How to Improve Your GEO Score — 7 Practical Steps for SMV'er

Your GEO Score reflects your visibility on ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini. Discover seven practical steps to improve your score — from robots.txt and llms.txt to JSON-LD schema and E-E-A-T signals. Featuring the Accountant case study (14% to 38% in four weeks).

Your GEO Score measures your visibility on ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini. Most SMV'ers score below 50 — but seven specific steps can significantly boost your score in four weeks. AddonNordic went from 14% to 38% AI visibility. Here’s what they did.

What is the GEO Score — and why should you measure it?

The GEO Score (Generative Engine Optimisation Score) is an overall measure of your company’s visibility in AI-powered search engines such as ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, based on 14 dimensions including AI crawler access, structured data, content quality, entity signals and E-E-A-T. By 2026, the GEO Score will be the primary indicator of whether AI models cite your company or your competitors. At Geoa, we measure your score across all platforms and provide you with a prioritised action plan for each dimension.

Your GEO Score is not the same as your Google ranking. Princeton KDD ’24 showed that AI models cite pages outside Google’s top 10 more often than top-ranked pages — so a low Google ranking does not mean you are invisible to AI. However, a low GEO Score means exactly that: AI models cannot find, read or cite your business.

Why is your GEO Score so low?

The vast majority of SMV websites are built for humans — not for AI crawlers. They look great, but they don’t speak the language of AI models. The 14 dimensions of the GEO Score cover everything from technical accessibility (can GPTBot and ClaudeBot crawl your site?) to content quality (do you have factual statements with source references?) to entity consistency (do your data match across Krak, Trustpilot and LinkedIn?).

In the GEO SFE ’26 study, researchers tested 1,200 SMV websites and found that the average score was below 45 out of 100. The biggest gaps are AI crawler access (most unintentionally block GPTBot), structured data (fewer than 3 per cent have the correct JSON-LD schema) and E-E-A-T signals (most have no visible founder or expertise). The good news is that all three gaps can be closed in under an hour.

7 practical steps to improve your GEO Score

1. Ensure AI crawlers can access your site

It sounds obvious, but it’s the biggest problem. Many SMV websites unintentionally block GPTBot, ClaudeBot and PerplexityBot in their robots.txt file. Check your robots.txt: if you have Disallow: / or are missing explicit ‘Allow’ rules for AI crawlers, you’re invisible. Open your robots.txt in a browser (your-company.dk/robots.txt) and check that GPTBot, ClaudeBot and PerplexityBot have access.

Fix: Add ‘Allow’ rules for AI crawlers at the top of your robots.txt. It takes 2 minutes and can double your AI visibility in a week. Relark.dk rose from a GEO Score of 49.9 (F) to measurable AI crawling within 7 days following this change alone.

2. Create an llms.txt file

llms.txt is a simple text file that tells AI crawlers exactly which content on your site is worth indexing. It should be placed in your root directory (your-company.co.uk/llms.txt). The GEO SFE ’26 study showed that pages with llms.txt are cited 2.7 times more often in AI responses than pages without it, regardless of their traditional SEO score.

Fix: Create a llms.txt with links to your homepage, pricing, case studies and contact page. Use the format from llmstxt.org. It takes 10 minutes and costs 0 kr. Read our complete guide: llms.txt — the secret weapon of SMVs.

3. Add JSON-LD schema markup

Structured data in the JSON-LD format helps AI models understand your business. Without schema, the AI only sees raw HTML — with schema, it understands that you’re an accountant with 15 years’ experience and a 4.8-star rating on Trustpilot. Princeton KDD ’24 showed that schema markup results in a +30% increase in citations.

Minimum requirements: Organisation (with CVR number, address, and ‘sameAs’ links to LinkedIn and Trustpilot), LocalBusiness (with GeoLocation), and Article (for blog posts). If you sell a service: add the Service schema. If you have customer reviews: add the Review schema with `itemReviewed` set to `Product` (not `Service` — Google Search Console rejects `Service`).

Fix: Use Geoas Auto Fix to generate the correct JSON-LD schema in 30 seconds. Or copy the template from the ‘How GEO works’ guide.

4. Optimise your content for AI citation

AI models cite short, factual answers — not long marketing copy. Use the BLUF (Bottom Line Up Front) model: answer the question within the first 60 words of your page. Princeton KDD ’24 showed that structural changes alone — such as moving the answer to the top — can increase the citation rate by +17.3%.

Specific tactics: Replace “We offer professional advice” with “We help SMV'er with VAT and annual accounts — fixed price from 4,900 kr/year”. Include at least 3 facts per 1,000 words (figures, prices, dates, percentages). Link to external sources — this provides a +115% citation lift for low-ranking pages. And make sure that at least 10% of your headings end with a question mark.

5. Build your entity signals across platforms

AI models verify your company’s identity across multiple platforms. The Digital Bloom ’25 showed that companies present on 4 or more platforms (Trustpilot, LinkedIn, Krak, Eniro, 118.dk) are cited 2.8 times more often. Trustpilot alone accounts for 14% of all AI citations. Businesses with an active Trustpilot profile are cited in 75.3% of relevant responses — compared with less than 1% without one.

Solution: Check that your CVR number, address, telephone number and opening hours are identical across all platforms. If Krak states something different to your website, the AI loses trust. Create or update your Trustpilot profile. Link to your LinkedIn page from your website using the JSON-LD sameAs tag.

6. Strengthen your E-E-A-T signals

Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness — E-E-A-T — is the framework Google (and AI models) use to assess whether your page is worth citing. Claude via Brave Search places enormous weight on E-E-A-T and cites pages with a clear, named author more frequently.

Specific E-E-A-T signals: Write 50 words explaining who you are and why you started the business. Include your CVR number (this indicates a registered Danish business). Have a clear ‘About Us’ section with a photo of yourself. Link to your LinkedIn profile. Display your certifications and memberships. Include a genuine telephone number and a physical address on your page. At Geoa, we’ve found that SMV'er with 4+ E-E-A-T signals score, on average, 28 points higher on the GEO Score than those without.

7. Update your content regularly

AI models prioritise fresh information. 76.4% of ChatGPT’s citations are less than 30 days old (The Digital Bloom ’25). If your website hasn’t been updated for months, your citation rate will drop significantly. The same applies to your GEO Score — the ‘Content Freshness’ dimension carries significant weight in the overall assessment.

Solution: Add a blog and write at least one post a week. Update your prices and services every month. Add new client case studies. Even small changes — such as a new date on the homepage — signal freshness to AI crawlers. With Geoa, you’ll receive ready-made blog content every week — you can copy and post it in 10 minutes.

How do you measure your progress?

You can’t improve what you don’t measure. Start with a free GEO-test at Geoa — it takes 60 seconds and gives you your baseline across all 14 dimensions. Then track your progress week by week. AddonNordic went from 14% to 38% AI visibility in 4 weeks. Relark.dk rose from a GEO score of 49.9 to measurable AI crawling in 7 days.

The 7 steps above can be carried out in sequence. Steps 1–3 take less than 30 minutes in total and deliver the biggest, fastest improvements. Steps 4–7 require a little more time, but deliver lasting results. Set a calendar reminder to repeat the GEO test every month — that way, you can see exactly which steps work for your business.