SEO, AEO, GEO and AIO checklist for 2026: how to optimise a website for Google and AI search

Most guides to AEO, GEO or AI SEO are written to sell a new service. This one is a working checklist, the same one we use on veridiancode.com and on client sites. We checked it against what Google, Microsoft (Bing and Copilot), OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity publish, the largest independent studies and the most-watched videos on the subject, as of 27 October 2026. Where a point is our own advice rather than a source's, we say so. If you only need the definitions, our shorter guide to AEO and GEO vs SEO covers them.

SEO, AEO, GEO and AIO in one table

The search companies don't treat these as separate disciplines. Google's guide to optimising for its generative AI features, added on 15 May 2026, files AEO and GEO under SEO and lists the AI-specific tricks it ignores. Microsoft uses the word GEO itself, calling Bing's AI citation report an early step towards GEO tooling, and its guidance makes a similar point: AI answers share the same foundation as ordinary search (crawling, understanding and ranking the web), even though grounding an answer is optimised for a different outcome. So the fundamentals come first, and the AI-specific work sits on top of them.

What changed in search in 2025 and 2026

If your SEO knowledge dates from 2024, these are the changes that matter most. Every date comes from the company's own announcement or documentation, or from the reports listed under Sources.

How Google and AI assistants find, read and cite a page

Every answer, whether it is a blue link, an AI Overview or a ChatGPT reply, comes out of the same chain. A crawler fetches your page, a system reads and stores it in an index, a ranking system retrieves it for a question, and the result is shown as a link or used as a source for an AI-written answer. A page that fails an early step never reaches the later ones.

Two details in this chain catch out most websites.

• JavaScript. Google renders JavaScript in a recent version of Chrome before indexing. The crawlers from OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity fetch your HTML but don't run your scripts, according to a study of billions of crawler requests by Vercel and MERJ (December 2024). A smaller Resoneo test in January 2026 found the same for the fetchers ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity use when a user asks them to read a page. A React or no-code site that sends an empty shell can rank in Google and still be invisible to ChatGPT, Claude and Perplexity.
• Query fan-out. AI Mode and AI Overviews split a question into several related searches and draw sources from each. That is one reason Ahrefs found that only 37.9% of pages cited in AI Overviews ranked in the top 10 for the original query in early 2026, against 76% in mid-2025 (Ahrefs also changed its method between the two). Covering the questions around a topic now matters as much as ranking for the main term.

Which crawler does what

Technical SEO checklist

Technical SEO decides whether anything else counts. None of it is new, but the rise of crawlers that read only raw HTML has raised the bar for JavaScript sites.

1. Send full HTML, without relying on JavaScript. Each page's text, title, meta description, canonical, hreflang, Open Graph tags and structured data should be in the HTML your server sends, through server-side rendering or prerendering. Google calls dynamic rendering, a separate version for bots, a workaround rather than a solution. To test it, open "view source" or fetch the page with curl: if the words aren't there, most AI crawlers can't see them. Evidence: Official and Study.
2. Mind the 2 MB limit. Googlebot reads the first 2 MB of an HTML file, measured uncompressed. Keep the title, canonical and JSON-LD in the head, not after large blocks of inline script. Evidence: Official.
3. Let the right crawlers in. Your robots.txt, firewall and CDN bot settings should allow Googlebot, Bingbot, OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot and Applebot. Some CDN bot-protection settings block AI crawlers by default, so test each user agent rather than trusting robots.txt alone. Evidence: Official and Practice.
4. Index only what deserves it. One canonical URL per page, a self-referencing canonical, noindex rather than robots.txt to keep a page out of Google, and a real 404 or 410 for pages that don't exist. A missing page that returns your homepage with a 200 status is a soft 404 that wastes crawling. Evidence: Official.
5. Permanent redirects for permanent moves. Use 301 or 308 redirects and keep them for at least a year. Pick one host (with or without www) and one trailing-slash style, and use it in links, canonicals and sitemaps. Google treats 302 and 307 redirects as temporary and doesn't use them as a signal that the new URL should replace the old one. Evidence: Official.
6. A clean XML sitemap. Only canonical, indexable URLs, at most 50,000 URLs or 50 MB per file, with honest lastmod dates. Google and Bing both ignore the priority and changefreq tags. Submit it in Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools. Evidence: Official.
7. Core Web Vitals in the green. Measured at the 75th percentile of real visits (table below). Google says Core Web Vitals are used by its ranking systems but that there is no single page experience signal, so fix what is red rather than chasing a perfect lab score. Never lazy-load the main image at the top of the page. Evidence: Official.
8. The same content on mobile. Since July 2024 Google indexes with its smartphone crawler only, so the mobile page needs the same text, links and structured data as desktop. Evidence: Official.
9. Crawlable links and a shallow structure. Use real HTML links (an a element with an href), not click handlers. Keep important pages a few clicks from the homepage, and make sure every page is linked from at least one other page. Evidence: Official and Practice.
10. hreflang done right on multilingual sites. Each language version lists every other version and itself, plus an x-default, and the links must be reciprocal or Google ignores them. Review translations properly: Google's scaled content abuse policy covers automated translation used to mass-produce low-value pages. Evidence: Official.
11. Structured data that matches the page. Organization or LocalBusiness on the homepage or about page, WebSite for your site name, BreadcrumbList, Article on articles, and Product, Event or VideoObject where they apply. Don't mark up anything visitors can't see, and don't add review stars to your own business, which Google treats as self-serving. Evidence: Official.
12. Images and video Google can index. Real img elements in the HTML (Google doesn't index CSS background images) with descriptive alt text and file names, in WebP or AVIF, with width and height set. Videos need a page whose main purpose is the video and a stable thumbnail. Evidence: Official and Practice.
13. HTTPS everywhere, and no pop-ups that hide the page. Evidence: Official.
14. Tell Bing straight away. Verify Bing Webmaster Tools and send new or changed URLs through IndexNow, which also reaches Yandex, Naver, Seznam and others. Google doesn't take part in IndexNow, so for Google rely on your sitemap and the URL Inspection tool. Evidence: Official.

On-page SEO and content checklist

Google's helpful content guidance now spells out what its quality raters look for in a page's main content: effort, originality, talent or skill, and accuracy. It also says that using AI to produce large amounts of text without human oversight counts as little to no effort. That is the standard this section is built around.

1. One page for each search intent. Look at the live results first: are they guides, product pages, comparisons or tools? Cover a group of closely related searches on one page. Don't make a page for every variation of a query or every fan-out question; Google's 2026 guide names that as scaled content abuse. Evidence: Official.
2. Say something that isn't already published. Google calls this non-commodity content: first-hand experience, original data, tests, case results, screenshots and a clear point of view. A rewrite of the top ten results adds nothing for a reader, or for an AI that has already read them. Evidence: Official.
3. Answer first. Put the answer or summary at the top and skip the warm-up. Google's rater guidelines describe low-value padding near the top of a page as filler. Evidence: Official.
4. Titles that match the page. Unique, descriptive, not exaggerated, with the brand at the end. Google sets no length limit, but in Zyppy's study of 80,959 titles, those of 51 to 60 characters were rewritten least often. Keep the title and the H1 in agreement, including any year. Evidence: Official and Study.
5. A meta description written for people. Google often writes its own snippet but uses yours when it describes the page better. Make it a factual summary with specifics. Evidence: Official.
6. Clear headings and sections. Descriptive H2s and H3s with one idea per section, plus a table of contents with stable anchor links on long pages. Heading order doesn't affect ranking, but it helps readers and screen readers. Keep key content visible rather than hidden in tabs, so Google can link to the exact section. Evidence: Official.
7. Short, readable URLs with hyphens, in your reader's language. Evidence: Official.
8. Internal links with descriptive anchor text. Every page should be linked from at least one other page, with anchor text that makes sense on its own. In Zyppy's study of 23 million internal links, URLs with 40 to 44 internal links got about four times the Google clicks of URLs with 0 to 4 (a correlation, not proof). Evidence: Official and Study.
9. Cite your sources. Link to the primary source for every fact that isn't yours. Google says outbound links can help establish trust, and the original GEO study found that citing sources and adding statistics made content more visible in AI answers. Evidence: Official and Study.
10. Honest authorship and dates. Readers should be able to see who wrote a page and who stands behind the site. Google accepts an organisation as the author in its Article markup, and a team byline linked to a real about page meets that bar. Never invent experts or use AI-made headshots, which Google calls deception. Show Published and Updated dates that match your structured data, and change them only when the content really changes. On health and money topics Google gives E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trust) extra weight, so we advise naming a qualified author or reviewer there. Evidence: Official and Practice.
11. Use AI as a tool, not an author. Google allows AI-assisted content. Since 1 October 2026 its guidance says all AI-generated content, including titles, descriptions, structured data and alt text, should be fact-checked by a person before it is published. Evidence: Official.
12. Length is whatever the question needs. Google has no preferred word count, and Ahrefs found a correlation of about 0.04, close to none, between word count and AI citations. Evidence: Official and Study.
13. Refresh rather than redate. Review time-sensitive pages after each core update and at least every quarter, and evergreen pages every 6 to 12 months; say what changed. Merge or redirect weak pages that compete for the same intent. Evidence: Practice.

One finding from the US antitrust case against Google is worth knowing. The court's opinion describes NavBoost, a system that remembers which results people clicked for a query, trained on 13 months of data. It is one more reason to write titles that deliver what they promise and pages that end the search, rather than sending people back to the results.

Off-page SEO: links, mentions and brand

Links still count. Google's ranking systems guide says PageRank is still one of its core ranking systems. But Google has also played links down: in April 2024 its analyst Gary Illyes said Google needs very few links to rank pages, though he later said he shouldn't have said it. For AI answers, the evidence points to brand mentions. In Ahrefs' study of 75,000 brands, mentions of a brand across the web correlated at 0.66 to 0.71 with its visibility in ChatGPT, AI Mode and AI Overviews, mentions on YouTube at about 0.74, and backlink-based metrics far less. A University of Toronto study (2025) found that AI search engines lean heavily on earned, third-party media rather than brands' own sites. Both are correlations, and the Ahrefs sample leans towards larger sites, but they point the same way.

What works in 2026

1. Original data that people want to cite: a survey, a price index, or an analysis of your own anonymised data, offered to journalists and writers who cover your field. Evidence: Study and Practice.
2. Expert comment for journalists. HARO is running again under Featured.com, and Qwoted and Source of Sources also connect experts with reporters. Answer quickly and briefly, and only where you have real expertise. Evidence: Practice.
3. Tools and pages worth linking to: calculators, checkers, templates and statistics pages. Ahrefs notes that clicks are shifting towards these action queries, which an AI answer can't complete. Evidence: Practice.
4. Reclaim unlinked mentions and broken links pointing to pages that have moved. Evidence: Practice.
5. Real relationships: client credits, partner and supplier pages, associations, events, podcasts and YouTube appearances that say your brand name. Mark any link given in exchange for something with rel="sponsored". Evidence: Official and Practice.
6. Directories and review platforms, for trust rather than PageRank. Clutch, GoodFirms, G2 and industry directories matter to buyers and to AI tools that read them, though Clutch's own help pages say its profile links are nofollow. Keep your business name, contact details and services identical everywhere. Evidence: Study and Practice.
7. Genuine community answers on Reddit, Quora and LinkedIn, as a named and disclosed expert. Evidence: Practice.

What gets a site penalised

Google's spam policies treat as link spam: bought links that pass ranking credit, links exchanged for goods or services, excessive link swaps, keyword-rich links in guest posts and press releases, low-quality directory and bookmark links, widget and footer link schemes, and links required by contract. Google's 2026 guide adds that seeking inauthentic mentions doesn't help in AI search either. Use the disavow tool only after a manual action, or if you or a past agency bought links; Google's John Mueller said in 2025 that the disavow tool isn't part of normal site maintenance.

Local SEO and Google Business Profile

Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence, and says no one can pay for a better local ranking. In Whitespark's 2026 survey of 47 local search experts, the top map-pack factors were the primary Business Profile category, proximity, and keywords in the business name, although keywords added to a business name break Google's guidelines. A dedicated page for each service topped local organic results, and third-party "best of" lists and mentions topped AI visibility. AI answers to local questions lean on Business Profiles: in BrightLocal's August 2026 study across the US, UK and Australia, the Business Profile was the top source for local answers in AI Overviews and AI Mode, while ChatGPT leaned on Yelp and other directories.

1. Verify and complete your Business Profile: a primary category that says what the business is, then services, hours, service areas, photos and a plain description. Use your real-world business name and nothing else. Evidence: Official.
2. Match your details everywhere. The name, address and phone number on your website should match your profile exactly, with LocalBusiness markup on the site. Keep the same details on the directories that matter in your market; in India that usually means Justdial, Sulekha and IndiaMART, plus Apple Business and Bing Places. Evidence: Official, Study and Practice.
3. One strong page per service, and per real location. City pages that swap only the place name are doorway pages under Google's spam policies. Evidence: Official.
4. A steady flow of genuine reviews. Ask every customer, reply within days, and never pay for reviews, offer discounts for them, or ask only the happy customers. In BrightLocal's 2026 consumer survey, 74% of US consumers considered only reviews from the last three months, and 45% used ChatGPT or other AI tools for local business recommendations, up from 6% a year earlier. Evidence: Official and Study.
5. Drop what's gone. Public Q&A on Business Profiles was replaced with AI answers in late 2025; chat and Business Profile websites were removed in 2024. Evidence: Official.

AEO: how to become the answer

The answer boxes on Google have changed shape. In Ahrefs' sample of a million results pages, featured snippets fell from 15.41% of pages to 5.53% between January and June 2025, while AI Overviews rose from 3.93% to 27.43%. People Also Ask stayed common, on 79% of pages in June 2025. AI Mode passed a billion monthly users in May 2026, Google says, and since October 2025 Search Live has let people in India ask questions out loud in English and Hindi.

Fewer people click when an answer is on the page. Pew Research found US users clicked a result in 8% of visits with an AI summary against 15% without one, and clicked a link inside the summary in 1%. Ahrefs measured a 58% lower click-through rate for the top result when an AI Overview appeared. SparkToro and Similarweb put US zero-click Google searches at 68% in early 2026. The useful finding comes from Seer Interactive: pages cited inside the AI Overview got about 120% more clicks per impression than pages that weren't, though still fewer than when no AI Overview appeared. Commercial and transactional searches are far less affected; in Seer's data, AI Overviews appeared on 36% of informational queries but 8% of commercial and 5% of transactional ones.

Write answers that can be lifted

1. Use the question as the heading where people ask it that way. Evidence: Practice.
2. Answer it in the first one to three sentences under the heading, in plain text, then add the detail, numbers and examples. We found no study behind the popular "40 to 60 words" rule; aim for a complete, direct answer. Evidence: Practice.
3. Use lists for steps and tables for comparisons when the content really has that shape. Evidence: Practice.
4. Cover the follow-up questions on the same page, not on a thin separate page for each. Evidence: Official.
5. Keep answers visible, not behind tabs, and check that no nosnippet or max-snippet rule stops Google from quoting them. Evidence: Official.
6. Find the questions in Search Console (filter queries for who, what, how and why), in People Also Ask, in tools such as AlsoAsked and AnswerThePublic, and in your own sales calls and emails. Evidence: Practice.

GEO and AIO: getting cited by ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude and Copilot

Each assistant gets its sources from a search index, so the first question is which one.

What the research says works, and how strongly

The original GEO study, by researchers from IIT Delhi and Princeton and published at the KDD conference in 2024, tested nine ways of rewriting a page. Adding quotations, statistics and source citations helped most, and the gains went mainly to pages that were already retrieved but ranked lower: citing sources lifted the fifth-ranked source by 115% and lowered the first-ranked one. Later work is more cautious. The C-SEO Bench study found that most AI-targeted rewriting methods did little or harm, and that ranking well in the retrieval step mattered more. Our reading: write well-sourced, specific pages, then put most of the effort into being findable and being mentioned.

Allow the search crawlers, decide on the training ones

A plain robots.txt that allows everything is fine for most businesses. If you want to keep your content out of AI training but stay in AI answers, disallow GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended, Applebot-Extended and CCBot, and leave Googlebot, Bingbot, OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot and Applebot allowed. OpenAI says changes to robots.txt take about 24 hours to reach its systems. Then check your CDN or firewall: a bot-blocking setting can undo what robots.txt allows.

Don't try to trick the machines

Hidden instructions to AI tools, "Summarize with AI" links that try to plant a brand in an assistant's memory, and "best" lists that rank their own author first all appear in the wild. Microsoft's security team found attempts of this kind from 31 companies in 60 days and calls it AI recommendation poisoning. Since May 2026 Google's spam policies cover attempts to manipulate generative AI responses, and Bing's webmaster guidelines now have a section on prompt injection and AI manipulation. In early 2026, Lily Ray reported that seven software sites with many self-promotional "best" lists lost between 29% and 49% of their search visibility, though Google hasn't confirmed the cause.

How to measure SEO, AEO and GEO

Treat AI traffic as valuable but small. Ahrefs reported that AI assistants sent 0.5% of its visitors but 12.1% of its sign-ups, while a peer-reviewed study in Marketing Science of 973 online shops found that ChatGPT visitors converted better than paid social but below every other established channel, organic search included. Both can be true for different businesses, which is why the enquiry form question matters.

Myths and outdated tactics to drop

The best YouTube videos on SEO, AEO and GEO

We went through more than a hundred videos. The most-watched and the most reliable aren't the same list: Google's own Search Central videos get 10,000 to 20,000 views, while general courses get millions. These are the ones worth your time, with view counts as shown on YouTube on 27 October 2026.

Classic SEO: technical, on-page, links and local

AI search: AEO, GEO and AI Overviews

A 90-day plan

This is the order we work in. It is our own advice, built on the checklist above.

1. Days 1 to 14: access and audit. Search Console as a domain property, Bing Webmaster Tools, GA4 with the AI Assistant channel, and the Business Profile. Crawl the site, check the HTML without JavaScript, test each crawler's access through the CDN, and write down 15 to 25 questions your buyers really ask.
2. Days 15 to 30: fix the foundations. Redirects, canonicals, sitemap, 404s, structured data, red Core Web Vitals, and the titles and descriptions of your most valuable pages. Make your name, contact details and services identical across the site, profiles and directories.
3. Days 31 to 60: content. Rework the pages that make you money so they answer first, then publish two to four pieces that only you could write, with your own data or results. Link them to each other and to your service pages.
4. Days 61 to 90: authority. One original data piece offered to the press, expert comments for journalists, a steady flow of reviews, complete directory profiles, and a YouTube or podcast appearance that names your brand.
5. Every month: ask the same buyer questions in ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google, read Search Console, Bing and GA4, and refresh what has gone out of date.

How we apply this, and what it costs

We run this checklist on our own site and on client sites. Our Technical SEO audit costs ₹12,500 and our AI search audit ₹20,000. Monthly plans are ₹7,500 for Local SEO, ₹17,500 for Growth SEO and ₹25,000 for AI Search Visibility, and Google Business Profile management is ₹4,000 a month. Our Search & AI packages combine them for less: Local Search ₹15,000, Search + AI ₹35,000 and Category Leader ₹45,000 a month. Every price is on our pricing page. We don't buy links, and nobody can promise rankings or AI mentions; we promise the work, the checks and an honest monthly report.