AEO · AI search optimisation · UK
AEO: get recommended by AI when buyers ask
A growing share of CBD and vape purchases now start with a question to ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity or Google’s AI Overviews: “what’s a good CBD oil for beginners in the UK?”, “which nic salts are closest to a disposable?”. Answer Engine Optimisation is how you become the brand those answers name — and in a category with no ads, it is one of the few levers left.
What AEO involves
AI assistants don’t rank pages, they assemble answers. Being cited means being the clearest, most trustworthy, most machine-readable source on the specific questions your buyers ask.
AI visibility audit
We ask the major assistants the questions your customers ask, record who gets recommended and why, and find the gaps between you and them.
Answer-first content
Concise, factual, well-structured answers to real questions — on product pages, guides and FAQs — written to be quoted, not just crawled.
Structured data
Organisation, Product, FAQ, HowTo, Review and Article schema, consistent entity data and clean HTML that models can parse reliably.
Entity & citation building
Consistent brand facts across the web — directories, publications, reviews, Wikipedia-style sources — so models are confident who you are.
llms.txt & crawler access
AI-crawler-friendly robots rules, an llms.txt summary and Markdown-clean pages so assistants can actually read you.
Monitoring
Regular re-testing of prompts across assistants and tracking of AI-referred traffic and sales in GA4.
Why AEO matters more for CBD and vape than almost any other sector
In most categories, a brand that isn’t recommended by an AI assistant can still buy its way in front of customers with Google Ads or Meta. CBD and vape brands can’t. That makes organic recommendations — in classic search and in AI answers — disproportionately valuable.
It also happens that AI assistants are cautious about these products. They tend to recommend brands that look transparent and compliant: visible lab testing, clear strengths, honest descriptions, no wild claims. Those are the same things regulators and payment providers want, so AEO work reinforces everything else we do rather than competing with it.
What we typically fix first
- Product pages with no plain-English answer to “what is this and who is it for?”
- Missing or broken structured data
- FAQs that exist only in a PDF or a chatbot widget
- Inconsistent business details across the web
- Robots rules that accidentally block AI crawlers (or a CDN that does)
- Guide content that is long but never actually answers the question
AEO FAQs
What is AEO?
Answer Engine Optimisation: making your brand and content the source that AI assistants and answer engines (ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Copilot) draw on and recommend when users ask questions in your category. It overlaps with SEO but focuses on clarity, structure, entity consistency and citation-worthiness rather than rankings.
Do AI assistants recommend CBD or vape products?
Yes, with caveats — they usually add safety notes and prefer brands that look transparent and compliant. Ask one which UK CBD oil to buy and it will name brands; the goal is to be one of them.
Is AEO separate from SEO?
They share foundations (technical health, quality content, authority) but AEO adds specific work on answer formatting, schema, entity data and AI-crawler access. We offer it standalone or as part of an SEO retainer.
How do you measure AEO results?
Repeat prompt testing across assistants (are you cited, how often, in what position), AI-referred sessions and revenue in analytics, and branded search growth.