Location, Location, Generation: Where You Ask Matters for Generative Engine Optimization

Key points

• Generative search engines answer local and commercial questions with a written answer and a few cited sources.1
• A growing practice of generative engine optimization (GEO) monitors which sources and brands these answers show, typically from a single place.1
• We ask 300 questions of ChatGPT with 19 declared locations, and of ChatGPT and Gemini from five network locations, each twice to measure run-to-run noise (31,200 answers).1
• ChatGPT follows the location an application declares, down to the city: it writes the place into its own searches, and its search backend localizes results even when the queries name no place.1

Sources (1)

• [1]Location, Location, Generation: Where You Ask Matters for Generative Engine Optimization
  arXiv (AI, ML, NLP, CV, robotics, multi-agent) · Oct 16, 06:07 PM

  In this paper, we present a controlled audit of how the user's location changes the sources that generative engines cite.

  Generative search engines answer local and commercial questions with a written answer and a few cited sources.

Extractive summary: sentences quoted from the sources.