SEO vs GEO How to be found in the age of AI search

Henry McIntosh, Twenty One Twelve Marketing | Forum held 16 July 2026

GEO. AEO. LLMO. Three acronyms for roughly the same thing, most of them invented by people with something to sell. We put that to Anthony Barone, co-founder of StudioHawk UK, and Oliver Pechter, co-founder of HeyAmos. Neither wanted to talk about acronyms. Both wanted to talk about positioning.

Is it SEO, GEO or AEO?

Call it AI search and move on. Anthony's reasoning was that SEO never stopped being the backbone: if there's no site for the models to crawl, there's nothing for them to cite.

Oliver's addition was that marketers keep producing acronyms because acronyms sell retainers. His example was llms.txt, the file consultants pitch as a way to speak directly to AI crawlers. No evidence it does anything. If someone's selling it to you, walk the other way.