10 / AI visibility
This page defines 16 AI Search terms. Each entry gives a plain definition, a What to check step you can apply to your own site, and links to deeper SiteAuditLint guides where they exist.
Large language model (LLM)
A large language model is an AI system trained on large amounts of text to understand and generate language. LLMs power AI assistants and AI search features such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity.
Test how major AI assistants currently describe your brand, products, and topics.
AI Overviews
AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries Google shows at the top of some search results, with links to the sources used.
Track which of your target queries trigger AI Overviews and whether your pages are cited in them.
How do I get cited in AI Overviews?
There is no special markup. Google says the same SEO best practices apply: indexable pages with clear, helpful, well-structured content.
Go deeper: Keyword ranking vs AI citation
Source: Google Search Central: AI features and your website
AI Mode
AI Mode is Google's conversational search experience that answers complex questions with AI-generated responses and follow-up questions, citing web sources.
Test key topics in AI Mode and note which sources and competitors are cited for multi-step questions.
Source: Google Search Central: AI features and your website
Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)
Answer Engine Optimization is the practice of structuring content so it can be selected as a direct answer by featured snippets, voice assistants, and AI systems.
Important questions get a direct, standalone answer in the first sentence below a matching heading.
Go deeper: AEO, How to optimize content for answer engines
Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)
Generative Engine Optimization is the practice of improving how often and how accurately a brand or page is cited in AI-generated answers.
Pages contain specific, verifiable facts and original information that AI systems can attribute to you.
Is GEO different from SEO?
It builds on SEO rather than replacing it. Most AI search systems retrieve from search indexes, so crawlability, indexing, and content quality still come first.
Go deeper: GEO, SEO, GEO, and AEO audit checklist
AI search visibility
AI search visibility describes how often a brand or website appears, is mentioned, or is cited across AI-generated search answers.
Track a fixed set of prompts across AI platforms over time, since single checks vary between sessions.
Go deeper: AI visibility tracker, How to build an AI search prompt set
LLM visibility
LLM visibility is how a brand is represented in responses from large language models, including both mentions from training data and citations retrieved from the web.
Correct outdated or inconsistent information about your brand on your own site and authoritative third-party profiles.
Go deeper: ChatGPT, Perplexity
Citation (AI search)
A citation in AI search is a linked source an AI answer references, usually shown inline or in a sources list.
Identify which of your pages get cited and which passages they are cited for, then strengthen similar pages.
Go deeper: AI citations, How to check if ChatGPT or Perplexity cites your site
Brand mentions in AI answers
Brand mentions in AI answers are references to your brand in AI-generated responses, with or without a link.
Monitor whether mentions are accurate, positive, and include your brand in relevant comparisons.
AI crawlers
AI crawlers are bots that collect web content for AI companies, either to train models or to retrieve pages in real time for answers. Examples include GPTBot, OAI-SearchBot, ClaudeBot, and PerplexityBot.
Review robots.txt rules per AI crawler, and confirm in server logs which bots actually visit your site.
Should I block AI crawlers?
It depends on your goals. Blocking training crawlers may protect content, but blocking search and retrieval crawlers can remove you from AI answers.
Go deeper: AI crawlers, AI crawlers vs traditional search crawlers
Source: OpenAI: Overview of OpenAI crawlers
GPTBot
GPTBot is OpenAI's crawler for collecting content that may be used to train its models. OpenAI uses separate user agents, such as OAI-SearchBot, for search features.
Treat GPTBot and OAI-SearchBot separately in robots.txt based on whether you allow training, search visibility, or both.
Go deeper: How to fix 403 errors blocking AI crawlers
Source: OpenAI: Overview of OpenAI crawlers
Google-Extended
Google-Extended is a robots.txt token that lets sites control whether their content is used to train and ground Google's Gemini models. It does not affect Google Search rankings or crawling by Googlebot.
Confirm that blocking Google-Extended matches your intent, and remember it does not remove content from AI Overviews in Search.
llms.txt
llms.txt is a proposed standard file at a site's root that gives AI models a curated, plain-text summary of a site's key content. It is not an official standard, and major AI search platforms have not confirmed using it.
Treat llms.txt as optional and low priority compared with crawlability and content quality.
Go deeper: llms.txt isn't one debate, it's two
Grounding
Grounding is connecting an AI model's response to verifiable source information, such as search results or documents, to improve accuracy.
Make key facts on your pages easy to extract, with clear statements, dates, and numbers.
Retrieval-augmented generation (RAG)
Retrieval-augmented generation is a method where an AI system retrieves relevant documents first, then uses them to generate its answer. Most AI search features use some form of RAG.
Make sure pages are crawlable and indexable by both search engines and AI retrieval crawlers, since content that cannot be retrieved cannot be cited.
Go deeper: Does technical SEO help your site appear in AI search?
Query fan-out
Query fan-out is a technique where an AI search system breaks one question into several related sub-queries, searches them in parallel, and combines the results. Google uses it in AI Mode.
Cover a topic's likely follow-up questions within clearly headed sections so your page can match several sub-queries.
Source: Google Search Central: AI features and your website
Sources
Official documentation referenced on this page:
Browse the full SEO terms glossary, or run a technical SEO audit with SiteAuditLint to check these signals on your own site.