SEO & AEO glossary

Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)

Answer Engine Optimization is the practice of structuring content so AI answer engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overviews cite it directly.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)

Generative Engine Optimization is optimizing content to appear in and influence AI-generated answers from tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and AI Overviews.

llms.txt

llms.txt is a proposed plain-text file at your site root that gives AI models a curated, structured map of your most important content.

AI Citation Tracking

AI citation tracking measures how often and how favorably answer engines mention your brand across a set of representative prompts.

AI Overviews (Google SGE)

AI Overviews are Google's AI-generated answer summaries shown above the classic results, synthesized from multiple sources with citation links.

Featured Snippet

A featured snippet is the boxed answer Google pulls to the top of results (position zero), extracted from a page that answers the query concisely.

Programmatic SEO

Programmatic SEO is generating many targeted, templated pages from structured data to capture long-tail search demand at scale.

Keyword Difficulty

Keyword difficulty is a 0–100 estimate of how hard it is to rank on page one for a term, based mainly on the strength of pages already ranking.

Long-Tail Keyword

A long-tail keyword is a longer, more specific search phrase with lower volume but higher intent and less competition.

Entity SEO

Entity SEO optimizes for the people, brands, and concepts a search engine understands as distinct entities, not just keyword strings.

Backlink

A backlink is a link from another website to yours — a core ranking signal that acts as a vote of confidence in your content.

Rich Results

Rich results are enhanced Google listings — stars, prices, FAQs, images — generated from structured data on your page.

Zero-Click Search

A zero-click search is a query answered directly on the results page — via a snippet, knowledge panel, or AI Overview — so the user never clicks through.

E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trust)

E-E-A-T is Google's framework — Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trust — for how human raters judge content quality.

Search Intent

Search intent is the goal behind a query — informational, navigational, commercial, or transactional — that a page must match to rank.

Topical Authority

Topical authority is the depth and breadth of coverage that makes a site a trusted source on a subject, earned by comprehensive, interlinked content.

Content Decay

Content decay is the gradual loss of rankings and traffic a page suffers over time as it becomes outdated or is outcompeted.

Structured Data (Schema Markup)

Structured data is machine-readable code (usually JSON-LD) that labels page content so search and answer engines understand it precisely.

Internal Linking

Internal linking is connecting your own pages with contextual links to spread authority, guide crawlers, and help users navigate.

Core Web Vitals

Core Web Vitals are Google's user-experience metrics — LCP (loading), INP (responsiveness), and CLS (visual stability) — used as ranking signals.

Canonical URL

A canonical URL is the version of a page you tell search engines to treat as the master when duplicate or similar URLs exist.

Crawl Budget

Crawl budget is the number of pages a search engine will crawl on your site in a given period, set by crawl rate and crawl demand.

robots.txt

robots.txt is a file at your site root that tells crawlers — including AI crawlers — which paths they may or may not request.