The RASE Framework for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)
The RASE Framework for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)
Christina Adame, President of SEO • Intero Digital • July 11, 2025
As AI-powered answer engines reshape how people discover information, ranking alone is no longer enough. To stay visible, brands must shift from simply being found in search to being recognized by the AI systems that are shaping today’s answers.
The rules of visibility are being rewritten. In a world where AI answers are replacing traditional search results, it’s no longer enough to rank. Your brand also has to be known by the generative engines that are shaping the conversation.
That’s where generative engine optimization (GEO) comes in. GEO goes beyond optimizing pages. It ensures your brand is contextually understood and retrievable by AI tools including ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google’s AI Overviews. It’s about embedding your brand into the fabric of the digital sources that AI relies on to build its answers.
To help you navigate this shift, we’ve developed the RASE framework that outlines four essential pillars that define what it takes to be visible in an AI-first search landscape.
Relevance: From Keyword Matching to Contextual Alignment
The SEO Perspective
Traditional SEO relevance focuses on keywords and search intent, matching what people type into search bars with optimized page-level content. It’s about satisfying user queries with on-site content that earns clicks.
The GEO Perspective
In contrast, GEO relevance is about making sure AI understands who you are in context. This means being a part of the conceptual fabric that large language models (LLMs) reference when assembling answers. It’s not just keyword density; it’s entity-rich content, topical authority, and semantic proximity to important industry terms, concepts, and influencers.
Recommendation: Create deeply structured content clusters around core topics and entities. Use consistent associations and link to reputable, AI-trusted sources.
Authority: From Backlinks to Brand Mentions and Entity Associations
The SEO Perspective
Backlinks have long been the currency of SEO authority. Sites with strong link profiles and domain trust tend to rank higher.
The GEO Perspective
Backlinks still matter, but brand mentions (especially in semantically rich and authoritative contexts) are now just as critical. Think of this as semantic reputation. If AI sees your brand cited consistently alongside top concepts and credible voices, it deems you trustworthy.
Recommendation: Use digital PR, earned media, and thought leadership to generate citations and mentions in forums, publications, and content that AI indexes and values.
Structure: From Indexability to Entity-Driven Retrieval
The SEO Perspective
Structure in SEO revolves around making content crawlable and indexable. That includes optimizing sitemaps, metadata, headings, and site health to aid rankings.
The GEO Perspective
GEO structure is about helping AI extract and understand brand information clearly and consistently. Structured data like schema markup plays a bigger role here by feeding knowledge graphs and enabling more precise retrieval. Your content needs to be semantically readable — not just for humans and search bots, but for AI parsers, too.
Recommendation: Use schema markup (Organization, Person, Article, etc.), clear internal linking, and semantically structured content that helps reinforce how entities relate.
Engagement: From On-Site UX to Real-Time Participation
The SEO Perspective
Engagement typically measures how users interact with your content on-site, such as bounce rates, dwell time, and conversions, and it signals to search engines that your content is relevant.
The GEO Perspective
In a generative AI world, engagement is less about on-site behavior and more about showing up in ongoing, real-time, high-trust conversations. This includes expert communities, Reddit and Quora threads, industry forums, and social discussions. LLMs incorporate these touchpoints into their training and retrieval models, which gives visibility to brands that participate actively and authentically.
Recommendation: Join niche conversations regularly. Stay visible in the digital spaces where your audience (and AI) go to learn and talk.
Why RASE Matters Now
GEO doesn’t replace SEO; it expands its scope. Traditional SEO built your storefront. GEO is how the AI neighborhood knows it exists and recommends it to others.
Without retrievability, even the best content can become invisible to AI. But when your brand shows up consistently, contextually, and authoritatively across the web, you do more than just rank. You reside in the minds of the machines that are shaping modern discovery.
From Rankability to Retrievability
Optimizing for GEO through the RASE framework means redefining what it means to “win” in search:
- Relevance is now about meaning, not just matching.
- Authority comes from trusted context, not just backlinks.
- Structure facilitates understanding, not just indexing.
- Engagement is earned in public discourse, not just on-site journeys.
If you want your brand to be discoverable in 2025 and beyond, start thinking about not only who your content reaches, but also who it teaches.
Because in an AI-first world, being known leads to being found.
