GEO/AEO/AIO vs. SEO: What Google and Wix’s NLWeb Tell Us About the Future of Search

We all know that AI is changing the way people search for information online.

Instead of only typing a few keywords into Google and scrolling through links, people are increasingly asking detailed questions and having full on conversations through Google AI Overviews, AI Mode, Claude, ChatGPT and other AI-powered tools.

Naturally, this has created an entirely new vocabulary around marketing: AEO (Answer Engine Optimization), GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), AIO (AI Optimization) and plenty of promises about how businesses can “optimize for AI.”

But how different is AI optimization really from the SEO work we've already been doing?

Google recently gave us a surprisingly clear answer.

At the same time, a new development from Wix and Microsoft gives us a glimpse into another important part of the future: websites becoming easier for AI agents to understand and interact with directly.

Together, these developments tell us something important about where search is heading and what therapists and wellness practitioners should actually be doing about it.

What Is AEO, GEO and AI Search Optimization?

AEO stands for Answer Engine Optimization, while GEO generally refers to Generative Engine Optimization. You may also hear the broader term AI Optimization (AIO) used to describe much of the same work.

The terminology is still evolving, and different marketers use these terms differently. But the basic goal is similar: helping search engines and AI systems understand your business well enough to surface it when someone asks a relevant question.

For a therapist, that might mean someone searching, “Who specializes in EMDR therapy near me?”, “Where can I find a therapist who works with postpartum anxiety?” or “What type of therapist can help with religious trauma?”

Those searches may happen through traditional Google results, an AI-generated Google response or a completely different AI platform. That changing search behavior matters, but it doesn't necessarily mean everything we know about SEO has suddenly become obsolete.

Optimizing for Generative AI Search Is Still Fundamentally SEO

This is something I've been talking about for a while: many of the strategies that help AI systems understand and recommend your website are the same foundational strategies that make a website strong for traditional search. In fact, I recently broke down many of these strategies in my guide on how to get found in AI search.

Now, google is now being unusually explicit about this.

In its official guidance for optimizing websites for generative AI search, Google addresses the question directly: Is SEO still relevant for generative AI search? Its answer is yes.

Google explains that its generative AI search experiences are rooted in its existing Search ranking and quality systems. From Google's perspective, optimizing for generative AI search is still fundamentally SEO.

So, what does Google recommend?

Many of the same things that have formed the foundation of good SEO for years: creating original, valuable content based on real expertise and experience; making your website technically accessible and easy for search engines to crawl and understand; organizing information clearly; providing detailed, accurate information about your services and business; and creating content for people first rather than simply because you think an algorithm wants it.

In other words, AI search doesn't erase good SEO. It makes many of those foundations even more important.

That's an important distinction when so much marketing around AI search suggests businesses suddenly need an entirely separate collection of tricks, tools and tactics. Google itself cautions website owners to evaluate third-party AEO and GEO advice against its official Search guidance.

That doesn't mean nothing about search is changing. It means we need to separate meaningful changes from AI-search hype.

More AI Content Isn't Necessarily Better AI Optimization

One of the more interesting parts of Google's guidance is what it tells website owners not to do.

AI search can use something called “query fan-out,” where an AI system explores multiple related searches to help answer a person's broader question. That has led to advice suggesting businesses should identify every possible question or query an AI system might generate and create individual pages targeting each one.

At first, that sounds logical. If AI might search dozens of different variations, why not create dozens of pages?

The problem is that this doesn't necessarily create a better experience for the person visiting your website. Google specifically warns against creating large numbers of pages for every possible search variation primarily to manipulate rankings or generative AI responses. Depending on how it's done, that can cross into Google's policies around scaled-content abuse.

This is especially relevant now that AI makes it incredibly easy to produce large quantities of content quickly. A therapist doesn't necessarily need dozens of slightly different pages answering essentially the same question. A thoughtful service page combined with genuinely useful articles that reflect your expertise may be considerably more valuable.

Google also emphasizes the value of unique, valuable and non-commodity content that offers something beyond what could easily be summarized from hundreds of other websites. For therapists and wellness practitioners, that's where your actual experience becomes valuable: your perspective, the questions clients frequently ask you, nuances you've noticed within your specialty, your approach to treatment and original explanations of complicated topics.

Those are the things that can make your content genuinely useful rather than simply adding another generic article to the internet.

So, Do You Need a Separate AEO or GEO Strategy?

Yes and no.

There are meaningful ways we can make websites easier for AI systems to understand. Clear service descriptions, locations, credentials, practitioner information, FAQs, strong content structure, appropriate structured data and technically accessible pages can all provide machines with better context about who you are and what you do.

But that doesn't mean you need to abandon SEO and replace it with something called GEO.

Google says there is no special schema markup required to appear in its generative AI search experiences. It also says you don't need to create special AI text files or use other supposedly AI-specific technical requirements to appear in these features.

So when someone promises a secret new method for “ranking in AI,” a little skepticism is healthy. There are absolutely new developments worth paying attention to, but a strong AI-search strategy should build upon good website and SEO foundations—not attempt to bypass them.

What Is Wix NLWeb?

This is where things get particularly interesting for Wix website owners.

Wix has collaborated with Microsoft to integrate NLWeb, an open-source framework designed to make websites directly queryable by AI agents. In very simple terms, traditional search engines and AI systems generally need to crawl, interpret and make sense of the information on a website. Wix's NLWeb integration adds another layer that allows supported AI agents to interact with a website's public information in a more structured, conversational way.

Wix says its implementation can draw from existing sources such as Schema.org markup, RSS feeds and other public site information. This potentially gives AI agents a more direct way to retrieve current, structured information from a website rather than relying entirely on their own interpretation of individual pages.

Imagine someone asking an AI assistant a detailed question about a business. Instead of the AI simply trying to interpret pages independently, technologies like NLWeb point toward a web where AI agents can increasingly interact with structured information provided directly by websites.

That's a meaningful shift, but it doesn't make all of the foundational work we've already been doing irrelevant. In many ways, it makes having clear, accurate and well-structured website information even more valuable.

What Does Wix NLWeb Mean for Therapists and Wellness Practitioners?

For most therapists, you don't need to understand the technical workings of NLWeb. What matters is the bigger picture: we're moving toward a web designed not only for people to visit websites, but also for AI systems and agents to retrieve and interact with information from them.

That makes the quality of the information on your website increasingly important.

If your website clearly explains the services you provide, who you work with, where you're located or licensed, your professional credentials, your specialties and areas of expertise, your therapeutic approach and the common questions prospective clients have, you're giving both humans and machines considerably better context about your practice.

And that's where good website strategy, SEO and AI optimization increasingly overlap.

NLWeb isn't a magic switch that makes AI platforms recommend your practice, nor does it guarantee rankings, referrals or visibility. Instead, it provides another mechanism through which supported AI systems may be able to accurately query the public information available on your website.

The usefulness of that technology still depends heavily on the quality and clarity of the information you've provided in the first place.

What About Privacy and Sensitive Client Information?

For healthcare and wellness websites, there's another important distinction to keep in mind. NLWeb is designed to work with public website information.

Information intended for prospective clients—such as services, practitioner bios, educational articles and public business details—can help AI systems understand a practice. Private client information is an entirely different category.

Client portals, intake information, form submissions, medical or therapy information and other sensitive data should never be treated as part of a public AI-accessible content layer. As AI-agent technology evolves, healthcare and wellness businesses will need to remain particularly thoughtful about the line between information intended for public discovery and information that must remain private.

AI Search Is Changing. The Fundamentals Aren't Disappearing.

There is real change happening in search. People are searching differently, Google is incorporating generative AI more deeply into Search, AI platforms are becoming another way people discover businesses, and technologies like NLWeb point toward a future where AI agents may interact with websites much more directly.

Those changes deserve attention, but they don't mean every therapist needs to rebuild their website around the newest AI-search tactic.

Start with the foundations: create a website with a clear technical structure, explain exactly what you do and who you help, build thoughtful service pages around the areas where you genuinely have expertise, and make your location, credentials and professional information easy to understand.

From there, continue publishing useful content that contributes something beyond what has already been said hundreds of times, while using SEO and structured information thoughtfully (the easiest way to do this is with your blog).

At Virtuwell Balance, this is why we view AI optimization as an extension of strong website and SEO strategy—not a replacement for it.

The platforms and terminology will continue to change, but creating a website that clearly communicates your expertise to both people and technology is a foundation worth investing in.

Shayah Reed

Virtuwell Balance Founder

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