AEO & Local SEO Glossary

Making your garage the business AI tools name when someone asks a question like 'best MOT garage near me', instead of competing for a ranked list of links.

Your overall score is your AEO readiness — how ready your site is to be named and cited by AI.

The same discipline as AEO, under a newer name: optimising for generative AI engines rather than traditional search results.

If you read about GEO elsewhere, it means the same work your report is scoring.

An AI system that answers a question directly instead of listing websites — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Microsoft Copilot.

Your score measures how visible you are across these engines, not just Google search.

The AI-written summary Google shows above the normal results. It names a handful of businesses and often those are the only ones a driver sees.

A garage absent from the AI Overview loses the booking before the map results are even reached.

When the answer is given on the search or chat screen and the user never visits a website.

Zero-click behaviour is why your website alone no longer wins work — the answer itself has to name you.

The underlying AI technology behind ChatGPT, Copilot and similar tools. It writes answers by predicting text from what it has learned and what it can read.

An LLM can only recommend your garage if it can read clear, structured information about you.

When an AI engine states something confidently that is wrong — including recommending a garage that has closed, or inventing services.

Missing or conflicting information about your garage is what makes hallucination likely, which is a score you want to raise.

A mention of your garage as a source or recommendation inside an AI-generated answer.

Citations are the outcome of every other signal in your report — technical, local and content all feed them.

How many times your garage is named across the AI engines for the searches that matter in your area.

It is the clearest measure of whether your AEO work is paying off over time.

A clearly defined thing — your garage — that an AI engine can recognise by name and connect to a place, services and reviews.

Inconsistent names, addresses or phone numbers split your garage into several weak entities instead of one strong one.

The information box Google shows about a business it recognises as an established entity.

Earning one is strong evidence the engines trust your garage, which makes citations more likely.

Google's quality framework: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness and Trustworthiness. It judges how credible a source looks.

Thin pages with no named staff, reviews or credentials score poorly here and rarely get cited.

Engines matching the meaning behind a query rather than the exact words typed, so 'car needs its yearly test' can match 'MOT'.

Your content scores better when written in plain, natural sentences instead of keyword lists.

How often rival garages in your area appear in AI answers compared with you.

Being absent usually means a named competitor is taking that answer instead.

A simple file at your web address that tells AI crawlers which pages matter and what your business does.

It is a quick technical win: AI engines get a clean summary of your garage to quote.

Optimising your online presence to appear for location-based searches such as 'MOT garage Leeds'.

Local SEO is the foundation AEO sits on — weak local signals hold your AI visibility down.

Your free Google listing (formerly Google My Business). It drives the map results and is one of the main sources AI engines read about local businesses.

An unverified or half-completed profile is one of the most common reasons a garage scores low.

Your Name, Address and Phone number being identical everywhere they appear — website, Google, Facebook, directories.

Any mismatch weakens the link between your garage and your town, and engines trust you less.

The three map results Google shows for local searches, sitting above the normal links.

These three garages take most of the bookings; everything in your report works towards getting you into them.

A mention of your business details on a directory, trade body site or review platform — not to be confused with an AI citation.

Consistent listings across reputable sites give engines more sources to confirm your details.

How many reviews your garage has, how recent they are, and how you respond to them.

Reviews are read both as local ranking signals and as proof an AI engine can quote when recommending you.

A page aimed at a specific town or area you cover, naming the services you offer there.

Without location pages, engines struggle to connect your garage to the towns you actually serve.

A search phrase with a place in it, such as 'MOT testing Warrington' or 'car service near Stockport'.

Mentioning your town and surrounding areas naturally is one of the quickest score gains available.

A grid of map points around your garage, each showing where you rank for a local search, so you can see which streets you win and which you lose.

It shows whether your weak local score is a town-wide problem or only in certain neighbourhoods.

Standardised code added to your website that spells out your business details — name, location, opening hours, services, reviews — in a format engines can read exactly.

No schema is one of the biggest single points available in your technical score, and it is a one-off job to add.

The schema type that describes a physical, customer-facing business such as a garage.

It gives AI engines your address, town and services as facts rather than guesses.

Schema that marks up question-and-answer pairs on your site so engines can lift your answer straight into a reply.

A handful of well-written MOT questions is one of the fastest routes to being quoted by AI.

Whether search and AI crawlers are allowed and able to read your pages at all.

If crawlers are blocked or pages fail to load, nothing else in your report can help until it is fixed.

The secure, padlocked version of your web address. Browsers and engines treat sites without it as less trustworthy.

A missing padlock dents both your technical score and the confidence of a visitor about to book.

How quickly your main pages appear, especially on a phone using mobile data.

Slow pages lose visitors before they read anything, and crawlers may read less of your site.

How well your site reshapes itself to fit a phone screen without pinching, zooming or sideways scrolling.

Most drivers search on a phone, so this shapes both your technical score and your conversion rate.

A page where a visitor can immediately see what you do, where you are and how to book or call.

The conversion recommendation in your report is the single change that would win the most extra bookings.

A short, plain-English statement of what your garage does, who it serves and where it is.

Engines quote descriptions almost word for word, so a vague one wastes your best chance at a citation.

A 0–100 measure of how present your garage is across the AI engines for the searches drivers use in your area.

It is the number at the top of your report, broken down into technical, local and content signals.

A structured check of your website and local presence against the things AI engines need in order to recommend you.

Your report is exactly this — a snapshot you can repeat to see your score move.

How your score compares with other garages in your town or of a similar size.

It tells you whether your score is genuinely lagging or simply normal for your area.

Ongoing monitoring of which AI engines name your garage, for which searches, and how that changes week to week.

A one-off audit shows the problem; tracking shows whether your fixes are working.