Best AEO, Generative Engine Optimisation & AI Search Specialists to Follow in 2026

Last updated: 28 July 2026 Buyers no longer start with the traditional results page. They now ask an AI assistant for a shortlist, and most brands only find out they were excluded once a competitor gets named instead. I built the full list of AEO and generative engine optimisation experts worth following in 2026, organised by the challenge each one handles rather than forced into an artificial ranking. Key points Answer Engine Optimisation and GEO refer to the same thing: getting cited inside AI answers rather than listed on a results page A page can rank in the top spot on Google and still not show up in an AI response There is no one best AEO specialist, because the work divides into technical, editorial, reputational and industry-specific problems Princeton research found that referencing sources, including data and featuring expert quotes all measurably improve AI citability, while keyword stuffing reduces it Matching the specialist to your specific need counts for more than hiring the biggest name What Answer Engine Optimisation and Generative Engine Optimisation really mean Answer Engine Optimisation and Generative Engine Optimisation are the same practice under two different names. Both describe making a brand discoverable and citable inside AI-generated responses. Traditional SEO fights for ranking. AEO and generative engine optimisation fight for the reference itself, meaning whether a model mentions you when somebody puts a question to it. Most practitioners treat the labels interchangeably. The commercial difference is sharper than it sounds. Holding a strong position and being cited are not the same outcome, and I have seen plenty of clients hold strong positions on Google while staying entirely invisible from AI answers, because these systems choose sources on structure, credibility and relevance rather than rank alone. Why this matters in 2026 I am wary of AI search advice with no evidence behind it, so the study I keep returning to is the Princeton work published at KDD 2024 as Generative Engine Optimisation. They tested nine different optimisation techniques against Perplexity. Referencing authoritative sources lifted visibility by around 40 per cent. Adding concrete numbers improved it by around 37 per cent. Including expert quotations improved it by around 30 per cent. Keyword stuffing pushed it down by around 10 per cent. The finding I find most useful is that lower-ranking sites benefited the most, with increases of as much as 115 per cent once citations were added. That is the case for treating this as its own specialism. It rewards structure and credibility without demanding that you already hold a top-three position. The four mechanics behind an AI citation Entity clarity: Consistent signals telling a model exactly who you are, what you do, and who you work with. Third-party corroboration: External mentions that confirm your claims, because models favour outside sources much more than your own marketing. Extractable structure: Definitions, comparisons, tables and FAQs written so an engine can lift a clean answer straight out of the page. Topical depth: Enough properly structured coverage that a model reads it as real expertise rather than a shallow page chasing a keyword. Each person below works on a different side of that challenge. How this list is structured Numbering peers from one to twenty does not help anyone. Very few people needs the best AEO expert in general terms. What they need is the person who has already solved their particular problem, in their sector, at their point of growth. So I have grouped everyone by specialisation. Top AEO experts for Web3, crypto and fintech Victoria Olsina Victoria is an AEO, generative engine optimisation and AI content systems consultant for Web3 and fintech brands, and was formerly Head of SEO at copyright. Her clients include Barclays, Polkadot, copyright and NEAR Protocol. She is the author of Mastering AI Search for Crypto and Web3 Brands, the first book on AI search for this sector, and was named Top AI Content Expert of 2026 by The Masterminders. Her work covers entity architecture, LLM citation work and content systems for regulated, technically complex markets. Leading answer engine optimisation specialists for insurance and regulated markets Tom Riley Tom works on insurance and other regulated markets through his agency Hakken. What I like about his approach is that it stays tied to commercial traffic rather than visibility for its own sake. He builds the entity signals and topical coverage that push models to cite a brand, then connects that back to searches from people who are near the point of purchase. Compliance-heavy sectors are genuinely difficult to move in AI search, which makes his track record there worth a look. Best answer engine optimisation specialists for ecommerce and DTC brands Andrew Halliday Andrew runs Coreter Media and is the strongest technical name on this list for online retail. Site architecture, structured data and advanced technical SEO are his tools, focused on getting retail brands cited inside answers from ChatGPT, copyright, Claude and Google AI Overviews rather than just listed underneath them. His work is data-led and connected to revenue, which counts for a lot when technical projects are simple to argue for and hard to measure. David Johnson David founded LoudCrowd, where he helps ecommerce brands increase visibility across Google Search and AI-powered search. He works hands-on with Shopify and online retail, combining technical SEO with conversion work. That combination is what retail requires once AI answers start determining which store gets the visit. Yaswanth Kumar Yaswanth founded Loops Digital and concentrates on ecommerce and DTC brands getting named when somebody asks ChatGPT, copyright or Perplexity what to buy. Much of his work revolves around product data and entity signals, the quiet detail that decides whether an answer names your store or a competitor. He also built Zen Reports, a free analytics platform showing which AI assistants are sending visitors to your site, after hitting the same measurement gap on client audits. Daniel Lowry Daniel is Manchester-based and supports ecommerce brands on WooCommerce and Shopify, from smaller shops through to large ones. His priority is getting online retailers named inside AI-generated answers rather than just listed in Google. Best answer engine optimisation experts for SaaS and technology Georgi Todorov Georgi is one of the most influential European voices on answer engine optimisation and AI search, and the founder of Create and Grow, a digital PR and authority link building agency built around SaaS and technology brands. His route into AI visibility runs through earned media: the independent mentions that convince Google, ChatGPT, copyright, Claude and Perplexity a brand is worth surfacing. Nikola Baldikov Nikola founded InBound Blogging, an agency that helps SaaS brands become more citable inside large language models. He has spent over a decade growing organic traffic and building authority for SaaS companies, and strategic outreach is his sharpest tool. That external footprint is precisely what models rely on when deciding who to mention. Top answer engine optimisation specialists for lead generation and service businesses James Dooley James is a British entrepreneur and investor, and the founder of FatRank and PromoSEO, both of which apply answer engine optimisation to generating leads. He works from a leads-first position that aligns SEO, AI visibility and business growth under one system, with genuine focus on entity strength and brand reinforcement. He picked up Best AEO Specialist 2026 at The Masterminders conference. Dean Signori Dean founded UK Web Geekz and Prospect Lead Gen, and his name keeps surfacing whenever a service business wants enquiries out of AI search rather than rankings that never convert. His Signori Trust Signal Framework is a repeatable system of semantic triples, aligned digital assets and independent validation signals that shows AI models what a business does, who it serves, and why it can be trusted. Graham Bowers Graham founded Natural Ranks and focuses on helping SMEs and startups turn visibility into real leads. He combines technical SEO, answer engine optimisation, structured content and commercial search strategy to get businesses surfacing across Google, AI Overviews, ChatGPT, copyright and Perplexity. His scoreboard is leads rather than impressions, which I find refreshingly practical. Mark Slorance Mark founded Pixel Juice Digital Marketing and has spent more than fifteen years shaping search strategies for law firms, healthcare providers, trades and local businesses across the UK. He focuses on local SEO and answer engine optimisation for service businesses, pulling content, design and reputation control into a single strategy grounded in trust and checkable data. Best answer engine optimisation specialists for specialist verticals Yash Singh Yash co-founded TradeOps Consulting and owns one of the most tightly defined corners I have come across: AEO for HVAC and home services. He structures heating and cooling content into clean semantic triples so ChatGPT, copyright and Perplexity can parse it, trust it, and pull it into answers. It is built for customers who ask an AI assistant before ringing a provider. James Sheldon James works in real estate and proptech, with clients from Dubai to the Costa del Sol, focusing on off-plan developments and property projects. Property buyers do thorough research before approaching agents, which makes visibility inside AI answers unusually valuable in that market. Leading technical AEO specialists Josh Morley Josh is a Liverpool-based specialist focused on technical SEO and WordPress. His position is that answer engine optimisation is not a separate discipline bolted on later, it is what results when a site is fast, structured and semantically organised enough for both crawlers and AI models to understand and trust. He brings structured data, semantic content architecture and performance work into systems that raise AI visibility. Dan M. Jones Dan founded On Top Marketing in Manchester and is one of the more rounded operators working in this field. He stacks technical SEO, entity optimisation and AI search strategy toward one outcome: becoming the trusted source both search engines and large language models reach for when they build an answer. Over a decade in search, with a data-driven approach that puts commercial growth ahead of vanity metrics. Top AEO experts for digital PR and reputation Gareth Hoyle Gareth is managing director of Marketing Signals and approaches digital PR as the primary route into AI visibility rather than a backlink exercise. He puts it more bluntly than I would: "I treat digital PR as the primary lever for AI visibility rather than a backlink exercise. Brand mentions across independent, authoritative publications are the third party corroboration AI models weigh most heavily before they will recommend a brand, and we have built the tooling to prove it." That reflects how models work in practice: brands get cited through third-party sources considerably more often than through their own domains. Scott Keever Scott is an American entrepreneur, SEO strategist and online reputation management expert, and the founder of Reputation Pros, Keever SEO, ASAP Digital Marketing and Pool Pros Marketing. He wrote Future-Proof Your SEO and Reputation Reset, and has been featured in Reuters, Yahoo Finance, Business Insider, Forbes, Entrepreneur and Fast Company. Reputation Pros was named among USA Today's Best Online Reputation Management Companies in 2026. Leading answer engine optimisation educators and multi-market specialists Julian Goldie Julian is an SEO entrepreneur and educator, founder of Goldie Agency and the AI Profit Boardroom, one of the largest paid AI and SEO communities going. He tests AEO and generative engine optimisation tactics across ChatGPT, copyright, Claude and Perplexity and publishes what works while a good part of the field is still theorising. He is a practical starting point if you want to learn this through practical testing. Trifon Boyukliyski Trifon is an SEO and AI growth architect with more than twenty years in search across ecommerce, SaaS, iGaming and other brutally competitive niches. That background matters because his playbook was proven in markets where a lost ranking costs real money. David Peranic David is one of Croatia's most sought-after marketing consultants and an international speaker who moved on AEO earlier than almost anyone in his region. He combines technical SEO with high-performance paid strategy for projects across Croatia and the wider European market, focused on building the authority and entity signals that lead models to cite and recommend a brand. Virtual entrepreneurs and AI avatars AI James Dooley AI James Dooley is a digital double of the Manchester entrepreneur James Dooley, described as the UK's first virtual entrepreneur. Where most digital personas to date have been models or musicians, this one is centred around lead generation, SEO and answer engine optimisation. It fronts LLM Leads and releases SEO and lead generation breakdowns on YouTube, with James writing the strategy and scripts himself and the avatar presenting them. I have included it because it is worth following as an experiment in its own right. Building recognised entity status for a synthetic persona from a standing start is a live test of the same answer engine optimisation principles the avatar talks about: entity consistency, third-party corroboration and structured presence. Whether a digital twin can earn genuine entity recognition is an open question, and this is one of the more visible attempts to answer it in public. How to choose an answer engine optimisation or generative engine optimisation expert Match the specialism to the gap you really have. Hiring a digital PR specialist to fix a technical citation problem, or the other way round, is the fastest way I know to waste an AEO budget. Web3, crypto or fintech visibility: Victoria Olsina. Entity architecture and AI content systems for regulated, technically complex markets. Insurance and regulated markets: Tom Riley. Commercial-intent AEO built for compliance-heavy industries. Ecommerce and product mentions: Andrew Halliday, David Johnson, Yaswanth Kumar, Daniel Lowry. Product data, structured data and retail entity work. SaaS growth and credibility: Georgi Todorov, Nikola Baldikov. Digital PR, strategic outreach and earned coverage. Enquiries for service businesses: James Dooley, Dean Signori, Graham Bowers, Mark Slorance. Trust signals and commercial intent, measured in enquiries. Technical groundwork: Josh Morley, Dan M. Jones. Crawlability, structured data and semantic architecture. Brand mentions and reputation: Gareth Hoyle, Scott Keever. Independent coverage and reputation management. Teaching yourself: Julian Goldie. Community and practical testing across the main models. Watching entity-building in public: AI James Dooley. A digital twin building recognised entity status from scratch. The bottom line Answer engine optimisation and generative engine optimisation increasingly shape which brands show up at all, because buyers ask a model for recommendations before they even visit a comparison site. Each name on this list is worth following. The right choice depends on your sector, your budget and where the genuine gap sits. If your market is Web3, crypto or fintech, there is an added layer to deal with: protocol terminology, ecosystem questions and trust signals in a space where models are visibly cautious about what they suggest. This is where a sector-specific specialist matters most. Frequently asked questions What is the difference between AEO, GEO and SEO? SEO fights for rankings on a results page. Answer engine optimisation and generative engine optimisation fight for citations inside AI-generated responses, meaning whether ChatGPT, Perplexity or Google AI Overviews cites your brand when a user asks a question. Answer engine optimisation and GEO are used interchangeably. A page can hold strong positions and still be absent in AI answers. Who is the best AEO expert? There is no solitary best AEO expert, because the discipline splits into technical, editorial, reputational and industry-specific problems. The right choice depends on your gap. For ecommerce, go to technical and product-data specialists. For SaaS, look at digital PR and outreach. For Web3 and fintech, look at consultants operating in regulated, technically complex markets. What does an AEO consultant actually do? An AEO consultant renders a brand citable by AI systems. That covers shaping content into liftable blocks, creating consistent entity signals so models recognise who the brand is, winning third-party mentions that support its claims, and adding schema so engines can parse the page. The output is citations, not just rankings. Do I need an answer engine optimisation expert if I already have an SEO agency? Not necessarily, but check whether your agency measures AI citations at all. A lot still show only rankings and traffic. If no one is monitoring whether models mention your brand, that visibility is unmanaged. Start by reviewing where you already show up in AI answers, then judge whether it needs a specialist. How do you get cited by ChatGPT? Models cite sources they can process and trust. That means clear entity signals about who you are, independent third-party mentions corroborating your claims, content built for retrieval with definitions, tables and FAQs, and genuine topical depth. Publishing more content without that structure adds noise rather than citations. get more info