for JS to fill them.

Use appropriate semantic HTML tags (headings, lists, sections).

Highlight headings with the correct H1, H2 and H3 tags in the logical hierarchy. Use

,

And

Pass Core Web Vitals for speed and user experience.

Answer engines prefer content that loads quickly and doesn’t frustrate users. Aim Core Web Vitals that meet Google’s thresholds: LCP less than 2.5 seconds, FID less than 100 ms, CLS less than 0.1. Compress images, minimize render-blocking resources, and use a CDN.

Write clear, descriptive URL slugs for each page.

A URL like /blog/what-is-inbound-marketing clearly signals what the content is about. A URL like /blog/post-47293 reveals nothing to AI systems and makes it difficult to categorize and cite your content.

Maintain a strict heading hierarchy with an H1 and a logical H2-H3 structure.

Each page should have exactly one H1, while H2 divides the body into its main sections. From then on, H3s and H4s should divide it further.

Don’t skip levels (H2 to H4) or use headings for style rather than structure. This hierarchy is one of the strongest signals that AI systems use to analyze the organization of your content.

Add internal links with specific, descriptive anchor text.

When linking to related content, use anchor text that describes what the linked page is about, rather than generic phrases like “click here” or “learn more.” Internal links help AI systems map your content relationships and understand topic clusters.

HubSpots Content Hub And CMS Hub Provide integrated tools to manage internal links at scale and ensure every page is logically connected to your broader content ecosystem.

Test whether important content remains accessible even when JavaScript is disabled.

Test your site with JavaScript disabled. Can you still read your answers, navigate headings, and see important information?

If critical content disappears without JS, crawlers and supporting technologies cannot access it either. Build a basic experience that works without JavaScript, then gradually improve it.

Common challenges in AI engine optimization

Believe it or not, the biggest obstacle to AEO success is not technical; it is organizational. Gaining internal buy-in from executives and stakeholders accustomed to measuring success through clicks and conversions requires a fundamental reframing of what visibility means in an AI-first world.

Challenge: Executives refuse to invest in “visibility without clicks.”

Solution: Represent AEO as brand awareness and category leadership, not traffic generation.

When your content is cited in thousands of ChatGPT answers or Google AI overviews, you influence how buyers think about the problem space and what solutions they consider. This is large-scale top-of-funnel influence, similar to PR, thought leadership or sponsorship.

Also explain the change in internet behavior and how website traffic is slowly becoming less and less an indicator of actual brand prevalence. Explain how competitors who have AI visibility today will have mindshare tomorrow.

Quantify the opportunity by tracking how often branded or non-branded responses appear to high-value queries, and then show the cost of allowing competitors to close this gap unchallenged.

Challenge: Attribution and ROI measurement are unclear.

Solution: AI quotes don’t generate sessions in Google Analytics, so traditional tracking fails. Build a hybrid measurement framework that combines proxy metrics with directional indicators.

For example, track your share of featured snippets and PAA appearances over time with tools like those from HubSpot AI search grader. Monitor your brand’s search volume. As your AI visibility increases, you should see more people searching for your brand name right after they come across it in AI responses.

Also, ask new customers how they first heard about you. Increasingly, replies reference “I saw you mentioned in an AI search” or “I found you while researching ChatGPT.” Correlate AEO milestones with pipeline velocity and deal size to demonstrate business impact, even if the path is not linear.

Challenge: It’s difficult to know which AI engines actually cited your content.

Solution: Most AI platforms do not provide a “Search Console for LLMs” where you can see when and how many times you have been cited. So you need to create a simple manual tracking system.

First, assign a team member to regularly query key AI platforms (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Bing Chat) with your target questions and document when your brand appears.

Log the request, the platform, the date, and whether you were the primary source or were mentioned alongside your competitors.

This qualitative data helps you understand which content formats and topics drive the most AI visibility. Over time, patterns will emerge. Certain types of content are cited more reliably or certain platforms prefer different answer structures. Use these insights to refine your AEO content strategy even without perfect analysis.

Challenge: Content teams do not have the capacity to retrofit existing content.

Solution: Prioritize ruthlessly.

AEO can feel like an overwhelming increase when you’re trying to optimize thousands of existing pages at once. Start with your top 20 highest traffic pages and the 20 pages that rank on page one but are not yet winning featured snippets. These are your most leveraged opportunities.

Start by adding schema and reply-first formatting to these pages. Then expand to pillar pages and core conversion content.

Challenge: Teams are unfamiliar with schemas and structured data.

Solution: Schema implementation is often the bottleneck because it requires collaboration between content creators who understand the information and developers who can correctly implement JSON-LD. Close this gap by creating schema templates that your content team can populate without writing code.

Tools like Google’s Schema Markup Generator or HubSpot’s built-in schema modules Allow non-technical users to add structured data via form fields.

Combine this with a validation workflow where someone tests each page Google’s rich results test before publication. Over time, as your team realizes the impact schema has on featured snippet wins and AI citations, they will build fluency and confidence.

Challenge: AI answers change quickly and there is no clear “winning” format.

Solution: The way Google AI Overviews formats responses today may differ from how it formats next quarter, and ChatGPT citation behavior evolves with each model update. This unpredictability makes teams hesitant to invest, but search engine volatility hasn’t stopped SEO from being non-negotiable.

Anchor your strategy on principles that remain stable regardless of algorithm changes:

• Answer questions directly
• Structure content clearly
• Build authority across the web
• Use semantic markup to clarify meaning

These fundamentals improve user experience and website performance even as AI algorithms change. Instead of optimizing for the specifics of a specific search engine, make your content universally understandable and valuable, which pays dividends across all discovery channels.

Challenge: Legal and compliance teams fear AI will misrepresent your content.

Solution: This is a real problem, especially in regulated industries. AI systems sometimes paraphrase incorrectly or quote out of context. Minimize this risk by being extremely precise in the first few paragraphs of your answer.

If the first 60 words answer the question completely and accurately, there is less room for misinterpretation by the AI. Avoid nuance and caveat in your direct answers; Keep these as supporting paragraphs.

For highly sensitive topics, consider whether you want to be quoted at all. In these cases, you can use robots.txt rules to block certain AI crawlers, but of course this limits your visibility. Weigh risks and rewards with your legal team and establish a monitoring process to identify and correct cases where your content is misrepresented in AI output.

Frequently asked questions about AEO best practices

How long does it take to see results from AEO?

You can typically see initial results within 4 to 8 weeks, but significant momentum builds within 6 to 12 months. The timeline depends on your starting point and how aggressively you implement changes.

If you’re starting from scratch, expect to spend the first month mapping questions, reviewing existing content, and implementing schemas on priority pages. In the 6th to 8th week, pages with newly added structured data often appear in featured snippets or PAA boxes. You may also notice that your brand is mentioned in AI-generated answers when you manually test queries, even though it doesn’t show up in traditional analytics.

As with conventional search engine optimization, the reinforcing effects begin in a time frame of 3 to 6 months. As you publish more answer-optimized content and build external authority, your brand will become a more trusted source across multiple topics. You’ll win more featured snippets, be cited in more AI summaries, and see your brand’s search volume increase as people become aware of your brand and later search for you directly.

After 6-12 months of regularly publishing AEO-optimized content, building authority, and updating existing pages with new PAA questions, you should see measurable business impact.

The pipeline influenced by AI visibility is growing, customer surveys are increasingly mentioning being discovered using AI tools, and your share of AI citations in your category is becoming a competitive advantage.

Pro tip: Set realistic expectations with stakeholders: AEO is not a quick-win tactic. It’s a strategic investment in long-term visibility and authority as the Internet shifts toward answer-based discovery. Early wins validate the approach, but sustained commitment is required to dominate your category in AI-powered experiences.

Do we need a schema on every page?

No, but you should prioritize schemas on pages where structured data will have the greatest impact. Not all sites benefit equally, and trying to add schemas everywhere at once results in unnecessary work without proportional benefit.

Start with pages that match the FAQPage schema, followed by Article, Speakable, and Organization. Depending on your offerings, product and service pages may also contain relevant schema types such as Product, Service, or LocalBusiness.

These help AI systems understand what you sell, where you operate, and how to showcase your business in local results and voice responses.

HubSpots CMS Hub Allows you to automatically add schemas using templates.

How can we track AI citations without a new platform?

You don’t need expensive enterprise software to start tracking your AEO performance. Start with a simple spreadsheet and manual review processand then add free or low-cost tools as you scale.

Create a tracking log with these columns: Date, Query, AI Platform (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Bing Chat), Your Brand Mention (Yes/No), Primary Source Citation (Yes/No), Competitor Mention, and Notes. Assign someone from your team to query 10-15 high-priority questions across multiple AI platforms each week. Document whether your brand appears in the response, how prominently, and what content is cited.

This qualitative tracking reveals patterns. Certain topics receive more visibility, certain content formats are cited more often, or certain platforms favor your brand over the competition.

Usee HubSpot AI search grader to get a baseline assessment of your AI visibility on key queries. This free tool shows where you are already showing up in AI-generated answers and identifies opportunities for improvement.

Combine this with Google Search Console to track featured snippet wins and PAA appearances; While these aren’t exactly AI citations, they are strong proxy metrics for content that AI systems deem worthy of excerpts.

Set up Brand Search Monitoring in Google Analytics 4. If your AEO efforts increase awareness, more users should search for your brand name immediately after encountering it in AI responses.

Create a custom report that tracks branded organic sessions, new users from branded searches, and conversions from branded traffic. Increases here indicate that your AI visibility is translating into downstream business value, even if the original discovery occurred outside of your website.

As your AEO program matures and you need more sophisticated tracking, consider platforms designed for AI visibility measurement. However, in the early stages, a disciplined manual process and intelligent use of free tools provide more than enough insights to guide strategy and demonstrate progress to stakeholders.

Will AEO replace SEO?

No. AI engine optimization and search engine optimization complement each other, not compete. Both are essential for maximum visibility in an AI-powered search landscape, and trying to choose one over the other presents significant opportunities.

Off- and on-page SEO remain fundamental as they determine whether AI systems even discover your content. Language models and response engines search the web in the same way as traditional search engines.

If your website has poor technical condition, slow loading times, or weak domain authority, AI systems will not index your content thoroughly or trust it enough to cite it. Strong SEO fundamentals (e.g. fast pages, clean HTML, reliable backlinks, and crawlable structure) are prerequisites for AEO success.

Invest in both.

What is the best way to keep AEO content fresh?

AEO content requires ongoing maintenance as AI systems prioritize freshness and accuracy. Outdated answers damage your credibility and reduce your chances of being cited.

• Start by assigning ownership. Each AEO-optimized content should have someone with expertise responsible for its accuracy and timeliness.
• Establish a review schedule based on the type of content and topic volatility. Hot topics such as industry news, tool comparisons or regulatory guidance require monthly or quarterly reviews. Evergreen content such as basic definitions or historical explanations may only need annual updates.
• Monitor people also asking questions and AI-generated answers to new questions. If Google starts showing PAA questions that you haven’t answered, update your existing pillar page or FAQ to include them instead of creating a new article. AI systems favor established, comprehensive pages over scattered content, so improving authoritative pages often produces better results than publishing new posts.
• Track product and market changes that invalidate existing answers. Stale answers quickly undermine trust.
• Use AI Search Grader and manual audits to identify citation losses. Refresh your page with updated data, examples, and direct answers to restore visibility.

AEO content isn’t about “set it and forget it.” Treat it like a living knowledge base that evolves with your business and the questions of your audience. The brands that commit to continuous development will maintain AI visibility as algorithms and user behavior change over time.

AEO best practices are your answer to brand visibility.

How is my identity crisis going today? Luckily, the more I learn about AEO, the less panic I feel. Because those old skills that helped me rank at the top of search engines are still important, they’re just evolving.

AEO is not about throwing away what we know; it’s about translating it for a new era. The same instincts that helped us master SEO – curiosity, clarity, structure, and empathy for the reader – are the same ones that will help us succeed in an AI-driven search landscape. So instead of panicking and losing control of the click, focus on gaining confidence in the response.

Because at the end of the day, that’s still what great marketing has always been about.