What is answer engine optimisation (AEO)?

AEO is the work of making your business the answer that AI assistants and Google's AI Overviews give. It means publishing clear, direct answers to the questions your customers ask, using structured data, and building consistent information about your business across the web, so tools like ChatGPT can confidently recommend you.

What is the difference between SEO, AEO and GEO?

SEO helps you rank in Google's search results. AEO helps you become the direct answer AI assistants and AI Overviews give. GEO, or generative engine optimisation, builds the trust signals and consistent facts that generative AI models use to decide which businesses to name. Most businesses need all three working together.

Why is my website not bringing in new customers?

Often it is only working for people who already know you. If most of your visits come from people searching your business name, your website is serving existing word of mouth, not finding new customers. Check how many of your visits and enquiries come from searches that do not include your business name. That number shows whether your site is reaching anyone new.

How do I know if ChatGPT is recommending my business?

Ask ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity the questions your customers would ask, such as the best provider of your service in your area, and record whether you are named. Repeat monthly, and add an AI assistant option to your enquiry form so you can count the leads it sends.

How should a small business track marketing ROI?

Give marketing its own accounts in Xero, record where every enquiry comes from, and compare each month's marketing spend against the enquiries and new clients it produced. Reviewing that quarterly shows which channels pay for themselves and which do not.

Are SEO and AEO costs tax deductible?

Generally, marketing costs incurred in running your business, including SEO and AEO services, are deductible, and GST-registered businesses can usually claim the GST on valid tax invoices. Keep the invoices, code them to the right marketing account in Xero, and check anything unusual with your accountant.

Small Business Spotlight: How Intrigue Digital Helped a Hypnotist Go From 2 to 22 Leads a Month

Published October 2026By True Tally Bookkeeping6 min read

Illustration of a small business owner at a laptop where a search result and an AI assistant answer both recommend their business, with a rising chart of new enquiries, coins and a ticked ledger showing the marketing cost paid back

Welcome to issue 05 of the Small Business Spotlight. Every fortnight we feature an Australian business and the money lesson behind their growth, in their own words, with our take on how any business can use it.

This issue: the team at Intrigue Digital on a question every owner who pays for a website should ask: is it actually finding you new customers, or just serving the ones who already know your name?

Meet Intrigue Digital

Intrigue Digital is an Australian search agency that helps businesses rank on Google and get recommended by AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity. That work is known as SEO, answer engine optimisation (AEO) and generative engine optimisation (GEO). They work with lawyers, accountants, finance brokers, health practices and trades, on a one-business-per-industry-per-postcode model, so they never help two direct competitors chase the same customers. Here is their story, in their words.

The challenge, in their words

Most clients come to us thinking their website is working for them. They see visits and the odd enquiry, so it feels fine. When we look closer, the traffic is nearly always people searching for the business by name. The brand is already known in the community, through word of mouth, referrals and years of doing good work, and those people would have found the business anyway. The website is not bringing in anyone new. It is just answering the door for people who were already on their way.

The turning point

The shift is to stop measuring the website by how many people visit, and start measuring how many people find you who had never heard of you. That means showing up for the questions customers type before they know who to call, on Google and in AI answers. In practice it is clear pages that answer those questions directly, consistent business details everywhere online, genuine reviews and mentions on other sites, and tracking where every enquiry actually came from. We also record a baseline before we change anything, so the owner can see what moved.

The outcome

What you can actually do is start to source leads that would never have heard of your business otherwise. One example is a hypnotist we work with. Before, nearly all their enquiries came from people who already knew them. Within six weeks they went from 2 leads a month to 22, from people searching for the service rather than the name. Their investment paid for itself in full in the first month.

The bookkeeper's takeaway

We see the same pattern from the bookkeeping side. Marketing spend sits in the books as a cost line with nothing next to it, so owners either keep paying out of habit or cut it out of frustration. The fix is to measure it like any other cost. Four moves any business can copy:

Separate branded from new demand. Ask how many of your enquiries came from people who already knew your name. If it is nearly all of them, your website is serving word of mouth, not growing it.
Give marketing its own accounts in Xero. Split SEO and AEO, ads, content and software subscriptions, so you can see what each one costs each month instead of one blurry advertising line.
Record where every enquiry came from. Add a "how did you hear about us?" question to your booking form, and include "ChatGPT or another AI assistant" as an option. AI-referred enquiries are easy to miss if you never ask.
Work out your payback. Compare the monthly cost against the new clients it brings and what each client is worth. A channel that pays for itself in the first month, as in the hypnotist example, is a very different decision from one you are still hoping about a year later.

AI search visibility for small business is real, but it is still a business decision, and the books are where you find out whether it is working. If you want your marketing costs set up so you can actually see what pays, that is squarely a bookkeeping job. Book a free call and we will help you set it up in Xero.

Disclosure: Intrigue Digital and True Tally Bookkeeping share the same owner. The results above are Intrigue Digital's own account of a client outcome. Individual results vary.

Know a small business with a money lesson worth featuring in the Small Business Spotlight? Email info@truetally.com.au.