What is answer engine optimization?

Answer engine optimization (AEO) is the practice of formatting content so AI systems can lift it as a direct answer. In simple words: SEO gets you ranked, AEO gets you quoted.

The engines in question are ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google's AI Overviews, and voice assistants. They pull short, factual passages that answer a question cleanly.

The mechanics follow from that. Answer the question in the first sentence. Keep one question per page. Use plain definitions, numbers, and structure an engine can parse. Pages written this way win citations even when they do not hold the top organic spot.

An AEO content generator produces pages in that format automatically.