It’s almost a tired cliche that Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is vastly different than than the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) that savvy marketers have been doing for years. There are tons of similarities between the two disciplines but certainly some key differences as well. While brand positioning, understanding of the market, content creation, and content optimization are the same across both, the game to optimize for and thus the key metrics to track are very different. Good SEO content can help you improve these metrics, but we often see the most effective content is targeted at GEO specifically. I’ll write something about GEO specific content another time. For this piece, I want to highlight the northstar for your GEO optimizations and key KPIs for you to track. Your SEO content may already be helping pump up these numbers.

Key Metrics to Measure for GEO

There are two groups of metrics that are important to measure. First, the impact you can measure from user interaction with your website. Second, how your brand is being discovered and portrayed in generative engine results. 

We’ll go through each of these metrics and highlight how you can measure them today or what tool you can use to track them.

Leads from AI Search

This is the ultimate conversion metric for GEO efforts. Track leads that originate from AI-powered search platforms by implementing proper form attribution to identify when prospects discovered your brand through AI responses before converting.

How to measure: Implement form fields or survey questions that ask "How did you first hear about us?" with options including "ChatGPT," "Google AI," "Perplexity," and "Other AI search tool." You can also use post-conversion surveys or phone qualification scripts to identify AI-originated leads. Since users may not immediately click through from AI responses, consider implementing lead scoring that accounts for prospects who mention discovering your brand through AI interactions during the sales process.

Pro tip: Train your sales team to ask about discovery methods during initial conversations, as many prospects who first encountered your brand in AI responses may arrive at your site through direct traffic or other channels later.

The rest of the blog post remains the same, but this correction makes the measurement approach much more practical and actionable for most businesses.

Page Referrers from AI Search

Monitor which specific pages on your site are receiving traffic from AI platforms. This metric helps you understand which content resonates with both AI models and users who choose to click through after seeing AI-generated answers.

How to measure: Check your Google Analytics referrer reports for traffic from ai.google.com, chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, and other AI platforms. Create custom segments to isolate this traffic and analyze user behavior patterns compared to traditional search traffic.

AI Web Crawls

Track how frequently AI models are crawling and indexing your content. While not all AI companies are transparent about their crawling behavior, monitoring server logs can reveal patterns of AI bot activity accessing your pages.

How to measure: Analyze server logs for known AI crawler user agents like GPTBot, Google-Extended, CCBot, and others. Tools like Screaming Frog and server log analyzers can help identify these crawl patterns. Higher crawl frequency often correlates with better AI visibility.

Brand Visibility

The percentage of AI-generated answers that mention your brand when responding to relevant queries. This is your core GEO metric - it measures how often AI models include your brand in their responses across all relevant topics and questions.

Definition: Brand visibility = (Number of AI answers mentioning your brand / Total AI answers for relevant queries) × 100

How to measure: Use specialized GEO monitoring tools like Gauge Platform that track brand mentions across multiple AI models daily. Manual testing can supplement this by running key queries across different AI platforms and tracking mention frequency over time.

URL Citation Rate

The percentage of AI answers that cite specific URLs from your domain. This metric reveals which pieces of content AI models consider authoritative and worth referencing when generating responses.

Definition: URL citation rate = (Number of AI answers citing your URL / Total AI answers in time period) × 100

How to measure: Monitor citation patterns using GEO tracking tools that can identify when your URLs appear as sources in AI responses. Track both individual page citations and overall domain citation patterns to understand which content formats and topics perform best.

Domain Citation Rate

The broader measure of how often any page from your domain gets cited by AI models. This gives you a domain-level view of your authority and trustworthiness in the eyes of AI systems.

How to measure: Similar to URL citation rate but aggregated across your entire domain. This helps you understand your overall domain authority in AI responses versus competitors and can guide broader content strategy decisions.

URL Mention Rate

When your URL is cited by an AI model, this measures how often your brand is actually mentioned in the response. This quality metric reveals whether citations are translating into brand visibility.

Definition: URL mention rate = (AI answers where your brand appears AND your URL is cited / Total answers where your URL is cited) × 100

Why it matters: A high citation rate with a low mention rate indicates your content is valuable to AI models but isn't effectively promoting your brand. Conversely, high citation rate plus high mention rate means your content successfully positions your brand as a solution.

Putting It All Together

These metrics work together to paint a complete picture of your GEO performance. Start by establishing baselines for each metric, then optimize your content strategy based on the gaps you identify. Focus on creating content that not only gets cited by AI models but also effectively promotes your brand when referenced.

The future of search is increasingly AI-driven, and brands that start measuring and optimizing for these metrics now will have a significant advantage as generative AI becomes the primary way users discover information and solutions.