Blog / article

20 Jul 2026 · 8 min read

How to get your company into the answers from ChatGPT and AI

More and more customers ask ChatGPT instead of searching on Google. Find out what GEO is and how to get your company into AI answers.

Direct answer: GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is the practice of preparing your website to be cited by AI answer engines — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Google AI Overviews and Claude — when someone asks them a question. If SEO is about appearing in Google's list of results, GEO is about appearing inside the answer AI gives your potential customer. For an SME in Portugal, it is the difference between being recommended and not existing at all for people who no longer search the way they used to.

The way people look for information has changed more in the last 18 months than in the previous decade. ChatGPT has passed 900 million weekly active users, and a growing share of searches no longer ends in a click through to a site: with AI-generated answers at the top of Google, more than two thirds of searches now produce no click at all. The question is asked, the answer is given, and the user never reaches your page — unless your page is the source of that answer.

Between companies, the effect is even sharper. Recent studies indicate that around 89% of business buyers consider AI-assisted search a relevant source throughout the decision process. And these are not low-quality visits: traffic arriving through AI assistants typically converts well above traditional organic search — in some studies, visitors coming from Perplexity converted at over 10%, against less than 2% from organic search. Someone asking AI “which agency is best for my case?” already arrives with intent. They arrive better informed and closer to deciding.

Translated to your business: if a potential client asks ChatGPT “which company can build my website and brand in Paços de Ferreira?”, either your name appears in the answer, or your competitor's does. There is no third option.

They are cousins, not twins. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) optimises for a list of blue links: the goal is to climb positions and win the click. GEO optimises for a written answer: the goal is to be the information the model picks to build that answer, ideally with your name cited as the source.

Good news: both rest on the same foundation. A technically healthy site — fast, well structured and with useful content — serves both worlds. The difference lies in how the content is written and organised. SEO tolerates pretty, abstract text; GEO rewards direct, factual answers that are easy to extract. An AI does not “feel” your brand — it copies clear sentences. If your page says “where vision takes shape”, that inspires a human, but gives the machine nothing concrete to cite. If it says “Shiftworks is a branding and digital performance agency for SMEs in Portugal”, AI already has a sentence ready to use.

There is no magic ranking number as on Google, but there are clear patterns in what these technologies favour:

• —Direct, factual answers. Content that starts by answering the question — before the context — is extracted far more easily. Most citations come from the first part of the content, not the end.
• —Clear structure. Question-shaped headings, lists, short sections and FAQ blocks are the most “citable” format there is. AI reads structure, not decoration.
• —Authority and proof. Signals about who writes, with what experience and with what results carry a lot of weight. Interestingly, mentions of your brand by others (press, directories, partners) correlate more with AI visibility than traditional backlinks. Real case studies, with numbers, are worth more than adjectives.
• —Depth. Complete, well-developed pages tend to be cited several times more often than short, shallow ones. Answering a question well takes space.
• —Freshness. AI citations drop sharply on old content. A blog with a regular cadence signals that the information is current — and this article is itself an example of that practice.
• —Machine readability. None of this works if AI crawlers cannot read the site. Server-side rendering, structured data (schema), a robots.txt that does not block AI crawlers and a well-built llms.txt file are the invisible technical base that holds up everything else.

You do not need to rebuild the site. You need to make it readable for people already asking AI. In order of return:

• —Start every page with a direct answer. One or two factual sentences right under the heading: what you do, for whom, where. That is the sentence AI will copy.
• —Add FAQ sections. Work out your customers' real questions (“how much does it cost?”, “how long does it take?”, “do you work remotely?”) and answer each one in direct text. It is the most citable format — and it generates FAQPage markup in the schema.
• —Turn headings into questions. “Our services” says little; “What does a branding project include?” is exactly what someone asks an AI.
• —Show proof. Case studies with concrete results, a bio of who leads, the number of projects. Authority is not claimed, it is demonstrated.
• —Publish regularly. One useful article a week or fortnight keeps the site fresh and creates dozens of entry points for different questions.
• —Secure the technical base. Confirm that AI crawlers are not blocked, that the schema is clean and that the location and company details are explicit. It is invisible work, but without it the rest is never read.

The first is confusing “being on Google” with “being in AI” — they are different things and one does not guarantee the other. The second is writing to impress instead of writing to inform: vague, overly creative language leaves the machine with nothing to cite. The third is treating GEO as a one-week project; it is a continuous discipline that lives on new content and accumulated authority. And the fourth, perhaps the most expensive, is waiting. Whoever structures their content now is building the authority AI will cite for years to come, while competitors are still debating whether this is a fad.

What is GEO?

GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is optimising a website to be cited by artificial intelligence answer engines — such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google's AI answers — when users ask them questions.

What is the difference between SEO and GEO?

SEO optimises for appearing in the list of search results and winning the click. GEO optimises for being the information AI uses — and cites — when it generates a written answer. They share the same technical base, but GEO demands more direct, factual, structured content.

Does GEO replace SEO?

No. It complements it. A healthy SEO foundation (a fast, well-structured, readable site) is the bedrock of GEO. The difference lies in how you write and organise content so AI can extract it easily.

How long does it take to see results?

It depends on the state of the site and the competition, but structural improvements and direct answers usually start showing within weeks. Authority — the most decisive factor — is built continuously, with real cases, mentions and a steady content cadence.

My company is small. Is it worth it?

Yes, and perhaps even more so. AI does not automatically favour big brands: it favours clear, well-structured sources. An organised SME can be cited ahead of a larger but messier competitor.

At Shiftworks we prepare SME websites to be found and cited both on Google and in the new AI assistants. We run a free diagnosis of your site: what is already right, what is stopping AI from citing it, and where to start.

Talk to us → · Reply within 24 hours.

Find out in seconds whether AI can read your site.