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The answer they cite
is yours.

A growing share of commercial research never reaches a list of blue links. It happens inside an AI assistant that reads the web and hands back one answer. Answer engine optimisation is the discipline of being the source that answer is built from.

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At a glance

Answer Engine Optimisation at a glance

Answer engine optimisation (AEO) is the practice of structuring content so AI assistants like ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini cite it as a source in their answers. It rewards clear direct-answer formatting, citation-ready schema, specific named entities, and dated, verifiable claims. Involve Digital engineers client content for citation and tracks share of AI citations as a first-class metric, not an afterthought.

The discipline

What Answer Engine Optimisation involves

Citation is the new ranking

When a buyer asks an assistant which provider to shortlist, there is no page two. There is one answer, assembled from a handful of sources the model decided to trust. Being one of those sources is the whole game, and it is decided by signals most SEO programmes never optimise for.

What the models actually reward

AI answer engines favour content that states a clear answer up front, backs it with specific and dated evidence, names real entities such as clients, places, numbers and products, and carries machine-readable structure. Vague, hedged, undated content gets passed over even when it ranks well classically.

The brands that win citations are the ones that read as authoritative to a model: specific, verifiable, and structured.

Engineering content for citation

We restructure key pages around direct-answer blocks, add the schema that tells a model exactly what each entity is, tighten claims so every number is specific and sourced, and build the named-entity density that signals genuine expertise. The same work makes the content better for human skim-readers, not worse.

Measuring AI citations

You cannot improve what you do not watch. We monitor how often, and how accurately, the major assistants cite your brand for the prompts that matter to your pipeline, and we treat that share of citation as a headline metric alongside classical rankings.

How we run it

How we run an AEO programme

01

Citation audit

We test the prompts your buyers actually use across ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini, and map where you are cited, where a competitor is, and where the answer is simply wrong.

02

Answer-first restructure

Priority pages are rebuilt around clear direct-answer blocks, so a model can lift a clean, correct statement without ambiguity.

03

Schema and entities

Citation-ready structured data and named-entity density that tell the models exactly who you are, what you do, and why you are credible.

04

Evidence and dating

Every claim tightened to a specific, dated, verifiable form, because models trust specificity and discard hedges.

05

Track share of citation

Ongoing monitoring of how the assistants answer your category, with citation share reported alongside pipeline.

Proof

Our Search Experience

The search engagements behind the discipline. Every metric is on the books and tied to a named client. Click any card for the full engagement detail.

Keep exploring

The other three pillars.

FAQ

Questions worth answering.

How is AEO different from classical SEO?

Classical SEO optimises to rank in a list of links on Google and Bing. AEO optimises to be cited as a source inside an AI assistant answer. The signals overlap on a clean technical base, but AEO leans much harder on direct-answer structure, named entities, dated evidence and citation-ready schema.

Can you really influence what ChatGPT or Claude say?

You cannot dictate a model output, but you can materially change the source material it reads. Assistants assemble answers from content they can find, parse and trust. Making your content the clearest, most specific and most structured source for your category measurably increases how often you are the one cited.

Is it worth it while AI search is still small?

It is small the way mobile was small in 2008. The share of commercial research running through assistants is climbing fast, the brands establishing citation authority now will be the defaults when it is the majority, and the work doubles as stronger classical SEO in the meantime.

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