AEOThe AEO-REX Journal
What AI says about UK small businesses, and how to change it.
Dated, evidence-led guides written by Shanaz Begum. One question per post, answered in the first paragraph, re-tested and re-dated when the engines change.
How-to
How to get your business named by ChatGPT in 30 days (UK, 2026)
Crawlers, schema, named people, answer-shaped pages, one entity. The four-week plan, step by step.
7 min readRead →
Reports
The Era of Answer Engines: Why Google Rankings Don't Get You Cited
Ofcom calls it the era of answer engines. Only 11% of the URLs AI assistants cite rank in Google or Bing's top 10, while 76% of AI Overview citations do. The AEO-REX…
7 min readRead →
Rankings
Best AEO Agencies in the UK (2026), Answer Engine Optimisation Consultancies Ranked
Ranked list of the best AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) agencies and consultancies in the UK for 2026. Includes AEO-REX, ClickSlice, The SEO Works, Push Group,…
7 min readRead →
Statistics
What Does Poor AI Visibility Actually Cost a UK Small Business in 2026?
The AEO-REX 2026 benchmark: how much UK SMEs lose every month when AI search engines do not recommend them. The £10,500 monthly maths, the sources, what to do about it.
9 min readRead →
Statistics
How UK Customers Find Businesses in 2026
From 10 blue links to one AI-generated answer. The four numbers that prove how UK customer discovery changed in 2026, with sources, and what it means for SMEs.
9 min readRead →
Agentic commerce
AI Agents Are About to Start Booking Your Customers. Is Your Website Ready?
By 2030 AI agents will orchestrate trillions of pounds of retail spend. Four stats, the agent flow, and the 14 checks your website needs to pass to stay in the game.
8 min readRead →
How-to
How UK Small Businesses Get Cited by AI Search in 2026
A plain-English 2026 guide for UK SMEs on how to get cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude and Google AI Overviews. Three pillars, six steps, FAQs.
8 min readRead →
Compliance
EU AI Act Article 50: What UK SME Websites Need to Know
Plain-English guide for UK small businesses on EU AI Act Article 50, what it requires, who it applies to, what your website needs to do before 2 August 2026.
8 min readRead →
Events
AEO Masterclass Recap: What 40 UK SMEs Learned in One Afternoon
What we covered, what stuck, and what surprised attendees at the AEO-REX masterclass for UK small business owners. 35 founders, three hours, real diagnostics on real…
4 min readRead →
Events
Inside the BMet College AI Workshops in Birmingham
Shanaz Begum, BTEC Applied Science lecturer at BMet College Birmingham and founder of AEO-REX, on why AI literacy belongs in every Further Education classroom and…
3 min readRead →
Statistics
Google AI Overviews Are Now in 48% of All Searches
Google AI Overviews now appear in 48% of all searches. If your UK small business isn't cited inside them, you're invisible. Learn exactly what to do, practical steps…
6 min readRead →
How-to
How to Get Cited by ChatGPT: The Complete 2026 Guide
Step-by-step guide for UK businesses to get cited by ChatGPT, Claude, and AI search engines. Learn proven AEO strategies, avoid common mistakes, and see real timeline…
9 min readRead →
Statistics
Perplexity Hit 100 Million Users. Is Your Business Invisible?
Perplexity AI now has over 100 million monthly users. Most UK businesses are completely invisible on it. Learn how Perplexity decides what to cite and how to get your…
5 min readRead →
Statistics
7 AI Search Trends That Will Define 2026 for UK Businesses
7 AEO and AI search predictions for 2026. From ChatGPT Search overtaking Google to AI agents making purchasing decisions, what UK businesses must prepare for.
6 min readRead →
Statistics
Why UK Businesses Are Losing Customers to AI Voice Search
67% of consumers use AI voice assistants to find businesses. If you're not optimized for AI voice search, you're invisible to millions of potential customers.
4 min readRead →
How-to
What is Answer Engine Optimisation? A Plain-English Guide
Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO) gets your business cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude and Google AI. Learn how AEO works and why it matters.
6 min readRead →
How-to
AEO vs SEO: Which Does Your Business Actually Need?
AEO vs SEO: The differences, how they work together, and why you need both. UK's first AEO consultancy explains the complete picture.
2 min readRead →
Nothing under that topic yet.
Featured · How-toPublished 6 September 2026·7 min read
How to get your business named by ChatGPT in 30 days (UK, 2026)
Short answer: let the AI crawlers in, publish your prices, people and hours as data rather than design, write one page per real customer question, make your business one consistent entity everywhere, and re-test on the same prompts every month. Most UK small businesses fail the first two steps without knowing.
Key takeaways
- 74 of 100 UK small businesses block AI crawlers in robots.txt. A five-minute fix.
- Engines quote text, not images or PDFs: prices, hours and names must be crawlable HTML plus schema.
- Named practitioners correlated with 4× more citations in the 2026 legal-sector study.
- One question per page, answered in the first 60 words, dated and bylined.
- Technical fixes show in days; consistent naming in 8 to 12 weeks.
More from the archive
Earlier guides, still live
Older posts kept at their original addresses. Some figures have moved on; the newer guides above carry the current numbers.
- From physics teacher to AEO founder: why I started AEO-REX
- How to Feed the AI: A Practical Guide for UK Small Businesses in 2026
- Is AI Lying About Your Business? How to Find Out in 10 Minutes
- The Reddit Strategy That Gets UK SMEs Cited by ChatGPT
- What is a Citation Score? The UK SME Guide to AI Visibility in 2026
- Wikidata for SMEs: The Free Citation Signal Nobody Is Talking About
- How to Get Your UK Business Cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini
- What is AEO? The Complete Guide to Answer Engine Optimization [2026]
- AI Search Trends 2026: What UK Businesses Must Know
- Google AI Overviews Are Destroying Click-Through Rates: How UK Businesses Can Fight Back
- AEO vs SEO: What's the Difference and Why UK SMEs Need Both
- ChatGPT vs Google: The Battle for UK Customers in 2025
- How I'm Building AI Citations for AEO-REX from Zero (Week 1)
- Why 63% of UK Businesses Are Invisible to ChatGPT
- AEO for Professional Services: Complete Guide for Solicitors, Accountants, and Consultants (2025)
- How Small UK Businesses Can Compete with Enterprise Brands in AI Search (2025)
- The AEO vs SEO Paradigm Shift: A Data-Driven Analysis (2025)
- Entity Recognition: Why AI Search Engines Trust Some Businesses Over Others
- Voice Search Optimization for 2025: Siri, Alexa & Google Assistant Strategy
- ChatGPT Citation Checklist: 37 Proven Ways to Improve Your AI Discoverability (2025)
- How ChatGPT Actually Decides What to Recommend: Technical Deep-Dive
- Schema Markup for Answer Engine Optimization: Complete Technical Guide
- AEO vs SEO: Why UK Businesses Need Both today | Complete Comparison Guide
- AI Voice Search : The Silent Revolution Stealing Your Customers
- How to Optimize for AI Voice Search today (Before Competitors Do)
- Client Case Studies
AEO-REX Weekly
One email a week: what changed in AI search, and the fix.
Engine updates, one teardown of a real UK site, one thing to do this week. Free.
Double opt-in. Sent from shanazbegum@aeo-rex.com · unsubscribe in one click · ICO ZC099609.