Mike Cheng

GEO Bullshit Jargon Translator - episode 7 - "Personalisation" 🔵 What GEO 'experts' say: "AI search is different to traditional search because next-gen AI search personalises answers to each user." 🔵 What GEO 'experts' mean: "You and I could type the same thing, and the machine will serve us different answers based on what we've done before." 🔵 What SEOs have been saying for years: "User intent matters. Previous behaviour affects search results. Things such as a searcher's location, browser, how often they visit a site, and more, can affect search results. The same keyword can mean ten different things depending on the person. That's why you don't write one-size-fits-all content." 🔎 SEO, innit?

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Most brands are doing SEO wrong in 4 layers. (And don’t realise which one’s holding them back.) Here’s the brutal truth: Every drop of visibility you're losing falls into one of these buckets... And in 2025? SEO isn’t one game. It’s 4 distinct battles you need to win: GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) – The Citation Battle - Ranking isn’t enough, Are you cited in ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity? - Think prompt phrasing, comparison blogs, expert lists No GEO = No mention = No trust AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) – The Snapshot Game - Own snippets, AI overviews, voice searches - Structure wins here: FAQs, schema, entity-rich answers No AEO = You don’t even show up AIO (AI Integration Optimization) – The Scale Factor - Plug into tools, APIs, workflows... let AI use your content - Think programmatic briefs, data-fed summaries, markdown chunking No AIO = No scale = Content chaos SXO (Search Experience Optimization) – The Conversion Engine - SEO isn’t just to rank, It’s to convert - Fast UX, scrollable layouts, mobile-first pages No SXO = Traffic that bounces Let’s take 2 real-world examples: DTC Brand Reality: AEO: Missed voice snippets and product schema GEO: No AI citations, poor content depth AIO: Manual content ops, no workflows SXO: Slow checkout flow, low conversions SaaS Startup Truth: AEO: Weak FAQs, no entity markup GEO: Blog lacks citations or prompt relevance AIO: No system for scaling blog or docs SXO: Long forms, high bounce on mobile You don’t have a traffic problem. You have a structure problem. Break SEO into 4: AEO: Gets you found in AI GEO: Gets you cited and trusted AIO: Gets you scalable content SXO: Gets you real conversions Common SEO Traps Long blogs, no structure = AEO fail No citations, no depth = GEO fail No workflow = AIO fail Poor design = SXO fail Your competitors ranking in ChatGPT? They cracked this. While you publish more posts and blogs randomly… They’re being retrieved, summarized, and chosen. Your next SEO breakthrough isn’t another post... it’s a new lens: AEO, GEO, AIO, SXO. Try These LLM-SEO Tools Built for AI visibility, citations, and structure: Semrush Enterprise AIO/AI Tool-Kit Peec AI Brandlight GrowthX AI AthenaHQ Cognizo Bluefish That’s how you rank and retrieve in 2025 and stay there. ♻️ Repost it to share with your network Follow me Madhav Mistry for insights on marketing

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GEO Optimisation Lesson 2: Optimise for Performance Attributes Yesterday, I explained how GEO was based around the optimisation of a website for its business/ brand positioning. Today, it's all about the performance attributes of products or services. This is part of a positioning strategy again. Take this response to my query in the image: "This Deansgate steakhouse is consistently praised for its luxury Sunday roast, featuring slow-roasted rump with beef dripping potatoes, Yorkshire puddings, and rich bone marrow gravy". Or this: "Blacklock Manchester Tucked away in a subterranean former textile warehouse on Peter Street, this chophouse offers a celebrated roast with your choice of beef rump, lamb leg, or pork loin cooked over a charcoal grill" And yes, this is copywriting. For the SEO or GEO a large part of the optimisation process is understanding what a business's performance attributes are. And coming up with ways to not only display them on a site but also to create 'mutual information' around them. Take wheelchair access. Does your business have a dedicated page or a clear section on your website that focuses on this? Does that page discuss vehicle access, parking options, and other relevant details? Or what about allergy information? Some restaurants use the same fryers for various items, which can cause issues for individuals with allergies. Is this information displayed clearly? Or do you go out of your way to cater for those concerns? This type of optimisation might seem obvious to some and less to others...but it's absolutely part of GEO, not SEO. Why? As AI search usage increases (and people become more familiar with it), the power shifts from those with the largest SEO or paid search budgets to those who are the best matches. Now, this is how SEO should always have been done. And it's actually what Google have always told SEOs to do. But the industrialisation of paid search and SEO has meant that SEOs were focused on matching sites for keyword rankings that earn business. AI-powered search changes this. It's the equivalent of fishing with massive nets and then sorting the catch, whereas keyword/traditional search is akin to fishing with rods. GEO and AI mode take marketing back to what matters. It doesn't actually matter who wins the AI search race. Because search is changing. However, make no mistake, this is going to change revenue models, and businesses must prepare for this. AI search is huge, and it's coming fast.

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16 SEO Tips Every Small Business Needs in 2025 SEO isn’t just for big brands with massive budgets. If you’re a small business owner in Australia (or anywhere in the world), the right strategy can help you compete with industry giants and actually win. Here’s the truth 90% of people searching online never scroll past page one of Google. If your business isn’t showing up there, you’re invisible to your customers. That’s why we’ve put together 16 must-know SEO tips to help your business grow this year: ✅ Focus on user intent (answer real customer questions) ✅ Optimize for mobile-first (most searches happen on phones) ✅ Improve page speed (slow sites lose sales) ✅ Create high-quality content consistently ✅ Strengthen local SEO (Google Business Profile is a must!) … and 11 more game-changing strategies. When applied the right way, these tips can: Bring more traffic to your website Build trust and credibility with customers Turn clicks into sales Swipe through, take notes, and start applying these to your business today. Which of these 16 SEO tips will you implement first? - ➕ Follow for more clarity in your SEO game. ♻️ Repost so your future self doesn’t forget this. Follow Dean Gravina for more

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Fab to join the State of Play panel last night on the future of SEO Worried about how AI might affect SEO? Key things we're thinking about right now at eight&four: 1) AI hasn't and will not 'kill' Google The actual big story going on in Search isn't LLM stealing market share, it's expansion & fragmentation of search surfaces... Datos’ Q2 report showed YouTube has tripled YoY, Pinterest search doubled, Reddit search +30%. Meanwhile, LLM prompt growth is modest (and early evidence seems to indicate the more people use the LLM's, the MORE they then use Google...!) So - don't get too focused on AI panic, instead stand back and think about how to build distributed influence across as many search surfaces as possible.. this means SEO teams need to be partnering with social teams, PR teams, paid teams - breaking down these baked in digital siloes internally (it's why we integrated a PR & comms agency into eight&four this year - to drive that integrated thinking for our clients) 2) If an agency is trying to panic you, walk away ESPECIALLY if they're trying to sell you a "GEO Ranking dashboard" 🙄. As always with any AI hype, step back, think critically, trust your professional judgement. Replace GEO theatre with clear roadmaps to assist with LLM inclusion, adapt owned content entities to support answer generation (in LLM's, or new AI features being implemented in Google - AI mode, Overview etc.). And yes, take those traditional SEO techniques (technical, schema, IA) into Reddit, YouTube, TikTok! 3) This is a huge opportunity for "SEO" Any hype cycle brings one clear benefit to marketeers - ATTENTION. Use this window of attention SEO is currently getting to make powerful changes to the way your organisation values and prioritises world class content strategy. Reclaim that consultancy seat. Authoritatively push for more effective content investment. 2026? Let's break down silo'ed digital channels, and work effectively together to drive DISCOVERABILITY for our brands. One integrated team, different specialists, working together to show up for our customers, with the right information, in the right places. Fortune favours the brave - go get it!! 🔥🔥🔥 Big thanks to Jessica R. for the invite, and fellow panellists Andrew Fox Helen Pollitt Jessica Atkinson João Filipe Pereira Mark Evans for a great chat 🙏

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If GA4 says your TikTok ads aren’t converting, don’t blame GA. Blame the dredded in-app browser! When someone clicks a TikTok ad, it opens in TikTok’s own in-app browser. If they later buy in Chrome or Safari, GA4 sees it as coming from a completely new user. Whereas TikTok happily takes the credit in their own reports. This isn’t unique to TikTok. Most social apps have their own in-app browsers, breaking the link GA relies on to join a user's attribution journey. GA isn’t broken - it’s just working with what it can see. Treat GA and your ad platform numbers as different viewpoints, not competing truths. And when the stakes are high, consider incrementality testing or even MMM if feasible. Perfect attribution is a myth. Knowing where the cracks in each methodology is the advantage.

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