As AI changes people’s browsing behaviour, many are asking if SEO is now redundant. The answer is no. Instead, SEO has become the foundation that makes a successful GEO strategy possible.
For years, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) has been a primary focus for digital marketing. It’s a technical discipline aimed at helping search engines find, crawl, and rank your website. Now, with the rise of AI-driven “answer engines,” a new discipline has emerged: Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO), the strategic work of becoming a trusted, authoritative source.
Since it’s still so new, there are competing names for it, such as AI SEO or AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) but we’re going with GEO for now.
Whatever you call it, it’s led to boardrooms and marketing departments everywhere asking: Is SEO obsolete?
From our perspective, the answer is no. Thinking that GEO replaces SEO is like believing that beautiful architecture replaces the need for a solid foundation and sound electrical wiring. The two are not in conflict; one cannot exist without the other.
SEO as foundations, GEO as architecture
The relationship between SEO and GEO is best understood with an analogy:
• SEO is the technical foundation of your digital building: It’s the essential, technical work that ensures your site is accessible and functional. This includes things like site speed, mobile-friendliness, a logical URL structure, and secure protocols (HTTPS). Like a building’s foundation, plumbing, and wiring, if it fails, everything built on top of it is compromised. An AI agent, just like a human, will not trust a slow, broken, or insecure website.
• GEO is the purpose and authority of the building: This is the what and the why. It’s the high-quality, authoritative content that lives within the building – the carefully researched data, the expert insights, and the credible third-party validations. GEO is what makes the building a trusted destination, like a world-class library or research institution.
A building with a perfect foundation but no books inside is useless. A library full of priceless books, but with a crumbling foundation is inaccessible. You need both to build the trust and your brand legacy.
How SEO and GEO work together
The most effective strategy doesn’t treat SEO and GEO as separate tasks, but as two sides of the same coin, managed in a continuous, collaborative loop.
1. SEO identifies the need: Your SEO team or expert uses technical tools to identify the specific, high-value questions your potential customers are asking. They discover the queries, the search volumes, and the user intent. For example, they might find a rising number of queries for “comparing CNC machine energy efficiency.”
2. GEO creates the authoritative answer: Your communications and content team (SE10) takes that insight and creates the definitive, authoritative content to answer it. This isn’t a simple blog post. It’s a comprehensive guide, complete with structured data, expert quotes, and downloadable comparison charts – the “Single Source of Truth.” And it’s the corroboration of that authority through coverage in the trade media – the “Web of Trust.”
3. SEO ensures flawless delivery: Your SEO expert then ensures that this brilliant new piece of content is perfectly optimised for delivery. It is structured with the correct headings (H1, H2), images are optimised with alt texts to accompany them, and it is easily crawlable by AI agents.
This integrated approach ensures that your best thinking is delivered flawlessly to the new AI gatekeepers.
SE10: Your integrated authority engine
A modern digital strategy requires both flawless technical execution and a world-class library of expertise, and our integrated team is built to deliver both.
Our in-house digital marketing expertise ensures your technical foundation – the SEO – is sound, structured, and perfectly optimised for AI crawlers. But our unique value lies in what we build on top of that foundation. Our journalistic and strategic teams are experts at creating the high-quality, authoritative GEO content – the expert interviews, the media placements, the thought leadership – that proves your credibility to both human and machine audiences.
We are the strategic architects who design the blueprint for your digital authority, and we have the integrated team of technical and creative experts to help you build it. We’re here to strengthen your brand legacy and the AI/GEO requirements to propel your brand into the future with unprecedented growth, all while forging deeper, more authentic customer connections through hyper-personalised content, in timely experiences.
Don’t abandon your SEO efforts – supercharge them. A modern digital strategy requires both a flawless technical foundation and a world-class library of expertise. To discuss how our GEO content strategy can amplify your existing SEO work, contact our team today.
Bolly Methakittiworakun
Digital Marketing Manager
About the author
Bolly is SE10’s digital marketing manager, leading the agency’s digital strategy to help industrial B2B clients connect with their audiences across a complex digital landscape. Her expertise in SEO, data-driven campaign management, and social media ensures our clients’ compelling stories not only reach the right people but also drive measurable business results.
