[ direct answers, no jargon ]
Frequently asked questions
What buyers and owners ask us about AI citation, answered the same way we would on a call. Each answer is backed by the posts and telemetry we publish.
What is answer engine optimization (AEO)?
Answer engine optimization is the work of making your business the answer AI assistants give when buyers ask who to hire. Buyers increasingly ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google AI Mode for a recommendation and act on it without ever seeing a results page. AEO structures your web presence so those engines can find, verify, and cite you by name.
How is getting cited different from ranking on Google?
Ranking is a list; citation is an answer. When a buyer asks an assistant "who should I use," there is no page two: either the model names you, with reasons, or it names someone else. Good rankings feed the old pipe, and optimizing for the results page does nothing for the buyer who never sees one.
How long until AI recommends my business?
First citation signals typically appear in 4 to 8 weeks for businesses with clean entity structure. Consistent multi-platform citations take 8 to 12 weeks, and measurable business impact usually lands in 3 to 6 months. Your starting position with schema, directory consistency, reviews, and content depth decides where you fall in each window - the full timeline is in our post on how long AI recommendation takes.
Read the honest timeline ->What is an AI citation sweep?
A citation sweep runs your real buyer questions through ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Copilot, and Google AI Mode on a schedule and records who gets named, with which source. It turns "is this working" into receipts instead of opinions. We run sweeps on our own properties and publish the results.
How to read a sweep ->How do I check if ChatGPT knows my business?
Ask it the way a buyer would: name your niche and city and ask who to hire, then see whether you are named and what the model says about you. Our free scan reads your site the way an answer engine does and shows what is broken. Five minutes tells you where you stand.
Run the free scan ->What does AI Rank Formula actually do?
Three moves, all done for you. Structure: entity graph, schema, llms.txt, and crawlable answers, the technical layer engines parse before deciding who to name. Substance: weekly pages built around the exact questions your buyers ask, sourced from regulators, standards bodies, and primary data. Receipts: scheduled citation sweeps that record who gets named, so you see progress instead of taking our word for it.
Am I locked into a contract?
No. We keep clients by showing receipts, not by holding them hostage. If the sweeps stop showing progress, you should fire us, and nothing in the paperwork stops you.
Something we did not answer? Ask us directly or run the free scan.