I used to run a startup that lived in the trenches of the SEO space back when it was the undisputed king of digital marketing. We helped pioneer content marketing and native advertising—two disciplines that, I’d argue, have their DNA firmly rooted in SEO.
Back then, everything happened in a world where Google had already cornered the market. SEO was never really “Search Engine Optimization”; it was GSO—Google Search Optimization. There was nothing inherently wrong with that, but that distinction is becoming vital today.
The New Gold Rush
For the first time in 20 years, audience search habits are migrating toward AI search apps. Predictably, a “New SEO” gold rush has begun. Startups are launching daily, promising various ways to monitor, optimize, or “hack” these new systems.
It feels exactly like the early days of Google. Back then, Google’s response was a delicate tradeoff between control and openness. They created “rules” for quality content and updated them roughly every year. This created a seesaw of tactics: SEO hackers would invent a shortcut, monetize it for a few months, and then watch it get demolished by the next algorithm update.
GEO, AEO, and the First Generation of AI Hackers
The current buzz around GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) is simply the first iteration of this market re-emerging. A new generation of hackers is trying to find a back door into the “mindshare” of the top AI apps.
However, as we watch this play out, there are three critical differences to keep in mind:
- A) The veterans are still in the room. Former SEO experts aren’t starting from scratch; they understand the cycle. Rand Fishkin—a brilliant expert and entrepreneur—recently published a great post on this. His main takeaway is that there is currently zero predictability. More importantly, his work provides the first real look at what an actual monitoring methodology should look like in the AI era.
- B) The end of “Winner-Take-All.” This is arguably the most significant online event of the century, yet few are discussing it. While I’d never count Google out, the “access to information” technology has been democratized. Users can now find answers in infinitely more places than a single search bar. This changes the incentive structure: optimizing for one engine leads to hacking, but optimizing for many forces a return to a baseline of honesty.
- C) The technology is (exponentially) more complex. Early Google was relatively simple: they crawled the web and published a summary. How AI services crawl, aggregate, learn, process, and compile what is ultimately served to the user is currently a massive, “black box” mess. It will take years to establish best practices and even longer for “rules of engagement” to evolve.
The Takeaway
For now, the lesson (largely paraphrasing Rand’s insights) is this: Systematically monitor your presence and presentation, and play with the tools, but don’t build a rigid strategy yet.
It simply isn’t possible to “solve” GEO/AEO in a week. We are in the observation phase, and that isn’t changing anytime soon.
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