What is a GEO agency, and what does it do for your business?
A GEO agency checks and improves the conditions that let AI search features find your content and use it as a source. GEO stands for generative engine optimization. We have worked in search engine optimisation for more than eight years. For Google AI Overviews and AI Mode those conditions are still mainly the fundamentals of search engine optimisation: accessible, indexable pages and helpful content. Nobody can promise you a mention in one particular AI answer.
The term is young and the demand is real. In our keyword research the German query "GEO-Agentur" is the focus keyword, with around 1,000 monthly searches and an average cost per click of €24.21. In English, "generative engine optimization" runs at 1,300 searches a month in Germany.
Where that much money sits, claims arrive quickly. This article separates the two: what the work really covers, what it cannot deliver, how you spot a provider who is not serious, and which basics you can check yourself. If you only want to know what we measure and what it costs: GEO and AI visibility as a service.
Why generative engine optimization became its own term
Search has not abolished itself, it has spread out. For Google the change can now be checked against clearly named signals.
| Check point | What it means |
|---|---|
| What the report shows | Impressions, pages, countries and time ranges, plus devices for Google Search |
| Requirement for a link in AI Overviews or AI Mode | The page is indexed and allowed to appear in a search snippet |
| What Google recommends for GEO | Basic SEO and helpful, original content |
None of this proves a general formula between ranking and mention. It does show that Google judges AI Overviews and AI Mode inside its own search by the same basic requirements as other search results. If you watch a single position only, you miss whether your pages are technically accessible and visible in the new reports.
AI Overviews do not appear on every search. Google plays them out when the system expects added value over the classic result page. What that does to your clicks depends on topic, search intent and presentation, and it should be measured for your own website.
Visibility in an AI feature does not translate into a revenue promise. Read search and usage data together with enquiries or sales, instead of turning one figure into your measure of success.
What a GEO agency does: five fields of work
Five fields of work. Not one of them is magic; technical accessibility and content you can stand behind are the basis for all of them. This is how we go about it.
1. Make the website technically readable
Which robots.txt rule matters depends on the product. For ChatGPT Search, OpenAI's crawler documentation names OAI-SearchBot; GPTBot controls use for training instead. Googlebot controls access for Google Search including AI Overviews and AI Mode. Google-Extended covers Gemini apps and Vertex AI, not inclusion in Google Search. What stays true: content has to be accessible to the system in question.
Check robots.txt and the delivered page separately. Google can process JavaScript as long as it is not blocked; complex JavaScript pages are still more work to verify. The full route is in the practical guide with a 12 point self test.
2. Back your content with evidence
The GEO study by Princeton researchers compared nine methods in a controlled experiment on a generative system the team built itself. Citing sources, quotations and statistics were among the three best methods there: they improved the position adjusted word count metric by 30 to 40% and the subjective impression metric by 15 to 30%. Those are experiment metrics, not results you should expect on a company website:
| Measure | Measured effect |
|---|---|
| Cite sources | One of the three best methods in the experiment |
| Statistics with evidence | One of the three best methods in the experiment |
| Relevant quotations | One of the three best methods in the experiment |
| Keyword repetition | not confirmed as an effective method |
A concrete statement a reader can check is more useful than an unsupported superlative. That is an editorial rule, not a promise about what a given AI system will cite.
What an llms.txt can do and where its limits are is covered in the primer on llms.txt, GEO and AI visibility.
3. Appear outside your own domain
Your own website stays the basis. Additional, correct information about a company can be useful to people and to search systems alike. Google names complete product and local business data as an aid to visibility in its AI answers.
Make sure that name, offer, location and contact details match on your own website and in the profiles you keep publicly. A mention elsewhere does not replace a solid, current company website.
A complete Google Business Profile can play its part where the local information fits. Google recommends it explicitly as part of the visibility of products and local businesses in search and AI answers. → Why "free" does not mean "unimportant" here.
4. Measure what can be measured
On 3 June 2026 Google introduced separate reports for generative AI features; since 31 August they have been rolled out worldwide. They show impressions, pages, countries and time ranges for Google Search and Discover; devices are available for Google Search. They do not measure mentions in ChatGPT, Perplexity or other services.
For other AI services a repeatable sample stays useful: the same questions that matter to your audience, with the date, the service and the answer on record. That gives you snapshots, not stable rankings. Third party tools can make the record keeping easier, but they have no access to internal ranking or AI systems, as Google states in its note on third party tools.
5. Fit GEO into your existing SEO
For Google, GEO is not a separate discipline next to SEO: Google assigns optimising for generative search features to search engine optimisation. Which priorities make sense for a website depends on its technology, its content and its audience. → What stays from SEO, what is new and what you can drop.
5 red flags: providers you should avoid
We say openly what we want to be measured against. If you see one of these five signals, with us or with anyone else, avoid that provider. Any single one is enough.
- Placements in AI answers are guaranteed.Answers and the sources shown in them can change. An agency can improve the conditions and document the development, but it cannot promise a placement.
- llms.txt is sold as the central measure.Google ignores llms.txt for visibility in Google Search. An Ahrefs analysis of 137,000 domains found no fetches for 97% of the existing files in May 2026; an SE Ranking analysis of almost 300,000 domains found no correlation with AI citations. Those are good reasons against a service promise, not against an optional file that serves some other concrete purpose.
- GEO, AEO and LLMO are offered as three separately billed services.Ask for the concrete measures: technical accessibility, helpful content, correct data and a measurement plan. Acronyms on their own do not describe a scope of work you can check.
- There is no measurement, only a promise.Without a documented starting point it is hard to judge later what has changed. Ask about the search console, the measurement period, the list of questions and the limits of each measurement.
- "Best provider" lists are recommended as a GEO measure.Such lists can be editorial formats, but they are not solid proof of better AI visibility. Ask for the source, and ask how a possible benefit for your company is supposed to be measured.
Do I need a GEO agency? Four questions to check yourself
We would rather say it now than after three months: not every company needs us. These four questions give a first orientation; they do not replace a measurement of your actual AI visibility.
- Open yourdomain.de/robots.txt. If ChatGPT Search matters to you: is OAI-SearchBot allowed? GPTBot covers training instead; Google-Extended covers Gemini apps and Vertex AI, not Google Search.
- Check the delivered home page and your important content. A test with JavaScript switched off can give you hints, but on a JavaScript website it does not replace a check with Google Search Console.
- Search Google for your company name and exclude your own domain. How many other pages name you?
- Do your most important pages carry a named author and, for substantial changes, an update date a reader can follow?
Nothing odd in all four? Then you can carry the basics on yourself: keep your evidence backed content up to date and maintain your company data. A second opinion can help, but it is not necessary.
One or two of them odd? Those can be pure implementation questions. A developer with a clear brief may be enough. The website check writes that brief down in a form you can hand on.
Three or four of them odd? Then a professional review of how technology, content and presence work together is worth it. Only the findings show whether support makes sense, and which kind.
What we do for you: findings, implementation, report
We work from Cologne for clients across the German speaking market, and we treat AI visibility not as a product of its own but as part of proper search engine optimisation and technical implementation.
Three steps:
- Findings.We check technical accessibility, data consistency across the relevant platforms and public sources. For AI services we put your twenty most important questions to ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google and record the answers as a snapshot: the AI visibility report from €690. Where it is needed, we look first at what your audience actually searches for: market analysis.
- Implementation.Implementation can cover robots.txt, rendering, structure, schema markup, a public pricing page, a Google Business Profile and the relevant directories. If the website cannot keep up technically, we rebuild it: that is our web design. If you are short of your own images and running on stock material, we produce them ourselves: photo and video. Out of more than eight years of search engine optimisation and more than 35 business profiles under our care.
- Report.Each month a PDF report with your real figures and the question that counts: who gets named on your topics, and are you among them by now? From that we derive what comes next: development strategy.
What we do not do: guarantee placements. Nobody can, see red flag 1.
See for yourself, with no obligation
Free, no obligation, facts instead of promises: start the website check or book a first call. Within two working days you get your findings by email. Then you know whether working together is worth it.
Frequently asked questions
What is a GEO agency?
A service provider that checks and improves the conditions for visibility in AI generated answers. That covers technical accessibility, content backed by evidence, consistent company data and a measurement plan that fits. One special file on its own is not enough for that.
How much does a GEO agency cost?
It depends on the goal, the starting point and the scope. Small technical corrections and a larger rebuild are different amounts of work. Ongoing support with us sits in the three figure monthly range and can be cancelled monthly. What your case needs is settled by the website check; the right scope can be discussed after that.
Current ranges: Pricing page
GEO agency vs SEO agency: what is the difference?
For Google, GEO and SEO belong together: Google recommends the same fundamentals for AI Overviews and AI Mode as for search. GEO describes the view on AI answers, for instance on technical accessibility, helpful content and the measurement of that visibility. It does not guarantee an answer or a position.
Can you guarantee that ChatGPT recommends my company?
No, and nobody can. AI answers are not deterministic. We create the conditions and measure the development. We do not promise placements.
How long does it take before AI systems mention my company?
That cannot be predicted seriously. Systems crawl, index and select sources at different speeds; even a technically correct page can stay unmentioned. This is why we document the starting point and check the changes over time.
Do I need a GEO agency if I already have an SEO agency?
As a rule, no. Ask your existing agency about robots.txt permissions, rendering, authorship, update dates and third party sources. If a clear answer comes back, you are covered.
Is GEO worth it for small business?
It can be worth it when the basics are missing or important information is hard to find. For the source ranked fifth, the GEO study measured up to 115.1% more visibility through citing sources in a controlled experiment. That is an experimental figure, not a growth or success guarantee for a small business.
How to read the sources The Google and OpenAI documentation describes the respective products and crawlers. The GEO and llms.txt studies are external investigations with their own data sets and their own limits; their results are not used here as a promise for any individual website.
Sources: GEO: Generative Engine Optimization · Ahrefs: 137,000 domains and llms.txt · SE Ranking: almost 300,000 domains and llms.txt · Google: optimising for generative AI features · Google: AI features and your website · Google: generative AI reports in Search Console · OpenAI: crawlers · Google: crawlers and Google-Extended
