If you've spent any time in the SEO industry, you've probably noticed the same thing happens every few years.
A new technology comes along, everyone loses their minds, and suddenly we're told everything we knew before is obsolete.
Right now, that shiny object is AI search.
Whether people call it GEO, AIO, AI SEO, or something else entirely, the pitch is always the same: add some LLM-friendly text to your website and you'll magically start appearing in ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity.
That's not how it works.
AI Search Still Depends on Search Engines
Anyone who's been doing SEO for more than a decade already understands something that seems to get lost in all the hype.
Large language models don't magically know what's on the internet.
They pull information from search engines.
Sometimes that's Google. Sometimes it's Bing. Increasingly it's Brave Search or other independent indexes. But regardless of which engine is being used, the underlying principle is the same.
If your website isn't visible in search, it's going to struggle to become visible in AI search too.
That's why, if you're running a vape brand or any business operating in a competitive niche, your priority shouldn't be GEO.
It should be SEO.
Organic Search Is Still the Foundation
For most vape brands, paid advertising isn't really an option.
That means organic traffic isn't just another marketing channel. It's the marketing channel.
Your focus should be on building a website that deserves to rank.
That means:
- Building genuine topical authority.
- Publishing content that fully covers your niche.
- Improving your site's authority over time.
- Making your pages satisfy search intent.
- Optimising every important page for conversions, not just rankings.
None of that has changed because ChatGPT exists.
In fact, it's arguably become even more important.
Don't Ignore EEAT
One area that's still widely misunderstood is EEAT.
No, EEAT isn't a direct ranking factor inside Google's core algorithm.
Google has said as much.
But Google's Quality Raters do look for it, and there’s a very good reason for this: EEAT isn’t for robots; it’s for humans, AKA your customers and potential customers.
That means you should build EEAT into your site anyway.
Not because you're trying to manipulate an algorithm, but because you want people visiting your site to trust you and buy from you.
Think about it: would you give your credit card details to a website that looked dodgy? Nope. That’s what EEAT is designed to fix. It’s also why EEAT is more important than ever in YMYL niches like vaping and cannabis.
Visitors should immediately understand:
- Who you are.
- Why you're qualified to talk about the subject.
- Why they should trust your recommendations.
- Why your website is different from every other affiliate site in your niche.
Those signals matter to users, and they're exactly the kind of things Google's quality raters are instructed to assess.
If your site ever gets manually reviewed and it's impossible to work out who's behind it, what experience they have, or why anyone should trust them, that's not a good position to be in.
GEO Isn't Replacing SEO
AI search is absolutely something you should be paying attention to.
Traffic patterns are changing.
People are increasingly asking questions directly inside ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity.
That trend isn't going away.
But treating GEO as a replacement for SEO is a mistake.
The two aren't competing with each other because the former relies on the latter: SEO > GEO.
The work that makes your site successful in traditional search is largely the same work that increases your chances of being surfaced by AI systems.
- Strong authority.
- Useful content.
- Clear topical expertise.
- Excellent user experience.
- Good technical SEO.
- Solid internal linking.
- High-quality citations.
Those fundamentals haven't disappeared.
The Bottom Line
If you're a vape brand wondering whether to focus on GEO or SEO, the answer is straightforward.
Do SEO first. Build authority. Cover your niche properly. Improve your site's EEAT.
Create content that genuinely satisfies search intent.
Optimise your pages so visitors become customers.
Once you've done that, you can start thinking about AI-specific optimisation but most brands with solid SEO don’t need to do anything; they’ll show up in AI Overviews and ChatGPT simply because they’re strong inside search engines like Google and Bing.
SEO isn't being replaced. It cannot be because, as of right now and for the foreseeable future, search engines (and by proxy, SEO) is the infrastructure that AI search relies on.