SEO is so yesterday. The future is here with AISO, GenAO, and AAO!

By Robyn White and Annie Deihl

This post was originally published on Women x AI

How to Get Discovered in the New World of Search

With the acceleration of AI development in just about every aspect of life, digital marketing is no different. From enhanced personalization and more comprehensive data analysis to automation of workflows, AI is transforming how the business of marketing gets done.

These changes are huge, but the biggest disruption is yet to come: search optimization becomes discoverability optimization. SEO isn't getting replaced; it's going 3D.

New Terms Hint At What's Coming

You may have heard of AIO (AI Optimization), but what about AISO (AI Search Optimization)? Or AAO (Autonomous Agent Optimization), LLMO (Large Language Model Optimization), GenEO (Generative Engine Optimization), and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)? Just alphabet soup? We wish!

Each of these initialisms relates to new, specific, important ways that customers and AI Agents will explore and shop.

Will one term eventually dominate all the rest?

The answer is so annoying—probably not.

At least for now, because AI is not just making search faster, it's changing what shows up in the results.

AI search engines reply to your questions (natural language queries) with direct answers and/or recommendations rather than a ranked list. To create these AI overview summaries, the LLMs value different indicators than standard SEO. For example, backlinks aren't valued as highly as well-structured content, like thorough tutorials and FAQs.

Additionally, content will be assessed for how AI systems understand, summarize, and reference information, drawing both on what models it's been trained on and on your input. Gulp! That means the "best" dog Perplexity recommends for you may not be mentioned when you ask Claude.

Separately, while there could be consolidation of AI companies, it's unlikely Google, OpenAI, Microsoft, Anthropic, Perplexity, DeepSeek, Mistral, and Meta will collapse into one giant, predominant AI company, so the model of one hegemonic dominating search source is unlikely to continue. Thereby lessening the chance that one single initialism will win out.

AI Agents are Evolving, Too

The other big factor at play is Autonomous Agents. Today, most think of AI Agents as the friendly bots encountered on AI conversation platforms (ChatGPT, Claude, Grok), as customer service agents, or even as hotel booking assistants. However, that's just one type of AI Agent, where the bot is taught how to complete "closed" tasks.

Soon, another type of AI Agent, an Autonomous Agent, will be able to complete "open" tasks, where it can reason and make decisions on your behalf.

So, for example, if you need a new refrigerator, your Autonomous Agent can find the most efficient, correctly sized, right color refrigerator for your home, including all the features you want, handle the financing arrangements, and go ahead and make the purchase and set up delivery. Pretty incredible!

How Do You Prepare for These Changes?

The good news is that there are several steps you can take now to help make sure your site is ready to meet the future. Here are a few suggestions to get you started:

• First, it's important to point out that SEO isn't going away because the AI models use training data (hello, world wide web!) and website summaries to predict their recommendations. E-E-A-T is still relevant and useful. Remember, OpenAI relies on Bing, so you'll want to make sure your site ranks well there, too.

• Second, make sure your site is accessible to the AI models and LLMs with content that is well-structured and indexed. Today, most AI platforms don't allow direct brand submissions for inclusion in overview summaries, though that seems to be changing with the introduction of OpenAI's "Search Product Discovery Initiative" and Perplexity's "Merchant Program."

• Third, similar to traditional Google Search, focus on high-quality content and seek third-party validation in the form of awards and partnerships; think industry-specific awards for excellence, as well as customer awards from Yelp!, TripAdvisor, and Trustpilot. Partnerships with other prominent brands or industry associations like the Better Business Bureau help build credibility. This is important because while SEO matches keywords, AI matches ideas and authority.

  
  

Finally, remember to monitor and test how the different models talk about your brand. You want to measure what's working best for each platform so you can adjust your strategy as you go. At least some things never change!