GEO vs SEO: What’s the Difference?

Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) is changing the way brands think about online visibility. But does that mean the SEO work you’re already doing is becoming less important?

Not at all. SEO continues to be essential as GEO builds on the strong foundations laid by search engine optimisation work.

Combining the two helps us to build our client’s visibility in both search engine listings and AI responses. This gives them the best chance of getting seen and understood by their candidates.

What is the difference between SEO and GEO?

The difference is that SEO helps a brand be discovered in search results, whereas GEO focuses on ensuring a brand is accurately understood, cited and represented in AI generated responses.

Unlike traditional SEO, which optimises for the user’s search keywords, GEO also focuses on synthetic query fan-outs. These are queries the AI systems make within search engines, in order to gather the information that forms their answers.

Optimising content for these synthetic keywords helps to ensure that brands are accurately interpreted and cited by AI tools.

Because a lack of information can lead AI to generate inaccurate or hallucinated answers, GEO also places a greater emphasis on closing content gaps and providing comprehensive and authoritative content to AI bots.

As Google integrates more and more generative AI features within search, through tools like AI Overviews and AI Mode, these two digital marketing disciplines are becoming ever more interconnected.

Is GEO replacing SEO?

No, SEO remains a vital part of making your careers site visible online. A lot of the work carried out as part of a SEO strategy will also support visibility in AI platforms.

At Enhance Media, we’ve been providing Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) services for more than 20 years. This includes making technical, on-page, and off-page improvements which are designed to help careers sites rank highly and attract more candidates in from results pages.  SEO forms the vital foundations that GEO then builds upon.

Generative AI tools often use search engines and other online sources to gather information before generating an answer (in a process known as synthetic query fan outs). This means that those sites most visible in search results gain an immediate advantage when it comes to GEO.

In recent years Google has brought their Gemini-powered AI features directly into its search experience, with the introduction of AI Overviews and AI Mode. The search giant has even produced guidance on optimising for generative AI in Search, making the connection crystal clear.

So rather than a replacement for SEO, think of GEO as a closely related discipline that is becoming ever more important to your online visibility. It builds on much of the work that SEO has already done in order to maximise mentions in AI responses.

These responses are undoubtedly influencing an ever-greater number of candidates as chatbot usage continues its rapid rise.

Is success measured differently in SEO and GEO?

Yes, there is a difference between SEO and GEO when it comes to measuring success. SEO metrics are more focused around rankings and clicks, whereas the impact of GEO is often measured by the number of mentions and citations. The accuracy of those mentions is also very important to assess because outdated or false information can impact brand perception.

Rankings, impressions, CTR and clicks are all familiar SEO metrics that gauge the impact of our work. The aim is to appear prominently when somebody searches for something relevant and encourage them to visit your website.

AI-generated answers don’t always work that way and your analytics team can’t just judge success on the number of clicks from tools like ChatGPT.

For example, a candidate might ask ChatGPT to recommend employers offering good technology graduate schemes. It generates a shortlist for them and they ask further questions to compare those recommended companies, all before visiting a single careers site.

Being mentioned in these answers therefore has the potential to increase traffic to your career site indirectly.

This doesn’t mean clicks or rankings suddenly don’t matter. With nine in ten candidates using search engines during their job search, traditional organic visibility remains hugely important.

However, with 81% of candidates also using or planning to use AI, there is now another part of the candidate journey to consider: whether your brand is being accurately mentioned and cited in AI-generated answers.

How does the technical side of SEO and GEO compare?

There is plenty of common ground between SEO and GEO when it comes to the technical set up of career sites.

A technically sound website, clear structure and accessible, well-organised content all help search engines find and understand a site. Those same foundations can make information easier for AI crawlers to retrieve too.

GEO is also focused on preparing websites for interaction with AI agents through some rapidly emerging technical standards.

Ultimately, GEO aims not only to increase AI citations but also to position brands as trusted sources that may become part of future AI training datasets.

But this is a fast-moving area and not every new AI optimisation tactic needs to become part of your website strategy.

Google, for example, says there is no need to rewrite content specifically for its AI features, artificially break content into smaller chunks or create an llms.txt file.

Its advice remains focused on the same fundamental principle: create useful content and make sure Google can access it.

So, while the technology is changing quickly, good technical foundations and useful content still come first.

What does GEO mean for employer brands?

An increasing number of candidates are using AI to research employers, compare opportunities and ask about everything from salaries and benefits to workplace culture.

For talent attraction teams, this means the EVP content on your careers site can start influencing a candidate before they even click on to one of your pages.

AI platforms can also gather information from different online sources. So if your careers site is missing information around a common candidate query, AI may instead source the answer from an outdated page elsewhere online, which misrepresents your brand.

The aim of Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) isn’t simply to get your organisation mentioned more often. It’s to give AI platforms enough reliable information to understand when your organisation is relevant and represent it accurately when it is.

At Enhance Media we use our Employer Brand AI Audits to pinpoint the content gaps, which are holding back visibility and negatively impacting brand sentiment in AI tools.

Unearthing opportunities from these in-depth visibility and sentiment audits then provides us with a solid GEO strategy, which is data led and tailored to your objectives.

Do you need SEO, GEO or both?

For most employers, this isn’t an either/or decision.

Candidates aren’t necessarily swapping search engines for AI. Both can form part of the same research journey.

SEO remains fundamental to helping candidates discover your careers site through search. It also provides many of the foundations AI-powered search experiences rely on to find your content.

GEO builds on those foundations by asking some additional questions such as:

• What are candidates asking AI platforms about your organisation or your sector?
• What are the subtopics AI bots are searching in order to provide in-depth answers?
• Is the information they need available and is it specific enough to be useful?
• Does your content give them clear, consistent information about your employer brand?

This is where GEO adds that extra value, which can have a huge impact on talent attraction in the age of AI.

As Google continues to combine traditional search with generative AI, the overlap between SEO and GEO will only grow stronger.

The goal isn’t to choose one over the other. It’s to make sure candidates can find accurate and useful information about your organisation, regardless of whether their research starts with a Google search or a question in ChatGPT.

How can our experts help?

At Enhance Media, we help employers, recruitment agencies and job boards to understand how candidates find and research their brands and vacancies. Then we identify and implement enhancements for their site, in order to build their visibility in both search engines and AI platforms.

Depending on your objectives and the status of your careers site, that might mean we recommend a dedicated SEO or GEO project, or a combination of the two.

The starting point for many of our clients is our Employer Brand AI Audits, which turn large volumes of AI response data into actionable insights. These form the basis of effective GEO strategies.

Contact our team to discuss how we can help more candidates to discover your employer brand via organic search and AI platforms. Alternatively, why not read more about our GEO service and Employer Brand AI Audits.