In self publishing marketing trust has shifted to individuals and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is way you can increase your chances of showing up in AI Overview.
Marketing and securing sales of your book used to be done through paid advertising and organic content marketing (writing lots of content and posting it across various platforms) a poor second or not considered at all, then turbo-charing this with SEO.
Plenty of people made millions selling the latest hacks to book sales through paid Facebook and Amazon advertising – and they were the only ones who really made money out of this.
Paid ads still have their place in book marketing but it’s really just rented attention and you can spend a lot and not get a return on your investment.
I’ve been a fan of organic content marketing for ages. Done right it builds your recognition as a trusted, consistent source of valued knowledge and insights – you know the ones you have shared in your book.
In 2025, the self published authors who win will be those who build direct connection over dependence on platforms.
You only have to see how LinkedIn has changed over the past year (everyone has seen engagement plummet) to realise that being beholden to someone else’s platform is a risky proposition. YES, use platforms for capturing attention BUT understand that in book marketing and sales, you have to build your own book community.
The future of building consistent book sales and connection with your audiences is through your own channels and crafting content is owned, trusted, and intentional.
Effective book marketing is about reaching the right people consistently, on channels you control, not chasing algorithms. And, the channels you control are email, communities, and platforms you own and your readers and book community trusts.
AND, there’s a new key element to all of this.
Prior to ChatGPT and AI, business book marketing was squarely focused on SEO – Search Engine Optimisation – across your website, newsletters, other platforms (LinkedIn, X, TikTok, Facebook, You Tube etc).
Now that Google, Microsoft and Meta have moved to bring AI-driven overviews into their platforms, business book marketing is now all about Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO). And with the launch of GPT-5, this is even more so.
What is GEO and how can you apply it to your book marketing?
GEO helps ensure your content is leveraged and potentially cited by AI tools when answering user queries.
GEO is all about making sure your content is easily understood and utilised by generative AI models such as Chat GPT, Perplexity, Claude, Gemini, Google’s AI Overviews and Microsoft Search.
www.fsh.com were on to this quite early and here’s a good article from them that I found valuable in my learning. 6 Generative Engine Optimization Strategies for marketers in 2024. Of course, I always read information with the lens of business book self publishing…but the reality is that books are no different from other marketing in the AI age. Thanks fsh. https://www.4fsh.com/about/
GEO specifically addresses how AI-powered search engines analyse and synthesise information to provide answers. It aims to make content easily “understood” and extracted by AI, potentially leading to direct quotes, summaries, or even integration within AI responses.
Think about it this way. If you get your GEO right thousands/millions of people will be ‘presented’ with your content in a AI Overview/summary and then perhaps they’ll link to it.
The shift to AI Overviews and summaries means you need to review the content on your website and rethink how you write for the platforms you share your content on, especially LinkedIn for those who are writing and marketing business books.
Optimised content creation for the new word of AI search means you need to craft content that is clear, concise, and structured in a way AI can easily grasp. This content directly addresses user intent and provides valuable, relevant information to the AI models. If you deeply understand your readers this shouldn’t be too hard.
A shorthand way of thinking about this is to craft content that poses questions and then answers these questions. Think about the questions your potential readers would type into ChatGPT, Google or Microsoft (and maybe use ChatGPT to provide you with some options) across different sections of your website, LinkedIn Articles, YouTube videos…basically all your content. Now OpenAI has launched GPT-5, this should deliver better-crafted marketing content than ever…although I need to go and test this out.
Yet, it’s not all about the content.
Build your authority
Establishing your website or brand as a trusted source of information is also crucial for GEO. This means building up a substantial number of relevant and current articles, blogs, newsletters and video that directly addresses user intent and provides valuable, relevant information to AI models.
Building authority is a long game.
Of course your business book goes a long way to building your authority, so keep GEO in mind when you’re creating website copy about your book. Again, think about creating content based on say 5-10 key questions people might ask when looking for a book on or around your topic. As I say to our clients, “Step out of being the author/expert and think about your potential reader.”
Tracking your content
As with SEO, there’s no point integrating GEO unless you have clear goals about what you want to achieve AND track the analytics. This way you can ‘see’ what content is resonating, what isn’t and tweak or change your content (and perhaps questions) to generate more traction.
Of course, part of tracking your content performance should be linked to clear goals for your business book. Are you looking to promote book sales, generate business leads, build your visibility, secure speaking engagements or all of these?
If you need some help understanding GEO and how to apply it to your business book content get in contact with us via [email protected]
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My insights, all written by me as I sort through the good, bad and AI slop and engage my trusted network so you don’t have to.