AEO vs SEO: what actually changes for a B2B SaaS company

AEO and SEO share most of the work: crawlable pages, clear answers, authority. What changes is the goal (being named inside an AI answer, not just ranked), where mentions matter (lists, directories, reviews), and how you measure (share of answers across engines, not only rankings).

So AEO is not a new discipline that replaces SEO. It is SEO with a second scoreboard. This guide shows what stays the same, what changes for a B2B SaaS company, and how to split the first 90 days. If you are new to the term, start with what AEO is.

What does Google say about AEO?

Google says you need nothing special. Its guidance is that no extra requirements or special optimisations are needed to appear in AI Overviews and AI Mode. A page must be indexed and allowed to show a snippet. That is all.

Google's AI optimization guide goes further. It calls optimising for generative AI search "still SEO". It says llms.txt files, special markup and content chunking are not needed for its AI features.

Google also warns against scaled content abuse and asks for helpful, people-first content. Mass-produced pages written "for AI" go against that.

Some AEO tool vendors frame AEO as a separate field. For Google's own AI features, Google disagrees. Both views hold a piece of the truth, and the rest of this page shows where each one applies.

What really changes between SEO and AEO?

The base stays the same. The goal, the sources that matter and the scoreboard change. This table sets them side by side.

The click row matters most for a SaaS team. 68.01% of US Google searches ended without a click (Jan to Apr 2026), up from 60.45% in 2024. And when Google shows an AI summary, users clicked a result in 8% of visits with an AI summary vs 15% without; 1% clicked a link inside the summary.

So a page can do its job without a visit. If the answer names you and the buyer books a demo later, traffic reports will miss it. That is why the scoreboard has to change.

Do AI engines cite what ranks on Google?

Partly. From our platform, AI engines often used the same sites that rank on Google, but usually not the same pages.

Our platform compared Google's top 10 for our target keywords with the sources ChatGPT and Perplexity used for our buyer questions. 19% of the Google top-10 URLs were also used by AI; 72% came from a domain AI also used.

Read this as indicative. The keywords and the questions were different sets, so it means "same sites, often different pages". It is not a precise overlap rate.

The two engines also lean on different kinds of sources. Our platform found that, across all our buyer questions, 45% of the links ChatGPT cited were directories and review sites such as Clutch and G2. Of the sources Perplexity read, most were guides and tools (35%), third-party lists (17%) and agency-written "best of" lists (16%).

The lesson: ranking on Google helps, because engines often read the same sites. But a good ranking alone will not get you named. You also need to show up on the lists and directories each engine reads.

What should a B2B SaaS team do differently?

Keep your SEO base and add three things: a question list, answer-ready pages, and mentions on the sites engines read.

1. Start from buyer questions, not only keywords. Write down the questions buyers ask when they are close to choosing. "Best [category] for a small sales team." "[You] vs [rival]." "How much does [category] cost?" These are the questions AI answers name vendors in.

2. Make your money pages easy to quote. Pricing, comparison, use-case and integration pages are what buyers read when close to choosing. Open each one with a plain answer. State who it is for, what it costs and what proof you have. One idea per paragraph, so an engine can lift it whole.

3. Earn mentions where engines look. Complete your Clutch or G2 profile with real reviews. Pitch honest data to the authors of third-party lists in your category. Join community threads openly, always saying who you are.

4. Watch the engines, not just Google. Ask your buyer questions in ChatGPT and Perplexity, a few times each. Note who gets named and which sources each answer uses. Then fix the gaps.

Should you hire an AEO agency or a traditional SEO agency?

It depends on where you lose buyers today. This table is a starting point.

How should you split effort in the first 90 days?

Fix the base first, then build answer pages, then earn mentions. Most of your SEO work continues as it is. AEO adds a layer on top.

This is the order we follow in our own 90-day program.

How do you measure both, through to pipeline?

Measure four layers: rankings, answers, visits and deals. Each one catches what the layer above misses.

1. Rankings and clicks. Google says AI Overviews and AI Mode traffic shows in your normal Search Console reports.
2. Share of answers. For each buyer question, count how often each engine names you, out of how many times you asked. One answer proves nothing.
3. AI visits. In GA4, set up a custom channel group with an AI assistant rule so visits from ChatGPT, Perplexity and others show as their own channel.
4. Pipeline. Add a "How did you hear about us?" field to your demo form. Tag deals where the buyer says they used an AI tool. Report AI-sourced leads and deals next to organic ones.

The aim is one monthly view: what AI says about you, what visits it sends, and what pipeline follows. Visibility on its own is not the goal.

What about schema, llms.txt and "chunking"?

Treat them as hygiene, not levers. Valid schema and clean HTML help any crawler read your page. None of them is proven to get you named in AI answers.

• Schema. Google says schema is not required for its AI features. Keep it valid and accurate, as part of normal SEO.
• llms.txt. It is a proposal by Jeremy Howard (2024), not a standard the main engines have said they use. Adding one is cheap. Paying for one as an "AI fix" is not wise.
• Chunking. Google advises against rewriting content into chunks for AI. Write short, clear sections for people. Engines benefit from the same structure.

We go through the evidence in do schema markup or llms.txt get you cited by ChatGPT?

Find out where you stand today

We turn AI visibility into pipeline. Our free AI visibility audit asks your buyer questions in AI tools. We re-check every question, because AI answers change from one ask to the next. It shows the answers, who is named instead of you, the sources behind them and your top 3 blockers. Results in 12 hours.

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If you want help with both SEO and AEO, our Design-Partner batch 1 has 3 spots, open until 31 Oct 2026. You pay EUR 1,500 at the start and EUR 1,500 at day 90. If we miss the goals agreed at kickoff, you get a full refund. A case study with us is part of the deal. We have no client case studies yet, which is why we offer these terms. See pricing