Adweek has published a challenge to one of search marketing's fastest-adopted metrics: generative engine optimization scores — GEO scores — are not the solution to a brand's visibility in AI-powered search engines.

The argument lands as marketers scramble for measurable footing in AI answer engines. GEO scores emerged as a vendor-defined metric (a numerical rating purporting to show how visible and favorably a brand appears in outputs from tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google's AI Overviews). Adweek's position: relying on that single number won't solve the visibility problem it claims to measure.

What is a GEO score?

GEO is the practice of optimizing content so large language models cite, reference or surface it when they generate answers. Vendors package this into a score — typically a composite of citation frequency, mention share and sentiment across AI engine outputs. The pitch is simple: raise the score, win the AI channel.

Adweek's piece pushes back on that framing. The core criticism is that a brand's AI engine visibility depends on factors a composite score can't capture, and that treating the score as a target — rather than a rough diagnostic — misdirects strategy.

This is an opinion and analysis piece from Adweek, not a search-engine policy announcement. No AI vendor has endorsed GEO scoring as an official metric, and there's no confirmed ranking system behind it — unlike, say, Google's documented core updates or spam policies.

Why the skepticism matters now

Marketers are under pressure to show AI-era results. Surveys across the industry have found brands reallocating budget toward AI visibility work, and tool vendors have moved quickly to sell dashboards that quantify it. Whenever a market outruns measurement, single-number metrics sell well and tell you little.

Adweek's caution fits a familiar pattern in search marketing. A decade of SEO tooling taught the same lesson: third-party scores — domain authority, keyword difficulty, visibility indexes — are tool signals, not search-engine statements. They're useful directionally. They're dangerous as targets, because optimizing for the proxy stops optimizing for the outcome.

What brands should watch instead

For teams building AI visibility programs, Adweek's argument implies a few disciplines:

• Treat GEO scores as one diagnostic signal among several, not a KPI.
• Measure outcomes directly — actual citations and mentions in AI answers for queries your customers ask, sampled over time.
• Verify across engines; each AI system draws on different retrieval and citation behavior, so a single composite score can flatten real differences between them.
• Keep separate what the engines confirm versus what tools infer.

The piece doesn't deny that AI visibility matters. It denies that a score solves it.

What to monitor next

Watch whether AI engine operators publish their own visibility or citation reporting — an official metric would restructure this debate overnight. Until then, expect scrutiny of GEO scoring to intensify as more brands demand proof their AI optimization spend works, and treat vendor scores as tool signals rather than ground truth.

By James Calloway