What do AEO and GEO services include for an aviation business?
Short answer: AEO and GEO services are ongoing work to make your business easy for search engines and AI answer tools to find, read and describe correctly: crawler access, clear answers, consistent facts, matching markup and measurement. No agency controls what an AI tool says.
What are AEO and GEO, and what are you paying for?
AEO means answer engine optimization and GEO means generative engine optimization. Google defines both and treats them as part of SEO (Google's generative AI optimization guide). Judge a provider by its deliverables, not the label. See AEO vs SEO for charter operators.
What work does a scope of services list?
The list below describes the kinds of deliverables any competent provider can explain. It is not a price list or a package.
- A crawler and access review. Someone checks that your robots.txt rules and any firewall in front of your site do what you intend for each search and AI crawler. The AI visibility audit checklist covers what that check looks at.
- Pages that answer buyer questions. Charter customers ask how pricing works and which aircraft fit a trip. Management prospects ask what an agreement covers. Each answer needs a page that states it plainly.
- A technical review. Google lists technical advice among the things an SEO consultant may provide, including hosting, redirects, error pages and JavaScript (Google's guide to hiring an SEO).
- Structured data that matches the page. Google describes structured data as a standardized format for describing a page, with JSON-LD recommended (Google's introduction to structured data).
- A change-notification setup. IndexNow is a protocol for telling participating search engines that a URL was added, updated or deleted. A successful response means the URL was received, not that it was indexed (IndexNow documentation).
- A monthly report. It states what changed, what was checked and what was found, in plain language.
What markup helps with who you are?
Organization markup is the clearest example of a deliverable that supports consistent business facts. Google says it helps Google understand an organization's details and tell it apart from other organizations, and that no properties are required. Google lists legalName, address, telephone, url, logo and sameAs among the recommended ones (Google's Organization structured data documentation).
Schema.org defines sameAs as the URL of a reference page that unambiguously indicates the item's identity (schema.org Organization). In practice that means pointing to the profiles that describe your company. This matters in aviation, where similar names are common and Sightline has seen operator listings that still show an old base airport or an aircraft that left the fleet.
Two limits apply. Google's guidelines say not to mark up content that readers can't see (Google's structured data guidelines). And Google does not guarantee that structured data will show up in search results (Google's structured data guidelines). Markup should match the page, not decorate it.
What do you own, and what can a provider only audit?
You fully control your own site: pages, robots.txt, markup, redirects and speed. A provider can change these with your approval, and Google advises that a consultant who touches your site should be willing to explain every change and granting only read access to Search Console at the audit stage (Google's guide to hiring an SEO).
Directories, marketplaces, social profiles and other sites that describe your company belong to their owners. A provider can find what is out of date and give you the list. Correcting a listing on someone else's platform usually means the account holder has to do it, or approve someone to. Ask any provider which side of that line each item on its scope falls on. Our guide to choosing an AEO agency has more questions worth asking before you sign.
What should a monthly report show?
A useful report separates what was done from what was observed. It should cover four things.
- Changes made. Each page, setting or listing touched, with the date.
- Search Console data. Google says AI feature traffic is included in the Performance report under the Web search type (Google's AI features documentation). Its optimization guide also points to a Generative AI performance report in Search Console (Google's generative AI optimization guide). Ask which one your provider is reading from.
- Bing Webmaster Tools data. Bing's AI Performance report, in public preview when announced, shows citation counts. Bing says the counts reflect how often pages are cited, not page importance, ranking or placement, and that its grounding query data is a sample of overall citation activity (Bing Webmaster Blog).
- A fixed question set. A written list of the questions your customers ask, checked on a schedule, with what each tool answered and whether your business appeared.
Read any "AI visibility score" with care. It is only as good as the question set and method behind it, and Google states that no third-party tool has access to its internal ranking or AI systems (Google's generative AI optimization guide).
What can a scope of services never include?
A promise of a ranking or a mention. Google's hiring guide says no one can guarantee a number one ranking, and that an audit should give realistic estimates of improvement and of the work involved (Google's guide to hiring an SEO). Sightline does not guarantee rankings or AI mentions either.
What does this look like for a charter or aircraft management company?
Sightline works on websites plus SEO, AEO and GEO for charter operators, aircraft management companies and aviation businesses, and reports in plain English each month. For an operator, the scope above becomes concrete: your base airport and fleet details are current everywhere they appear, your pages answer the questions buyers ask, and you can see what changed each month. See our AEO and GEO page for aviation for how we approach it.
If you want to see where you stand first, Sightline offers a free AI visibility check: about ten customer questions across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI answers and Claude, with a short written report, no charge and no obligation. You can book a 20-minute call to talk through what your business needs.
Frequently asked questions
Is GEO different from AEO?
The two terms overlap. Google's guidance defines both and treats them as part of SEO (Google's generative AI optimization guide). Judge a provider by the work it describes, not the acronym.
Can an agency promise my business will appear in AI answers?
No. Google says no one can guarantee a number one ranking (Google's guide to hiring an SEO), and that indexing and serving aren't guaranteed (Google's generative AI optimization guide). Be wary of any provider that promises a mention.
Who fixes a wrong listing on another website?
Usually the account holder for that listing. A provider can find the error and give you the list, and can fix it if you approve access.
What should I ask for before I hire a provider?
Ask for a written scope, a list of every change to your site, the questions it will track and how it reports.
Want to see how your operation shows up?
On a 20-minute call we'll run a few of your customers' questions and look at the results together.