How to get a website optimized for AI Search (GEO/AEO) right now?

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tree_ashleystewart1984

Newbie

Jul 14, 2026

4

0

• Today at 10:57 AM

• #1

Hey everyone, I’m currently running marketing for a small startup and was recently tasked with "optimizing our website for AI Search," with the rationale being that everyone uses AI for search now and traditional SEO isn't as important as before. However, I’m pretty lost on how to approach this, so I’d love to get some real-world advice from you guys.

Current status of our website:

• The site is broken and unfinished. The dev team is working on a UI revamp, but it's not done yet and pretty chaotic. We’ve been operating for over a year, but the site is still not stable.
• SEO content is thin. We only have about 73 posts in total, including 6–7 recent 2026 posts scraped using an AI tool.
• The scraping tool is provided by an external vendor using AI, but they don't really understand SEO/GEO/AEO. It basically just scrapes content from other websites.

I’d like to ask:

1. In what order should I prioritize and address these issues?
2. Is using an AI scraping tool like this viable, or does it do more harm than good?
3. At this stage, is doing foundational SEO and keyword research still necessary, or should we go all-in on GEO/AEO?

 

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Liza_123

Newbie

Jul 6, 2026

13

3

• Today at 11:15 AM

• #2

I wouldn’t go all-in on GEO/AEO yet. Your biggest bottlenecks are the unfinished website and scraped content. My priority order would be:

1. Make the site stable, crawlable and technically sound.
2. Audit the existing posts and remove, noindex or properly rewrite scraped pages with original information.
3. Do keyword and search-intent research as part of foundational SEO.
4. Create answer-first content with clear headings, concise explanations, comparisons, FAQs, sources and real company expertise.
5. Track AI citations and referral traffic separately from normal organic traffic.

The scraping tool may be useful for research, but publishing scraped output at scale will probably create more problems than value. GEO/AEO should be built on top of good technical SEO and original content, not used as a replacement for them.

 

SEO JOKER

Elite Member

Jr. VIP

Aug 16, 2014

3,099

679

• Today at 11:29 AM

• #3

If I were in that situation, I would focus on fixing the website first so it is stable and easy to use. After that, I would invest in proper keyword research and create original, genuinely useful content. Once those fundamentals are in place, it makes sense to expand into GEO and AEO. I also wouldn't depend too much on scraped AI content, since it usually lacks originality and doesn't provide lasting value.

 

Crab

Registered Member

Jun 10, 2026

87

16

• Today at 11:32 AM

• #4

First of all get the website to work. After that focus on SEO. Build a clean page, optimize speed and internal linking so when Google crawles them it can find more pages and hopefully index them. Also use Bing Webmaster Tool combined with IndexNow and submit your pages to Yandex and Brave. Also setup Google Search Console

 

nigunim

Elite Member

Jr. VIP

Apr 14, 2011

3,718

435

• Today at 11:54 AM

• #5

I'd focus on getting the website stable first because no AI optimization will make up for a poor user experience. Then invest in original, helpful content backed by proper keyword research and solid SEO. Once that foundation is in place, you can improve for AI search with clear content structure, topical authority and strong entity signals instead of relying on scraped AI content.

 

SerpStory

Junior Member

Jun 17, 2026

101

13

• Today at 2:26 PM

• #6

I think the best approach is to focus on the same things that make a website useful for people. Create clear and accurate content, answer questions directly, organize topics well, and build a trustworthy brand.