What do we mean by AI visibility?

AI visibility is how often and how accurately your business is mentioned, described, and cited in answers from AI engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews. It is measured on three levels: whether you are included in the answer, how you are positioned, and how often you are used as a source.

AI visibility, therefore, refers to your presence within the actual response the user receives, not your position on a list of results. It’s about how often and in what ways your brand, technical terms, and content appear when AI explains a topic, compares solutions, or recommends providers.

Practical example:

Imagine you’re a local plumber looking for work. Several people in your circle have told you that they search ChatGPT when they need plumbing services. You have a relatively good website and try a search in ChatGPT yourself: “plumber in Oslo who takes emergency jobs.” Nothing. Only a couple of competitors are mentioned. You are invisible. They’ve achieved AI visibility, and there’s still room for you in the results. You just need to know how.

When we talk about AI visibility, we typically look at three things: whether you’re included in the answer at all, how you’re described and positioned, and how often you’re cited as a source across a wide range of questions and platforms. In other words: traditional visibility asks “how high do we rank?”, while AI visibility asks “are we included in the answer, and what role do we play in the story AI tells about our market?”.

Example of how Sikte AI is both mentioned and cited in Google AI Mode.

What is the difference between AEO, SEO, and GEO?

SEO optimizes for ranking in search results, AEO structures your content so AI engines can use it as direct answers, and GEO builds topical authority so generative engines prefer your brand. In short: SEO makes you findable, AEO makes you quotable, GEO makes you preferred.

The difference between AEO, SEO, and GEO mainly comes down to the type of visibility you’re optimizing for. SEO is traditional search engine optimization, where the goal is to rank highly in standard search results and drive traffic to your website. AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) is about structuring content so that AI and search engines can easily extract short, precise answers to specific questions, such as in featured snippets, and FAQ boxes.

GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) takes it a step further by examining how to build the entire topic ecosystem around your brand, so that generative engines and LLMs choose you when explaining a topic or recommending relevant entities. Where SEO focuses on individual pages and keywords, and AEO on specific questions and clear answers, GEO is about building broad topical authority, consistent messaging, and reliable sources across multiple pages and formats, so that AI actually prefers to use you when compiling its own answers.

How do AI engines determine which sources to use?

AI engines evaluate sources on five criteria: relevance to the question, authority and trustworthiness (E-E-A-T), structure and clarity, original value, and how current and verifiable the content is. Pages that score well on all five are most often chosen as sources in AI-generated answers.

AI engines do not retrieve information from a single source, but from a large number of pages that are evaluated and ranked in several stages. They look for content that is relevant, understandable, credible, and offers something more than what is already available.

Relevance to the question

LLMs, or AI engines, prioritize pages where the topic, headings, and first paragraph clearly match the user’s question and intent. Clear titles and paragraphs that provide specific answers to “what,” “how,” and “why” increase the likelihood of being selected as a source.

Authority and credibility

Domain and topical authority still play a major role. Websites with a clear subject focus, high quality backlinks, and consistent, reliable content are more likely to be selected. AI engines use signals such as E-E-A-T (experience, expertise, authority, trustworthiness) to assess which sources are safe to rely on.

Practical example:

When Sikte AI was working with AI-visibility for a client who wanted to understand how their competitor was always mentioned and cited in ChatGPT, our analysis revealed the competitors most cited page. They had a well structured “Rewards and tests” page with links to several test-pages and rewards where we found backlinks to their homepage. This page was doing it for them. They were being framed as “best in test” and “award-winning product” in their category. We made a similar page for our client who’s now challenging the success story of that competitor. 

Structure and clarity of content

Pages that are well-structured with headings, short paragraphs, bullet points, and direct answers at the beginning of the text are easier to extract and cite correctly. AI engines favor content from which it is easy to extract sentences without much noise, and which includes clear definitions and explanations.

Original content and information

When multiple sources say the same thing, AI will often select pages that provide new insights, data, or practical examples, rather than simply repeating standard explanations. Content that offers unique analysis, firsthand experiences, or concrete frameworks will have a higher information gain and thus a greater chance of being cited.

Up-to-date and verifiable

For rapidly evolving topics, AI engines assess how recently the content was published or updated. At the same time, claims are cross-checked against other sources; information that can be easily verified across multiple credible websites carries more weight than isolated claims.

What does this mean for Norwegian companies?

For Norwegian companies, this means that content no longer just needs to be “ranked”; it must be usabledirectly in AI responses. AI engines are becoming an additional filter between you and the customer, in both B2B and B2C, and if you aren’t visible there, you can become invisible early in the buyer’s journey even if you still have decent Google rankings.

Specifically, this means that service pages, technical articles, and FAQs must be structured around questions and user cases, not just keywords, and that you should build clear topic hubs (with internal links, FAQs, and in-depth content) in the areas you want to dominate in the market. Norwegian companies that manage to combine classic SEO with AEO (clear answers) and GEO (broad topical authority) will have a much better chance of being mentioned, explained, and recommended when customers ask AI tools what problems they should solve, and who can help them.

The most common mistakes businesses make today

The most common mistakes companies make (or fail to make) when striving for AI visibility, and how to avoid them:

1. They only optimize for Google rankings, not for AI responses.
   Many companies continue to write content solely for traditional search results and forget to provide clear answers to specific questions, as AI engines require. The solution is to incorporate short, direct answers, FAQ sections, and clear H2 headings that reflect the actual questions users ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini.

2. They buy tools but leave the content vague and unstructured.
   Many companies invest in AI-readability tools but keep their landing pages and blogs as long walls of text without a clear structure or prioritized messages. For AI visibility, content must be broken down into clear paragraphs, bullet points, definitions, and process steps that make it easy for models to extract sentences and paragraphs as standalone answers.

3. They publish large amounts of generic, AI-generated content with no intrinsic value.
   It’s tempting to mass-produce content using generative tools, but generic texts that simply repeat what “everyone else” is saying are rarely chosen as a source. AI engines prefer content that adds new information, original data, experiences, examples, or clear frameworks, which provides a higher “information gain” than standard explanations.

4. They lack a clear thematic structure and signals of authority
   Many websites have scattered articles without a clear thematic focus, weak internal linking, and few signals of expertise in a specific field. To be selected as a source in AI responses, you need to build topical authority: a strong pillar page, supporting articles covering subtopics, well-thought-out internal links, and a clear professional profile that demonstrates you “own” the topic in your market.

How to get started with AI visibility

Getting started with AI visibility is all about doing a few key things in the right order. You don’t have to overhaul your entire marketing strategy overnight.

1. Identify the questions your target audience asks, including in AI tools
   Start by collecting actual questions asked by customers and potential customers: in sales meetings, support interactions, chat sessions, searches on your own website, and by testing relevant prompts in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini. This will give you a concrete list of topics and phrasing you should structure your content around, including on your services page, FAQ, and blog.

2. Create one strong “pillar page” on your core topic
   Choose one area you want to dominate (such as a product category or service area) and build a comprehensive landing page that explains what it is, why it’s important, how it’s done, and answers common questions. This page will serve as the hub that AI engines and people use to understand your perspective on the topic, and to which other support pages can link.

3. Create supporting content that addresses the sub-questions
   Write shorter, more focused articles and FAQs that tackle the most important questions individually, such as “How do you measure AI visibility?” or “When should you start taking beta-carotene?”. Link these internally back to the pillar page and to each other, so you create a clear topic cluster that shows search engines you cover the field broadly and deeply.

4. Make your content easy for AI engines to use
   Review your most important pages and ensure that each page has a clear H1 heading, logical H2 headings, short paragraphs, bullet points, and a mini-FAQ at the bottom with direct answers of 40–70 words. Where appropriate, you can use FAQ and HowTo schema, but the most important thing is that the text itself provides clear, extractable answers that AI can directly incorporate into its own responses.

5. Start measuring AI visibility—keep it simple at first, then get more advanced later
   Begin with manual tests: ask key questions to various AI tools and note whether and how you are mentioned as a source or recommendation. Eventually, you can start using your own AI visibility tools that track which prompts, engines, and pages actually generate visibility, and use that insight to prioritize which topics and pages you should improve next.

Recommended next read: How to improve AI Visibility

FAQ

What is AI visibility?

AI visibility is the extent to which your brand is understood, mentioned, and cited in answers generated by tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and other AI-driven search experiences. Unlike traditional search visibility, which is mostly about rankings and clicks, AI visibility is about becoming part of the answer when users ask questions, compare options, or look for recommendations.

What is the difference between SEO and AEO?

SEO focuses on helping your website rank in traditional search results and generate traffic from search engines. AEO, or Answer Engine Optimization, focuses on structuring and writing content so AI systems can easily interpret it, extract it, and use it in direct answers to user questions.

How do we know if our website is visible in AI search?

A practical way to assess AI visibility is to test the questions your customers are likely to ask in tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI, and then check whether your business, domain, or content appears in the response. If you want a more systematic view, you can also use specialized AI visibility tools to track how often your site is cited or referenced across selected prompts over time.

Can Sikte AI help improve our AI visibility?

Yes, Sikte AI helps businesses of all sizes map and improve their AI visibility in search engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, AI Overviews, AI Mode, Gemini and more. We handle the technical groundwork on your website so that AI is able to read the content, and then monitor and optimize it further. Fill out the contact form and we'll get in touch for a chat!