#SEOisAEO: Episode 3 - Three Pillars of a Successful AEO Strategy - Jason Barnard with Kim Krause Berg, Rebecca Sentance & David Bain
Published by: Semrush. Host: Jason Barnard. Guests: David Bain, Rebecca Sentance, Kim Krause Berg. September 18, 2018
The third episode of the #SEOisAEO series moved from explaining why Answer Engine Optimization matters to exploring how a successful AEO strategy actually works.
Hosted by Jason Barnard and featuring David Bain, Rebecca Sentance, and Kim Krause Berg, the September 18, 2018 discussion examined the strategic foundations businesses need as search engines evolve from returning lists of links toward providing direct answers and recommendations.
At the centre of the conversation was Barnard’s three-pillar framework for AEO: Pertinence, Understanding, and Credibility.
The framework presents a straightforward progression. A business first needs to be pertinent to the user’s question. It then needs to communicate what it offers in a way that machines can understand. Finally, it needs to convince the search or answer engine that it is the best and most credible solution available. The transcript describes these three stages as identifying relevant answers, communicating those answers to Google in an understandable format, and convincing the engine to select the best solution.
From SEO to AEO: Building on a Strong Foundation
The discussion did not position AEO as a reason to abandon SEO.
Instead, the speakers explored how traditional SEO provides an important foundation for an AEO strategy, while businesses increasingly need to think beyond rankings, keywords, and links.
The fundamental shift is from asking “How do I rank this page?” to asking “How do I make my business the best answer to the user’s question?”
This means considering the entire journey from the user’s intent to the search engine’s understanding of the available answers and, ultimately, its decision about which answer to present.
Barnard’s framework captures that process through three questions:
Are we pertinent to the question?
Does the machine understand what we are offering?
Can we demonstrate that we are the best answer?
The three pillars - Pertinence, Understanding, and Credibility - provide the foundation for answering those questions.
Pertinence: Start With What the User Actually Wants
The first pillar is Pertinence.
Before a search engine can recommend a business, it needs to determine whether that business is a plausible answer to the user’s question. This goes beyond matching exact keywords. The engine needs to understand the intent behind the query and determine whether the business genuinely addresses that need.
Kim Krause Berg explored this idea through the broader context surrounding a search. Search engines can consider information about what people are doing, where they are, and what device they are using. Relevance is therefore influenced by much more than the words entered into a search box.
For businesses, this means content strategy should begin with the user rather than the keyword.
Instead of producing content simply because a particular phrase has search volume, marketers need to understand the problem behind the query. What is the person trying to accomplish? What information do they need? What would make one answer more useful than another?
The more accurately a business addresses the user’s underlying need, the stronger its relevance to that query.
Keywords Still Matter - But They Are Only the Beginning
The move toward AEO does not make traditional SEO signals irrelevant.
David Bain discussed the continuing role of keywords and links, particularly in helping search engines identify and consider relevant content.
Links, for example, can provide a strong signal that a page deserves consideration. Bain explained that the value of a link depends partly on the authority and relevance of the site providing it. A good content strategy that naturally earns relevant links can therefore help a page enter the consideration set for important queries.
But getting considered is not the same as being selected.
Once Google has identified potentially relevant content, other signals become increasingly important. If users do not engage with the content or find what they need, strong traditional signals alone may not be enough to maintain visibility.
Bain therefore positioned links as an important initial signal rather than an overarching ranking factor.
This creates an important distinction between traditional SEO and AEO:
SEO can help put your answer into consideration. AEO asks why the engine should choose it.
Understanding: Communicate Clearly With the Machine
The second pillar is Understanding.
Once a search engine knows what the user wants, the next challenge is determining what each potential answer actually offers.
Businesses therefore need to communicate clearly with the algorithms.
Barnard’s framework describes this as communicating the answer to Google in a format it can understand and potentially present on the appropriate device or channel.
This is where content structure, clarity, accessibility, and the way information is presented become increasingly important.
A business cannot simply assume that a search engine will understand its offering because the information exists somewhere on its website. The information needs to be communicated in a way that reduces ambiguity and makes the intended meaning clear.
Long-Form or Short-Form? Start With the User’s Need
Rebecca Sentance challenged another common assumption surrounding AEO: that content must always be short because it may eventually be delivered through voice search.
Her answer was more nuanced.
Content should be as long or as short as necessary to fulfil its purpose.
A detailed how-to guide needs enough depth to properly address the subject. A blog post should provide a complete treatment of its topic. The objective should not be to remove useful information simply to make a piece shorter.
The more important consideration is how that content is presented.
Sentance recommended testing content on mobile and voice search to understand how it is actually experienced by users. A responsive website can present both detailed and concise content effectively, while voice interfaces require publishers to understand which parts of their content are being surfaced.
She also made an important distinction between short content and readable content.
Readable content uses straightforward terminology, clear language, and an accessible structure. That makes it useful for audiences and beneficial for SEO, but readability does not require content to be short.
For longer resources containing multiple answers, Sentance suggested using headings and anchor links to help users navigate directly to the information they need. This allows a single comprehensive page to address several related questions without sacrificing depth.
Credibility: Convincing the Engine You Are the Best Answer
The third pillar is Credibility.
At this stage, the search engine has identified what the user wants and has found potential answers that are relevant and understandable.
Now it needs to decide:
Which answer should it choose?
Barnard described this as the stage where a business needs to convince Google that it is the best solution among the relevant options.
This is where credibility signals become critical.
Traditional SEO has often treated links as one of the strongest forms of authority. But the discussion demonstrated that credibility extends well beyond conventional link building.
Are Links Becoming Redundant?
Bain’s answer was clear: links are not redundant, but their role is changing.
A link can act as an initial signal that tells Google to consider a page. The authority and relevance of the linking website influence how meaningful that signal is.
But what happens after the page enters consideration matters.
Bain explained that Google may test how users respond to content against other pages already ranking. If people click through, engage with the page, and find what they need instead of returning to search for another answer, that user experience provides additional evidence that the content is satisfying the query.
This means a page cannot rely on links alone.
If users do not appreciate the content or cannot find the answer they need, strong links may not be enough to maintain its position. User experience therefore becomes part of the broader process of convincing the search engine that the content deserves to be selected.
Credibility Signals Go Beyond Links
Rebecca Sentance expanded the idea of credibility signals beyond traditional backlinks.
These can include positive mentions, linkless mentions, third-party reviews, and a presence in trusted databases.
A business does not necessarily need every mention to include a hyperlink for that reference to contribute to the wider information ecosystem surrounding the entity.
Third-party reviews can also provide important evidence. When people independently describe a business in consistent ways, those references contribute to the broader understanding of what that business is and whether it can be trusted.
The same applies to information across trusted databases and other authoritative sources.
The important distinction is that credibility cannot simply be self-declared.
A business can say it is trustworthy, authoritative, or an expert. But credibility becomes stronger when independent sources corroborate those claims.
Sentance emphasized the value of maintaining a consistent, factually correct presence across the internet. Every reliable reference provides another signal that can help an engine assess the credibility of the business and its information.
Accessibility Is Part of the Strategy
The discussion also connected AEO with accessibility and user experience.
Content cannot fulfil its purpose if people cannot access, understand, or interact with it.
The speakers discussed practical barriers that can interfere with this experience, including poor mobile presentation, intrusive elements, and obstacles placed between users and the information they came to find.
Accessibility therefore becomes more than a technical consideration. It is part of ensuring that the information a business wants to communicate is actually available to the people who need it.
This principle also matters to search engines. If content is difficult for users to access or understand, the business is making it harder to demonstrate that its answer genuinely satisfies the user’s need.
From Being Relevant to Becoming the Answer
The three pillars ultimately describe a progression.
Pertinence establishes whether a business is relevant to the user’s question.
Understanding determines whether the machine can clearly interpret what the business offers and the answer it provides.
Credibility gives the engine reasons to select that business over other relevant options.
This is why traditional SEO remains important, but it is no longer the complete strategy.
Keywords and links can help a business enter the conversation. But the business also needs to demonstrate relevance, communicate clearly, provide a good user experience, and establish credibility through evidence beyond its own website.
The strategy therefore moves from:
“Help Google find my page.”
to:
“Help Google understand why my business is the right answer.”
From AEO to the New Search Paradigm
The Episode 3 discussion also provides an early foundation for concepts that Jason Barnard has developed further over time.
The original AEO idea focused on moving beyond ranking pages toward becoming the answer an engine selects. The current framing on JasonBarnard.com extends this into the broader New Search Paradigm, where AI-powered systems increasingly synthesize information and recommend solutions rather than simply returning lists of links.
The page also describes AEO as evolving toward Assistive Engine Optimization, where the objective is increasingly to become a trusted solution within a conversational journey.
This evolution does not change the basic logic established in Episode 3.
A machine needs to understand what the user wants, what the available answers are, and which answer it can trust enough to recommend.
The Zero-Sum Moment: Why Being the Best Answer Matters
This becomes particularly important in an answer-driven environment.
When an engine selects one answer over another, the opportunity is no longer simply about occupying one position among ten blue links. If the engine chooses a competitor’s answer, that competitor may effectively become the narrative the user receives.
The Episode 3 page describes this as the Zero Sum Moment in AI: when an engine needs to choose the most useful and credible answer, one source’s gain can mean another source’s loss.
That makes credibility and differentiation increasingly important.
A business needs to give the engine a clear reason to choose its information rather than a competitor’s.
From Three Pillars to The Kalicube Process™
The three-pillar framework also became an important precursor to Jason Barnard’s later work.
The original vocabulary was Pertinence, Understanding, and Credibility. Jason later formalised the logic into the UCD model: Understandability, Credibility, and Deliverability, which sits at the core of The Kalicube Process.
The terminology evolved, but the underlying idea remained consistent: a brand needs to be understood, trusted, and ultimately selected by the machine.
That makes this 2018 discussion an important point in the development of Jason’s approach to AEO and the broader relationship between brands, search engines, and AI systems.
AEO Builds on SEO - It Does Not Replace It
The third episode of #SEOisAEO ultimately reinforced a simple but powerful principle: AEO is not about abandoning SEO. It is about building on its foundations.
Traditional SEO remains useful for helping search engines discover and consider content. But succeeding in an answer-driven environment requires businesses to go further.
They need to understand user intent.
They need to communicate clearly.
They need to make their information accessible and useful.
They need to provide a strong user experience.
And they need to build credibility through independent evidence, including links, mentions, reviews, and corroboration from trusted sources.
The three pillars provide a clear framework:
Pertinence: Be relevant to the question.
Understanding: Make it easy for the machine to understand your answer.
Credibility: Give the machine reasons to believe you are the best answer.
Together, these principles move SEO beyond the goal of simply ranking a page. They focus on the larger challenge of becoming the trusted answer an engine is confident enough to choose.
Event type: Online webinar
Series: #SEOisAEO - Answer Engine Optimization
Published by: Semrush
Host: Jason Barnard
Speakers: Jason Barnard, David Bain, Rebecca Sentance, Kim Krause Berg
Date: September 18, 2018
Topic: The Strategic Imperative: How to Educate the Algorithms to Win the Zero Sum Moment in AI
