What is the difference between SEO and AEO and should developers care about both?

Most developers have heard of SEO. AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) is newer and honestly more important to understand right now.

SEO — Search Engine Optimization
Optimizing so Google ranks your pages higher in search results. Core levers:
→ Keywords in titles, headings, meta descriptions→ Backlinks from other sites→ Core Web Vitals (LCP, CLS, FID)→ Crawlability — can Google even find your pages?
The goal: appear on page 1 of search results so users click through to your site.

AEO — Answer Engine Optimization
Optimizing so AI systems (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Claude) pull YOUR content as the answer to a question — often without the user ever clicking a link.
Core levers:→ Structured data (FAQPage, HowTo, Product schema)→ Writing in clear question-and-answer format→ llms.txt — a file that tells AI crawlers what your site is about→ E-E-A-T signals (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trust)
The goal: become the source AI cites, not just the site Google ranks.

Should developers care about both?
Yes — but prioritize in this order:
1. Fix technical SEO first (crawlability, metadata, Core Web Vitals)2. Add structured schema markup3. Write content in a clear Q&A structure
Steps 2 and 3 serve both SEO and AEO simultaneously — so the incremental effort to cover both is smaller than it looks.
The developers who understand AEO now are building a compounding advantage as more users shift from Google search to AI-first answers.