Long-form on SEO, GEO, AEO, the Pulse rubric, and the UK Pulse Index. No filler.
Generative engine optimisation explained: what AI search engines reward, how it differs from SEO, and the seven categories that drive citations.
Three acronyms, three different success metrics. Side-by-side breakdown of SEO, GEO, and AEO, the shared technical floor, and how Pulse weights each.
Every category, weight, scoring contract, and what a passing score looks like. Plus the per-finding tagging that turns audits into a 12-week delivery plan.
The editorial roadmap. No surprise drops.
Honest comparative shortlist
Step by step plus rubric callout
Code samples plus our own llms.txt linked
Working JSON-LD examples
Talking-point and podcast hook
Quarterly link-bait data report
Polarising trust-builder
One Insights post per fortnight. SEO, GEO, AEO, and the Pulse rubric. Sourced, sharp, no filler. Written by Maya.
valUX runs Pulse audits that measure both classic SEO and generative search in one score, one roadmap, one afternoon.
One score. Every engine your buyers actually use: ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Google Gemini, Google Search, Microsoft Copilot, Apple Intelligence, Meta AI.
SEO alone is a shop with a polished shopfront on a street nobody walks down. Google's AI Overviews, ChatGPT web search, Perplexity, and Gemini answer the question before your listing gets the click.
GEO alone is viral word-of-mouth through a broken front door. An AI will happily recommend a site it can't crawl, only to send visitors into a slow, unschemaed page that converts no-one.
You have visibility when both are done together. That's what Pulse measures, in seven categories, with a reproducible score you can track month on month.
Pick the discipline your business needs. Most buyers pick Complete, because that's what actually moves the needle in 2026. Split audits exist for teams who've already got half of it handled. Pricing is quoted per buyer scope at proposal stage; email info@valux.uk or use the contact form to enquire.
Turnaround: Pulse Essentials 48 hours, Pulse Growth 5 working days, Pulse X 7 working days. No lock-in.
One product, three tiers, always Complete (SEO + GEO together). No split retainers. Pricing quoted per buyer scope at proposal stage. 30 days notice. No lock-in. Requires a Complete audit within the past 90 days (or bundled as month one).
Three buyer profiles, one audit shape. In-house marketing teams who need a defensible third-party score. Founder-led SMEs with no in-house SEO. Agencies who need a second opinion, white-label-friendly. Not for: pure local SEO with no AI exposure, vendor lock-in, day-rate engagements.
Five phases, each with named outputs and a re-score at the end. Week 1: audit, baseline, prioritise. Weeks 2-4: quick wins and the technical floor (schema, robots, llms.txt, Core Web Vitals). Weeks 5-8: content and citation surface (citation-shaped pages, author entities, sources blocks). Weeks 9-11: authority and AI-engine probe (ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini). Week 12: re-score, signed delivery report, next-quarter plan.
An SEO audit you can defend in a board meeting. Six SEO surfaces (technical foundations, on-page structure, authority and brand, content and intent, local visibility, schema) on the seven-category Pulse rubric. Read the SEO audit page.
Be cited by ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini. Six AI surfaces (AI citability, brand authority, structured data, platform optimisation, agent readiness, content + E-E-A-T) on the seven-category rubric. Direct citation probes across each engine. AEO (answer engine optimisation) is included: Google AI Overviews, featured snippets, People Also Ask, voice answers all map to existing Pulse categories. Read the GEO audit page, or SEO vs GEO vs AEO explained.
Diagnostics: Pulse Check (30-second free diagnostic). Shipping next: llms.txt validator, schema-for-AI checker, AI-crawler access tester. All tools.
One email a month. What changed in AI search, what we shipped, what we'd do differently. Subscribe at hello@valux.uk. No course pitches, no growth hacks.
Pulse scores a site across AI Citability & Visibility (25%), Brand Authority (18%), Content Quality & E-E-A-T (18%), Technical Foundations (13%), Structured Data (8%), Platform Optimisation (8%), and Agent Readiness (10%). Most UK SEO audits cover the middle four. The other three are categories most agencies don't measure. Reproducible scoring. Same site, same inputs, same number next month. Full scoring rubric.
Field notes from a UK visibility agency. The reasoning behind Pulse and the maths behind GEO. Read the full insights index, or jump to a recent post:
valUX is an independent UK agency. Email info@valux.uk, or book a 30-minute discovery call. Pulse Check (30-second diagnostic): valux.uk/pulse-check.
GEO
Explainer
7 min read
9 min read
SEO
Methodology
Pulse
