AI & AEO

Search Generative Experience (SGE → AI Overviews)

Quick Definition

SGE was Google's experimental name (2023–2024) for the AI-generated answer module above organic search results; it graduated to production as Google AI Overviews in mid-2024.

In context

Historical context: SGE was the labs experiment that became AI Overviews. Documentation and articles published 2023–early 2024 use 'SGE'; everything since uses 'AI Overviews' or 'AIO'. The mechanics are the same: Gemini generates a synthesised answer with cited sources, displayed above the classic organic results on a substantial share of queries. Optimisation playbook unchanged from SGE era — direct-answer formatting, FAQ schema, topical authority.

Example

Canadian SEO articles written in 2023 about 'optimising for SGE' are now correctly framed as 'optimising for Google AI Overviews' — the underlying tactics are identical.

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Related terms

Semantic Search

Semantic search is search that interprets the intent and contextual meaning of a query rather than matching only literal keywords — the dominant search paradigm since BERT (2019).

AI Overviews

AI Overviews (formerly Search Generative Experience or SGE) are AI-generated answers that appear at the top of Google search results for many queries.

Agentic Search

Agentic search is the next-generation pattern where an AI agent autonomously plans, executes, and refines a multi-step research task on the user's behalf — not just answering a single query.

Model Knowledge Cutoff

The knowledge cutoff is the date beyond which an LLM has no training data — historically a hard limit, now mitigated by retrieval-augmented generation in modern AI search.

AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)

AEO is the practice of optimizing content to be cited in AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity, and other generative search engines.

Claude Search

Claude Search is Anthropic's web-search capability inside Claude, which queries live web sources and synthesizes cited answers similar to ChatGPT search and Perplexity.

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