Does your SEO agency do GEO, or do you need a separate one?

Most businesses do not need a separate GEO agency. If your SEO agency is competent and is willing to add prompt testing, AI reporting and entity work to what it already does, one team is usually the better setup. You need a second provider, or a new one, only when your current agency cannot show you that work on request.

GEO (generative engine optimization) is the work of getting your business described accurately and cited in AI answers from tools such as ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity and Copilot. AEO (answer engine optimization) is the related work of making your content the direct answer to a question. Both sit on top of ordinary SEO. Google says so directly for its own products, and the low-risk groundwork is much the same for the other engines.

So the useful question is not what the agency calls itself. It is whether the people working on your account do the handful of tasks that are specific to AI answers. This guide shows where the overlap is, what is new, and eight checks to run on your current agency.

How much GEO overlaps with SEO

For Google's AI features, the overlap is nearly complete by Google's own account. Its guide to optimizing for generative AI features says: "The best practices for SEO continue to be relevant because our generative AI features on Google Search are rooted in our core Search ranking and quality systems." To be eligible, "a page must be indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet." The same guide adds that "Structured data isn't required for generative AI search, and there's no special schema.org markup you need to add."

That guidance is about AI Overviews and AI Mode. Google does not speak for other companies, and each of them documents its own crawlers and products to a different degree. Even so, the low-risk groundwork does not change from one engine to the next: pages a crawler can reach and read, content that states facts clearly, and a business whose details match wherever they appear. An SEO agency doing its job is already doing most of that.

If you want the definitions side by side, see our comparison of GEO, AEO and SEO.

What is shared and what is new

The right-hand column is the real scope of "GEO" for a site with sound SEO. It is a modest list, which is why a good SEO agency can cover it.

Two of those rows have their own guides: which AI crawlers to allow or block, and what is and is not confirmed about Bing Webmaster Tools and IndexNow for AI search.

Eight checks for your current agency

Ask your agency for each item below. Every one should be something they can send you within a few days, because an agency that does this work has it on file.

Some background for checks 3 to 5, as of October 2026. Google launched its Generative AI performance reports in Search Console on June 3, 2026 and says that "As of August 31, 2026, we've rolled out these insights to all websites worldwide." They show impressions in AI Overviews and AI Mode. The report may not appear if a site lacks enough generative AI impressions. Microsoft introduced an AI Performance report in Bing Webmaster Tools as a public preview on February 10, 2026, covering citations in Microsoft Copilot, Bing's AI summaries and select partner integrations. GA4's default channel group has an AI Assistant channel, which by Google's definition "excludes Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode."

These reports are free and first-party. An agency that has never opened them for your account has not started measuring GEO for you.

How to read the results

• Six to eight delivered: your agency covers GEO. Ask for it to be written into your scope and reports.
• Three to five: the foundations are there. Ask for a plan and a date for the rest.
• Two or fewer: GEO is not part of your service today. Decide whether your agency can add it or whether you need someone else.

These bands are our own rule of thumb, not an industry benchmark or an official score.

Signs the label changed and the work did not

Adding "GEO" or "AI SEO" to a service page is easy. Changing the work is harder. Watch for these signs that only the wording changed:

• Your monthly report looks the same as last year's, with a new heading.
• "AI visibility" is shown as a single score with no prompts or answers behind it.
• The plan is a list of add-ons presented as requirements: special files, special markup, rewriting everything "for AI."
• Nobody can tell you which AI engines they tested or when.
• Recommendations come with no source.

On the third point, Google's guide is blunt about its own products: "You don't need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, markup, or Markdown to appear in Google Search (including its generative AI capabilities), as Google Search itself doesn't use them." It also says "You don't need to write in a specific way just for generative AI search." Other engines may treat such files differently, and an agency can reasonably suggest them. It should not sell them as essential, and it should be able to say which platform reads them.

The opposite problem exists too. A GEO-only provider that dismisses SEO is ignoring what Google has published. The guide's own summary is: "Prioritize effective SEO strategies over "AEO/GEO hacks.""

When one team is better

For most small and mid-sized businesses, one provider covering SEO, GEO and AEO is the simpler and safer arrangement. The reasons are practical:

• One set of pages. SEO and GEO edit the same titles, copy, schema and internal links. Two vendors editing the same page can undo each other's work.
• One technical owner. Crawl rules, redirects and site speed affect both. Split ownership invites gaps.
• One report. Rankings, AI impressions, AI referrals and leads belong in a single view, or you cannot see how they relate.
• One budget conversation. Hours can move to wherever the need is greatest that month.

A note on our own position: eSEOspace sells SEO, GEO and AEO together in combined monthly plans and has no GEO-only plan, so we are not neutral here. The argument stands without us, though. It follows from Google's statement that, for Google Search, this work is still SEO. Our guide on adding GEO to an existing SEO program shows how the combined workflow runs.

When a separate GEO provider makes sense

There are real cases for a second provider:

• Your SEO agency does not want the work. Some firms specialize in technical SEO or link building and say so. Respect that and add a specialist.
• Your SEO is done in-house. A capable internal team may only need outside help with prompt testing, reporting or digital PR.
• You need a specific skill. Earned media coverage, for example, is a different craft from on-site optimization.
• You want an independent audit. A one-time outside review of your AI visibility can test what your agency is telling you.
• Your agency failed the eight checks and has no plan to change.

If the last case applies, think about replacing the agency instead of adding one. The comparison of agency, in-house and freelancer options covers the alternatives.

If you do run two providers

Two vendors can work together if you set rules at the start:

1. Name one owner on your side. One person approves priorities for both firms.
2. Write down who edits what. List page types and file types, including robots.txt, schema and templates, and assign each to one vendor.
3. Share one roadmap. Both firms see the same planned changes and dates.
4. Keep the accounts in your name. Analytics, Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools and tracking tools belong to you, with each firm added as a user.
5. Agree one report. Decide which numbers are the shared scoreboard so neither firm reports a private version of success.

Check that each agreement allows this kind of cooperation and says who owns the work produced. Contract terms vary and this is not legal advice, so have your attorney review both.

How to ask your agency to add GEO

If your agency passed some checks and you would like to keep it, make the request specific:

1. Ask for a baseline: an agreed prompt list, tested on named engines, with the answers saved.
2. Ask for the three first-party sources to be added to your regular report.
3. Ask for a short list of pages to improve first, chosen from the baseline.
4. Ask what this changes in your scope and fee, in writing.
5. Set a review date to look at what has moved.

The full list of questions to ask a GEO agency applies just as well to a provider you already have. If you end up shopping for a new one, our earlier post on choosing an AI visibility company covers the general qualities to look for.

Conclusion

GEO is mostly SEO done thoroughly, plus a short list of new tasks. If your agency can show you a prompt baseline, the first-party AI reports and a deliberate position on AI crawlers, you already have GEO coverage and should get it written into your scope. If it cannot, ask it to start, and bring in a specialist or a replacement only if it will not. To see where your site stands either way, request a free GEO audit. More guides are in our GEO and AEO Guide.

Frequently asked questions