Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is the practice of structuring a business's information so AI answer engines — ChatGPT, Google's AI Overview, Perplexity, and Gemini — name and recommend it inside their written answers. Unlike SEO, which competes for a clickable link, AEO competes to be the source the AI quotes directly.
When someone asks an AI assistant a question like “what’s the best med spa for Botox near me?”, the AI doesn’t return ten blue links — it writes a short answer and names a few specific businesses. AEO is the work of becoming one of the businesses it names.
The mechanic is different from traditional search. AI answers are assembled from content the model can read and trust: plain-text facts, clear question-and-answer sections, consistent business details across the web, and corroborating sources that agree. Ad spend and review count, which move Google’s map pack, do not by themselves win the AI’s answer.
For local service businesses — med spas, dentists, clinics — AEO is especially valuable because the questions patients ask (“how much does X cost in my city?”, “who’s the best provider for Y?”) are exactly the questions AI now answers directly, before the patient ever visits a website.
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