Andy and Brian dig into the new (and mysterious) world of Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) and what that means for how B2B eCommerce companies that are looking to drive traffic to their websites (which is, of course, all of them).

In case you missed it, here’s an overview:

Andy explained that SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, has long been the marketer’s playbook. To compete in search results, marketers would pay agencies to optimize their sites using tactics like keyword density to rank in sponsored or organic results. But now, the challenge is entirely different. How do you, as a marketer, optimize to appear in the answers generated by tools like ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, Grok, or other AI-driven answer engines?

Andy and Brian have been discussing this with their network all year. They asked how people are preparing for this shift, and while most agreed that it’s a priority, almost no one knew how to actually do it. Some agencies claim to have a “secret formula” for getting into the answer engines, but no one seems to know what that formula is.

Andy recently attended the CommerceTools Elevate summit, where Heather Hershey, Research Director for Digital Commerce at IDC, discussed this very topic. She said that by 2028, GenAI-enabled search platforms would become the primary user interface for shopping and product discovery. That’s not just e-commerce—that’s commerce as a whole. IDC also predicts that traditional search volume could drop by 25% as soon as next year, as buyers shift to AI-powered tools. Andy, who heard her speak in person, pointed out that this shift might happen even faster than projected based on how often people are already using answer engines like ChatGPT or Gemini instead of traditional Google searches.

So, what does a marketer do now? Before, it was all about winning a spot on the search results page. Now, the challenge is getting into the answer itself.

Heather emphasized that answer engines focus on the context of the buyer. Unlike traditional SEO, which prioritized attractive imagery and emotional appeals, answer engines care about facts—price, description, specifications, and availability. This could render a lot of traditional website strategies less relevant.

Brian said he lived this shift personally. As a VP of e-commerce, we used to rely heavily on SEO to drive a large portion of our traffic. The playbook was clear: optimize for specific keywords, structure your site well, ensure backlinks from authoritative sources, and focus on a seamless user experience. Many of those practices still have some value, but the landscape is changing rapidly.

We asked our peers, practitioners, and agencies what GEO best practices look like today. Some of the old SEO methods still apply, but the core of optimization has shifted. Generative AI reduces clicks because it delivers answers directly, so you may see site traffic drop even as sales remain steady or grow—if you’re doing GEO right.

Semantic relevance is key now. It’s not about keywords; it’s about topics and expertise. The most critical factors are what IDC refers to as E-E-A-T: Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness. If your brand has authoritative content, backlinks from respected sources, and strong topical relevance, you’ll still have an edge in the generative engines.

We’re about to see an explosion of content as companies race to create more use cases, product stories, and thought leadership materials—sometimes purely for the purpose of being picked up by answer engines. But just as keyword stuffing was eventually penalized, low-quality, mass-produced content will likely be filtered out by AI engines over time. There will be an arms race between companies generating this content and AI systems trying to discern what’s high-quality and authoritative.

We expect AI agents will eventually be tasked with evaluating whether content is authentic and authoritative. In fact, search engines like Google have been doing this for years—assigning weight to backlinks from government sites, academic institutions, and other highly credible sources. That will likely carry over into GEO as well.

The key will be third-party validation. You won’t succeed by simply cranking out low-effort content. Authoritative third-party sources will matter more than ever.

Brian said he’s been in SEO since the mid-2000s, and he remembers the days when you could quickly rank for non-branded keywords by spinning up focused websites and building backlinks. GEO is going to go through a similar Wild West period where people will try to game the system. Best practices for GEO will likely solidify over the next 5 to 10 years.

In the meantime, some basics still apply: create structured, scannable content that AI engines can easily process. But marketers will need to rethink how they measure success. It won’t be about clicks anymore—it will be about how often you show up in AI-generated answers and how to track those appearances objectively.

Andy noted that this will bring new KPIs and new ways of working. B2B companies that are just now mastering traditional SEO will face another learning curve.

Jason Hein made a critical point: B2B companies will need to create content that preserves sourcing, authenticity, and supplier validation to protect against product liability issues. This means there will need to be a clear chain of custody for content—did it come from the manufacturer, was it created by AI, and who verified it? This is not just a B2B problem—it’s the same issue the media, news, and video content are grappling with across society. How will we know what’s AI-generated, what’s real, and who decides?

These concerns are especially critical in B2B. If AI generates incorrect information and a wrong part is installed in a machine, it could have dangerous consequences. Mistakes in B2C, like ordering the wrong T-shirt color, are minor by comparison. The stakes are much higher in B2B, and we may see entire industries emerge to verify the authenticity of content. Jason quipped that the lawyers will likely sort it out—unless the lawyers are AI too.

We must also remember that while AI makes mistakes, humans are not infallible either. It’s not about perfection; it’s about setting fair standards for both AI and human-generated content.

Andy and Brian wondered how long this transformation would take, so we asked our LinkedIn community: when will GEO become more important than traditional SEO in driving traffic? An overwhelming 76% said within one year, 21% said within three years, and only 3% said five years. No one said never. That’s a surprisingly fast timeline.

What makes this different from past changes is that people are already personally using these tools. B2B marketers are seeing firsthand how random AI-generated answers can seem, and they want to understand how to get their brands into those answers. The personal adoption of AI tools like ChatGPT has accelerated the urgency.

Despite all this, they were still shocked that so many believe GEO will surpass SEO within a year. It underscores how quickly things are moving.