Compare the Terms Without Mixing the Jobs

Ask what kind of thing each term describes and which decisions the website owner can actually control.

Comparison table

Ten commonly confused terms

Term	Category	Main purpose	Primary user	Controllable input	Not guaranteed
SEO	Publishing/search	Discovery, indexing and relevance	Site and content owners	Crawlable pages, useful content, architecture	Ranking
GEO	Publishing strategy	Usefulness in generated answers	Publishers and organizations	Original value, evidence, clarity	Citation
AEO	Answer strategy	Direct question satisfaction	Publishers and support teams	Immediate answers and structure	Selection
AIO	Ambiguous term	AI Optimization or AI Overviews	Depends on scope	A clear definition	Settled meaning
REG	Original framework	Recognition and accurate retrieval	Businesses and data stewards	Identity and retrievable facts	Platform control
RAG	AI architecture	External retrieval during generation	AI engineers	Index, retriever and model	Correctness
JSON-LD	Data format	Machine-readable linked data	Developers and publishers	Valid visible-page-aligned markup	Rich results
robots.txt	Crawl control	Permission for compliant crawlers	Site owners	Allow and disallow rules	Indexing
IndexNow	Submission protocol	Notify participating engines	Site owners	Key and URL submission	Indexing
Local SEO	Local discipline	Location-related discovery	Local businesses	Profiles, details and location pages	Map placement

Classification rule

Access, content, identity, visible facts, structured data, internal links and maintenance.

Crawling frequency, indexing, ranking, retrieval, citations, generated wording and recommendations.

Practical conclusion

A sound plan names the work accurately, explains the evidence and separates eligibility from outcomes.