AEO
Answer engine optimization: optimizing for answer engines. Often used as a synonym for GEO.
GEO glossary
22 useful terms for reading your results, without the jargon.
A
Average position
The average rank of your mention within the answers where you appear.
AI Overviews
Short form of “Google AI Overviews”: both mean the same thing. The app shows “AI Overviews” when space is short, for example on engine badges and in narrow columns.
B
Business profile
A local listing (name, address, opening hours, reviews) that engines use alongside their answers.
C
Citation
An explicit mention of a source or a brand in an answer.
Citation share
The weight of a domain among all the sources cited in your market.
E
Entity
Something the engine identifies: a brand, product, media outlet, place, person or event.
G
GEO
Generative engine optimization: all the actions that help you get cited in AI answers.
Google AI Overviews
An answer written by Google and shown above the standard results. Shortened to “AI Overviews” in the app.
Google AI Mode
Google’s conversational mode, which answers with an exchange rather than a list of links.
M
Market
The country an answer relates to: the one you track.
P
Prompt
A tracked question. You see its dated answer for each engine.
Perception
The tone and themes associated with your brand in the recorded answers.
R
robots.txt
A file that allows or blocks crawlers, including AI crawlers.
S
Search intent
What the person behind the question actually wants: to compare, to buy, to find a place.
Share of voice
The weight of your brand in the mentions of entities of the same type — brands on one side, products on the other — against the other players cited.
Source
A page or domain an AI engine relied on to answer.
Searches run by AI engines
Queries the engine writes itself before drafting its answer.
Structured data
Markup that describes your content explicitly for machines (address, opening hours, product).
T
Theme
A group of questions around a product range, a service or an area.
Term share
The proportion of answers containing a given term in which your brand is cited. Denominator: every answer in the period where the term appears, whichever brand is cited.
V
Visibility
The share of collected answers that mention your brand or what you attach to it (products, people, events).
