What AI SEO Services Actually Include (What 246 Agencies Sell)

Every agency page ranking for “AI SEO services” describes its own package. We took a different route. We read the GEO or AI SEO service page of each of the 246 agencies in this directory and tagged the services and platforms it names, then hand-checked each one. This guide reports what the market actually sells.

One definition first, because the phrase gets used two ways. Here, “AI SEO services” means work to get your brand mentioned or cited in AI-generated answers. It does not mean ordinary SEO carried out with AI tools.

What Are AI SEO Services?

AI SEO services are paid work that aims to get a brand mentioned, cited or recommended in AI-generated answers, such as Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, as well as ranked in classic search results. The discipline is also called generative engine optimisation, a term coined in a 2023 paper by researchers at Princeton and IIT Delhi.

That paper, Aggarwal et al. on arXiv (published at KDD 2024), reports that its methods could boost visibility by up to 40% in generative engine responses. Read that number carefully. It comes from the authors’ own benchmark on a research engine, not from a client campaign.

The other meaning of the phrase is SEO done with AI tools: AI-written briefs, automated audits, keyword clustering. That is what most Reddit threads and tool vendors mean. It is a useful category, but it is not what agencies are selling when they quote you for AI search visibility, and it is not what this guide covers.

Google’s position matters here too. According to Google Search Central’s guide, AI features and your website, a page only has to be “indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet” to appear as a supporting link, and “you don’t need to create new machine readable files, AI text files, or markup to appear in these features.” That statement covers Google’s own features. It says nothing about ChatGPT or Perplexity.

That Google caveat is why the vocabulary matters. Agencies sell the same work under several names.

AI SEO vs GEO vs AEO: One Service, Several Labels

Generative engine optimization services and AI SEO services are usually the same offer, often listed side by side by the same agency. According to the GEO Agency Directory dataset of 246 agencies, verified 23 Sept 2026, 103 agencies (42%) use two or more of the labels GEO, AEO, AI SEO and LLMO to describe what they sell.

Outside sources say the same. The Wikipedia entry on generative engine optimization lists AEO, LLMO, AIO and “AI SEO” as synonyms for GEO and notes there is no consensus on terminology.

We would not claim the labels are identical in every case. Some AEO offers lean harder on Google’s answer features, some GEO offers lean harder on ChatGPT. But they mostly overlap, and the label on a proposal tells you very little about what is in it.

So do not shortlist by label. Shortlist by deliverables. If the label tells you nothing, what should be in the box?

What AI SEO Services Include: The Core Components

What do AI SEO services include? Agency service pages describe six core deliverables: an AI visibility audit with a prompt baseline, entity consistency, content restructured for answers, structured data and crawlability, digital PR for third-party citations, and reporting on AI mentions. That list comes from Percepture’s GEO page, Level Agency’s five-step programme and Thrive’s AI SEO page, plus the search snippets of other agencies; our 246-agency dataset tags service labels and platforms, so it does not measure these components.

Thrive’s AI SEO services page splits the same ground into eleven components. The packaging differs. The underlying work does not change much. For each component below, you get what it is, what the deliverable should look like, and a plain test for whether it is real.

AI visibility audit and prompt baseline

This is a fixed set of buyer prompts, the questions your customers actually type, run across the AI platforms before any work starts. The deliverable is a sheet showing which prompts mention you, which mention competitors, and which cite nobody useful.

Test: can the agency show you the prompt list and the starting results? If there is no baseline, there is no way to judge the retainer six months later.

Entity and brand-fact consistency

Models build their picture of your company from many sources. This work makes your company description, services, address and key people match across your site, your profiles and knowledge sources such as Wikipedia and Wikidata where you qualify for them. Percepture’s GEO service page lists entity and knowledge-graph support as a component in its own right.

Test: ask for the list of profiles they will audit and correct.

Content restructured for answer extraction

AI engines lift passages, not whole pages. This component rewrites key pages so a model can pull a clean answer: a direct answer under each question heading, FAQ blocks, comparison tables, definitions stated plainly. Level Agency lists content structuring as step two of its programme.

Test: ask to see a before and after of one of your own pages. A rewrite that only adds keywords is not this.

Structured data and crawlability

This covers schema markup and checking that AI crawlers are not blocked in your robots.txt file. It is the item closest to plain technical SEO, and we would say so openly. Google’s documentation states no special markup is needed for its own AI features.

Test: if this line carries a large share of the fee, ask what it adds beyond the technical SEO you already pay for.

Digital PR and third-party citations

Models lean on sources other than your website: review sites, industry press, comparison articles, forums. This work gets your brand named in the sources models draw from. In our view it is usually the slowest part, the most often outsourced and the hardest to verify.

Test: ask who does it, in-house or a subcontractor, and what a month of output looks like.

Reporting on AI mentions and AI referral traffic

Ongoing reports should show mentions, citations and share of voice across the tracked prompts, plus visits arriving from AI platforms. One catch: Google Search Central says traffic from its AI features is “included in the overall search traffic in Search Console”, with no separate report. An agency therefore needs a separate tracking tool.

Test: ask which tool, and whether you get your own login.

Notice how many of those six you could buy from a traditional SEO firm. That is not an accident.

What’s Usually Bundled In (and What’s Just SEO)

Most AI SEO agencies are SEO agencies first. In the same dataset, 175 of the 246 agencies (71%) also sell traditional SEO, and only 71 (29%) were tagged with AI search services alone. That answers the ai seo services vs traditional seo question for most buyers: the same firm usually sells both.

In practice, technical SEO, content and link building often appear in AI SEO proposals as the same deliverables with a new name. That is fine, provided the proposal says so. Wikipedia’s GEO entry carries the view that GEO and AEO are “significantly, but not fundamentally, different from SEO”, and our data fits that description.

Our position is simple. Pay AI specialist rates for the genuinely new parts: measurement of AI mentions, entity work and third-party citations. Pay SEO rates for the SEO. If a proposal blends the two into one line, ask for it split.

Beyond SEO, these are the add-ons agencies list most often on their service pages:

• PPC: 49 agencies (20%)
• Web design and development: 34 agencies (14%)
• Content marketing as a separate line: 22 agencies (9%)
• Digital PR or PR as a separate line: 12 agencies (5%)

That last figure sits oddly next to PR being one of the six core components. Only 12 agencies list PR as its own service, which suggests many fold it into the core package rather than selling it separately. Treat that as an observation from the tags, not a finding about why. Either way, it is one more reason to ask who actually does the PR.

The other thing the bundle should specify is where it is trying to get you cited.

Which AI Platforms Do Agencies Optimise For?

Google AI Overviews is the platform agencies name most. In our dataset of 246 agencies, 208 service pages (85%) name Google AI Overviews, 89 (36%) name Perplexity, 52 (21%) name Gemini, 19 (8%) name Claude and 6 name Microsoft Copilot. These are the platforms named on each agency’s own service page.

The AI Overviews lead is no surprise. It sits on top of Google’s normal results, so it overlaps most with the SEO these firms already sell. Claude and Copilot are rarely named at all.

The practical point is that “AI search” is several targets, not one. A package that claims to cover AI search but only measures AI Overviews is mostly an SEO retainer. Ask which platforms will be tracked, with which prompts, and how often. If the platforms your buyers actually use are not on the list, the package is not built for you.

Put the components, the bundle and the platforms together and you have what a proposal should be checked against.

How to Compare AI SEO Services Proposals: A Checklist

When comparing AI SEO services proposals, three questions separate a real package from a relabelled one: which buyer prompts will be tracked and how often, what the measured baseline is before work starts, and which deliverables are new rather than SEO you already pay for. These questions are our editorial recommendation, based on the components agency service pages list (Percepture, Level Agency, Thrive) and the label and platform data from our 246-agency dataset.

Here is the full list. Each question comes with what a good answer sounds like.

1. Which buyer prompts will you track, and how often? A good answer names a fixed list, agreed with you, rerun on a stated schedule.
2. Can I see a baseline before work starts? Yes, as a document you keep, showing where you appear today and where competitors do.
3. Which deliverables are new, and which are the SEO I already pay for? According to the GEO Agency Directory dataset, 71% of agencies also sell traditional SEO, so expect overlap. A good agency labels it line by line.
4. Which platforms are covered? Named platforms, matched to where your buyers search, not a vague “all major AI engines”.
5. Which tool measures AI mentions, and do I get raw access? A named tool and your own login, so the numbers are not only in their slides.
6. Who does the PR and citation work? A straight answer on in-house versus outsourced, with an example of typical monthly output.
7. What is the contract length, and what happens at the exit? A stated term, and confirmation that the prompt list, data and content stay with you.
8. What will you not promise? A good agency will not guarantee citations or mentions. Nobody controls what a model says.

One more rule follows from the label data. Per the GEO Agency Directory dataset, 42% of agencies use two or more names for the same offer, so ignore what the service is called and score proposals only on these answers. We hold no independent outcome data for any agency, and we found none published elsewhere, so this checklist judges how well a proposal is specified, not what it will achieve.

Once you have several proposals in hand, run each one through the list side by side. Gaps show up fast.

How Much Do AI SEO Services Cost?

How much do AI SEO services cost? It depends on scope: a one-off audit, a content sprint and a monthly retainer are priced very differently. Most agencies do not publish a price at all: only 37 of the 246 in the directory show one. According to our GEO agency cost guide, UK entry prices run from £399 to £2,500 a month.

Neither Percepture nor Thrive shows a price on the service pages we read. The cost guide links every published figure to its source, broken down by market.

Once you know what to ask for, the next step is shortlisting.

Finding an AI SEO Agency

The GEO Agency Directory ranks agencies by observed search visibility, meaning whether the agency itself appears in Google for the terms it sells, not by payment or endorsement. Our best AI SEO agencies list applies that score, and the methodology page explains exactly how it is calculated.

There is a UK wrinkle. In our 23 Sept 2026 panel, 11 listed agencies appeared in Google UK’s top 20 for “ai seo services”, and every top-10 agency with a stated HQ was based in the US. If you want an agency in your own time zone, start with the UK agency list.

Don’t buy the label, buy the deliverables. Shortlist from the AI SEO agencies ranked by visibility, then request proposals and put the checklist above to work on each one.

AI SEO Services: Frequently Asked Questions

What are AI SEO services?

AI SEO services are paid work to get a brand mentioned, cited or recommended in AI-generated answers, such as Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, alongside classic search rankings. Agencies sell the same work as GEO, AEO, AI SEO or LLMO. In our dataset, 103 of 246 agencies (42%) use two or more of those names for one offer.

Is there an AI that can do SEO?

AI tools can do parts of SEO: drafting briefs, running audits, clustering keywords. That is the other meaning of “AI SEO”, and it is what many Reddit threads and tool vendors mean. It is not the same thing as an AI SEO service, which aims to get your brand cited in AI answers. No tool or agency controls what a model says about you.

How much does AI SEO cost?

It depends on scope. A one-off audit, a content sprint and a monthly retainer are priced very differently. Most agencies do not publish a price: only 37 of the 246 in the directory show one. According to our GEO agency cost guide, UK entry prices run from £399 to £2,500 a month, each figure linked to its source.

Which AI SEO service is best?

It depends on which AI platforms your buyers use and what your current SEO already covers. We do not endorse any agency. Our best AI SEO agencies list ranks agencies by observed search visibility, meaning whether the agency itself appears in Google for the terms it sells. Use it to shortlist, then score each proposal with the checklist above.