Why Generative Engine Optimization / SAIO Matters Now
As AI-powered tools like ChatGPT, Google SGE, Gemini, and Perplexity redefine how users discover information, the way businesses approach search visibility is changing. In this new environment, it’s no longer enough to rank first—your brand needs to be cited and referenced by generative engines.
A growing number of marketing agencies are stepping into this space, offering services that go beyond traditional SEO. Their goal: to help brands appear in AI-generated responses, boost visibility in answer boxes, and maintain discoverability in what many now call Search 3.0.
This article compares 10 leading agencies that specialize in what’s broadly referred to as Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) or Search Artificial Intelligence Optimization (SAIO)—a field still taking shape, with different players using different names for similar strategies.
Before we dive into the agency breakdowns, let’s define the most established term in this domain: GEO/SAIO and its alternative names frequently used by agencies.
What Is SAIO and How Do Agencies Define It?
SAIO (Search Artificial Intelligence Optimization) is the practice of optimizing digital content, technical infrastructure, and brand presence to improve visibility in AI-generated responses—particularly those from LLMs (Large Language Models) used in tools like ChatGPT, voice assistants, and AI overviews. It involves aligning with how AI interprets, trusts, and cites information, rather than how traditional search engines rank pages.
The most common terms in the space also include:
| Term | Focus |
| SAIO (Search Artificial Intelligence Optimization) | Broad strategy across LLMs and AI search engines |
| GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) | Optimization for LLM platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini |
| AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) | Appearing as direct answers in AI-driven queries |
| LLM SEO (Large Language Model SEO) | Tailoring SEO for how large language models fetch content |
| AI Optimization / AI SEO (General AI visibility terms) | Covers content structuring, citations, and brand signals |
| Conversational Search Optimization | Optimizing for question-style, natural-language queries |
| Natural Language Search Optimization | Similar to conversational search focus |
| AI Search Optimization | General optimization for AI-generated rankings |
| AI Engine Optimization | Technical structuring for AI interpretability |
| Search 3.0 Optimization | Describes the next generation of search behaviors |
| SEO for AI Search Engines | Literal description of the new SEO environment |
The agencies reviewed below go beyond keyword targeting to help brands:
- Get cited by AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity
- Appear in Google AI Overviews and voice assistants
- Optimize content structure, authority, and schema for generative retrieval
- Monitor AI visibility and future-proof organic discovery
Top 10 Generative Engine Optimization Agencies
Disclaimer: The pricing information presented is taken from Clutch as of June 2025, and we do not hold responsibility for any changes or inaccuracies.
1. 42DM
42DM is a full-cycle B2B marketing agency pioneering in SAIO/GEO. Its mission is to help tech and SaaS companies lead the AI search landscape—getting discovered and cited by tools like ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, and Perplexity.
42DM’s approach to SAIO includes:
- Creating a Technical Foundation for AI Search: Implementing structured data and optimizing website structure/XML sitemaps for AI interpretation and crawling, while also shaping AI’s perception of the company.
- Launching SEO for AI-Driven Search: Tailoring content for AI search queries and user intent, adhering to E-E-A-T guidelines, optimizing for semantic search, and building supportive links.
- Building Third-Party Trust Signals: Strengthening online presence on marketplaces, directories, and review sites; securing mentions in trustworthy industry media; and engaging in strategic PR outreach.
- Ensuring Organic Social Activities and Demand Generation: Combining social media strategy with demand generation through content distribution, strategic hashtagging, community engagement, and tailored Demand Generation/ABM programs.
42DM has demonstrated success in SAIO, with proven case studies, where a targeted SAIO strategy resulted in 150 clicks from AI engines in two months, 12 AI overview snippets, and an 8% conversion rate. Another case saw a 491% increase in monthly organic clicks, 29K monthly non-branded clicks, and 1407 top 10 keyword rankings.
Founding Year: 2015.
Company Size: 51–200.
Headquarters: Jersey City, New Jersey.
Average Hourly Rate: $50 – $99 / hr.
2. Victorious
Victorious is an SEO agency offering Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) services to help businesses adapt to AI-driven search. As traditional SEO loses visibility to tools like ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews, Victorious focuses on making content discoverable by answer engines.
Its AEO approach includes:
- Audit & Strategy – Identifying where existing content fails in AI search and building a roadmap for improvement.
- Query Research – Analyzing how users phrase questions in AI tools, forums, and SERPs to define target topics.
- Content Optimization – Restructuring and updating content with clear Q&A sections, summaries, and semantic formatting.
- Technical Enhancements – Ensuring content is crawlable by AI bots, using schema markup, and adjusting site architecture.
- Structured Data & Snippet Targeting – Preparing content for featured snippets and AI-generated answers.
Victorious reports results such as increased organic traffic, featured snippet wins, and improved conversion rates from AI-exposed content.
Founding Year: 2013.
Company Size: 50 – 249.
Headquarters: San Francisco, CA.
Average Hourly Rate: $300+ / hr.
3. Intero Digital
Intero Digital is a full-service digital marketing agency offering Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) to improve brand visibility in AI-driven search environments.
Intero’s proprietary framework, Intero GRO, integrates SEO, digital PR, and AI content structuring to align with how large language models retrieve and prioritize information.
The GEO approach includes:
- Entity-based content strategy – Optimizing content structure, topics, and metadata for alignment with AI retrieval models.
- Structured data and technical SEO – Implementing schema, improving accessibility, and ensuring crawlability by LLM crawlers.
- Digital PR and brand mentions – Building authority through strategic placement in trusted publications and platforms.
- Cross-platform engagement – Enhancing presence on multimedia, community platforms, and across relevant AI sources.
- AI performance analysis – Using tools like InteroBOT® to simulate crawler behavior and test how content performs in AI search.
GEO is positioned as a way to adapt to declining traffic from traditional SEO and meet changing user behaviors driven by conversational AI tools.
Founding Year: 1996.
Company Size: 250 – 999.
Headquarters: Colorado Springs, CO.
Average Hourly Rate: $100 – $149 / hr.
4. Coalition Technologies
Coalition Technologies is a digital marketing agency offering LLM SEO. The agency combines traditional SEO with prompt-aware optimization to increase visibility in conversational and AI-driven search results.
Their approach includes:
- LLM-focused content optimization – Aligning page content with common AI prompts and restructuring it for answer engine compatibility.
- Technical and on-page SEO – Running audits, improving metadata, and enhancing site performance to comply with AI and search engine standards.
- Human-written content – Producing expert-level, high-quality content tailored for both SEO and AI citations.
Voice search and assistant targeting – Optimizing for platforms like Siri, Alexa, and Meta AI to ensure broad AI assistant coverage. - Data-driven campaign reporting – Tracking rankings, featured snippets, and AI prompt visibility through proprietary tools.
Coalition Technologies emphasizes ethical, human-first content creation while using AI to guide strategy—not replace expertise. Its clients have achieved results like increased citation in AI responses and higher rankings across both traditional and generative search environments.
Founding Year: 2009.
Company Size: 50 – 249.
Headquarters: Los Angeles, CA.
Average Hourly Rate: $50 – $99 / hr.
5. Marcel Digital
Marcel Digital is a Chicago-based digital marketing agency offering Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) services. Their approach focuses on helping businesses structure content to appear as direct answers in AI-generated search results.
Marcel Digital’s AEO services are integrated with traditional SEO and web development efforts, targeting both discoverability and authority in evolving AI environments.
Their AEO strategy includes:
- Technical and performance optimization – Improving page speed, mobile responsiveness, and crawlability for AI search systems.
- Content optimization for AI readability – Writing and structuring content to deliver clear, concise answers to common user questions.
- Schema and structured data – Implementing FAQ, HowTo, and other markup formats to help AI engines interpret content.
- Authority building – Expanding digital presence across reputable sources to increase trust signals for AI platforms.
- User experience alignment – Enhancing navigation and aligning content with intent to meet the expectations of AI users.
Marcel positions AEO as a complement to SEO, helping businesses remain discoverable as search shifts toward direct, conversational, and multimodal responses.
Founding Year: 2003.
Company Size: 10 – 49.
Headquarters: Chicago, IL.
Average Hourly Rate: $200 – $300 / hr.
6. Avenue Z
Avenue Z is a digital agency offering AI Optimization (AIO) services. The agency helps brands assess, track, and improve their visibility in AI-generated answers and shopping results.
AIO at Avenue Z combines technical, content, and PR-based strategies to increase a brand’s recognition in AI-driven environments.
Their approach includes:
- AI content strategy – Structuring and mapping content around topical relevance, conversational format, and AI compatibility.
- Technical optimization – Enhancing crawlability, indexing, and schema markup for LLM alignment.
- Media signal building – Securing press coverage and authoritative backlinks to boost brand presence in AI knowledge graphs.
- AI shopping optimization – Aligning product data and feeds with AI shopping platforms to improve recommendation rates.
- AI visibility audits – Measuring brand share of voice and identifying visibility gaps across major AI platforms.
Avenue Z positions AIO as essential for maintaining brand control and visibility, as traditional keyword rankings give way to AI-based content surfacing.
Founding Year: 2007.
Company Size: 50 – 249.
Headquarters: Miami, FL.
Average Hourly Rate: $150 – $199 / hr.
7. Single Grain
Single Grain is a digital marketing agency that integrates both SEO and GEO.
Key components of their GEO strategy include:
- Conversational content structuring – Writing in Q&A formats, listicles, and FAQs to align with how LLMs extract and generate responses.
- Dual SEO-AI optimization – Balancing traditional on-page and technical SEO with AI-oriented tactics like schema use and natural language prompts.
- Authority-building signals – Incorporating industry citations, statistics, and structured knowledge that AI models recognize and reuse.
Platform-specific content tailoring – Adjusting content formats based on how different engines (e.g. Google SGE vs Claude) process and favor information. - AI visibility tracking – Monitoring brand mentions and citations in generative tools as a success metric alongside traffic and ranking.
Single Grain emphasizes the importance of being cited by AI tools—not just ranked—positioning GEO as essential for content discoverability in the AI-driven search landscape.
Founding Year: 2009.
Company Size: 10 – 49.
Headquarters: Los Angeles, CA.
Average Hourly Rate: N/A.
8. Digital Brand Expressions
Digital Brand Expressions (DBE) is a digital marketing agency offering Search Artificial Intelligence Optimization (SAIO). Their team tested early versions of AI search tools and built SAIO strategies around how generative engines select and cite sources.
The SAIO approach includes:
- Discovery and goal setting – Understanding business needs and defining visibility objectives in generative search.
- Audit and planning – Reviewing current content and site structure to identify AI citation gaps.
- Content restructuring – Optimizing for clarity, relevance, and answerability in chatbot contexts.
- Technical setup – Ensuring crawlability, structured data, and schema implementation.
- Ongoing testing and updates – Tracking AI citation performance and refining tactics as platforms evolve.
DBE views SAIO as a complement to SEO, designed to increase brand exposure in unpaid, AI-generated summaries where traditional links may be absent.
Founding Year: 2001.
Company Size: 10 – 49.
Headquarters: Princeton, NJ.
Average Hourly Rate: $150 – $199 / hr.
9. Gorilla Marketing
Gorilla Marketing is a digital agency providing Ask/Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) services. Their focus is on optimizing content to answer user queries directly, bypassing traditional keyword-based SEO.
Their AEO services include:
- Query-driven content creation – Writing content in natural, conversational formats that match how users ask questions in AI tools.
- Structured content and markup – Implementing schema, FAQs, and semantic structure to signal relevance to AI systems.
- Technical optimization – Enhancing site speed, mobile responsiveness, clean URLs, and XML sitemaps.
- Voice search optimization – Tailoring content for long-tail voice queries and smart assistant interaction.
- Performance tracking – Using tools like Google Analytics and Search Console to monitor visibility and impact.
Gorilla Marketing emphasizes early adoption of AEO as a competitive advantage, helping brands shift from traditional rankings to AI-powered answers.
Founding Year: 2015.
Company Size: 10 – 49.
Headquarters: N/A.
Average Hourly Rate: $150 – $199 / hr.
10. NoGood
NoGood is a digital growth agency offering end-to-end Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) services. NoGood’s AEO framework combines audits, content refinement, and real-time AI visibility monitoring through their proprietary platform, Goodie.
Their AEO services include:
- LLM visibility audits – Evaluating brand presence and content coverage across major AI tools.
- Content creation and optimization – Developing concise, intent-aligned content formatted for AI readability.
Technical optimization – Enhancing indexing, site speed, schema markup, and mobile performance. - Authority and citation analysis – Building credibility through strategic PR, backlinking, and digital footprint expansion.
- Performance monitoring – Tracking AI search exposure, traffic, and conversions via the Goodie AEO platform.
NoGood positions AEO as a natural extension of SEO, designed to future-proof digital visibility in the age of AI-generated answers.
Founding Year: 2017.
Company Size: 10 – 49.
Headquarters: New York, NY.
Average Hourly Rate: N/A.
Key factors for choosing a Generative Engine Optimization marketing agency
Selecting the right agency for GEO can determine how well your brand adapts to AI-generated search. Unlike traditional SEO, SAIO demands alignment with how large language models (LLMs) interpret, trust, and cite sources.
When choosing an SEO intelligence agency, consider:
- Terminology clarity and focus
Look for agencies that not only use buzzwords like “GEO” or “AEO,” but demonstrate a real understanding of how LLMs like ChatGPT and Gemini function. - Content citation expertise
Effective GEO agencies prioritize content that is citable and referrable by AI—structured for clarity, trustworthiness, and authority. Ask how they optimize content for direct citation, not just keyword match. - Structured data and schema implementation
Agencies should demonstrate expertise in technical SEO for AI, including the use of structured data (e.g. FAQs, HowTo, Product schemas), as it feeds directly into AI model training and response generation. - Track record in competitive niches
GEO is especially valuable if your business operates in a saturated market or lags behind in traditional SEO. Agencies with case studies in high-competition industries can deliver better results. - AI-specific visibility tracking
Ensure the agency provides visibility reports that reflect performance in AI tools—not just classic SERPs. This includes tracking citations in Google SGE, Perplexity, and even Gemini.
5 tips on how to get the most out of your Generative Engine Optimization marketing agency
Partnering with a GEO agency isn’t just a handoff. To maximize results, brands should stay actively involved:
- Define clear AI visibility goals
Don’t treat SAIO as a traffic play. Instead, clarify if you’re aiming for answer box presence, third-party citations, product visibility in AI shopping, or research-stage discovery. - Align with your audience’s behavior
SAIO matters most if your audience uses tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, or Perplexity to compare products or research vendors. If they do, you need to be discoverable where they search. - Support content development
Provide your agency with subject-matter insights, data, and FAQs that can be turned into structured, conversational, AI-friendly content. - Stay agile with feedback loops
AI search is evolving rapidly. Make sure your agency is adjusting strategies monthly, not yearly. Ask for test-and-learn approaches and quick turnarounds on optimization experiments. - Maintain traditional SEO foundations
Good SAIO/GEO builds on solid SEO. Agencies that treat them as separate silos miss out. Ensure your site is crawlable, fast, and semantically sound.
Conclusion
Search has changed. Simply being ranked isn’t enough—your brand must be cited, summarized, and surfaced by AI.
Most companies aren’t ready. Their content isn’t structured for large language models. Their technical setup isn’t optimized for AI parsing. Their authority signals are too weak to earn trust from generative systems.
That’s where a generative SEO agency comes in.
The right agency knows how AI systems decide what to cite. It builds structured, AI-friendly content. It strengthens your digital footprint across trusted sources. It monitors how often—and where—your brand is mentioned by tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Google SGE.
This is not an SEO upgrade. It’s a visibility shift.
If your team is serious about staying visible in a post-SERP world, now is the time to act. Choose an agency that’s ahead of the curve—and knows how to make AI work for you.
Frequently Asked Questions
