The Engine Blog
Strategy, research, and applied thinking from the intersection of search and AI. Written for founders and marketing leads who want to understand how organic growth actually works in 2026, not how it worked in 2018.
Google confirmed the google.com/goto redirect on 26 August 2026. Our AI citation capture went from 209 source URLs to zero in one week. What broke, and why.
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We counted every source Google AI Mode cited for 10 buying questions across 8 weeks. Reddit led on 8 of 10, LinkedIn on 8 of 10. Method and caveat inside.
Your AI search visibility score blends two unrelated questions. We publish our own numbers, including the weak half, and show how to split yours today.
AI engines don't punish AI content today. The incentives say a turn is coming. What the GEO reversion is, the signals behind it, and how to hedge now.
Rankings up, pipeline flat? Your SEO dashboard measures the clicked web and misses citations and mentions, the two AI-search metrics that decide who wins.
Your pages rank and AI answers still skip you. That is not an SEO problem, it is an entity problem. The diagnostic that tells you which one you have.
Your page ranks first and a lower page gets the AI citation. Ranking and citation are two different races. Here is the mechanism and the page-level fix.
A mention is your brand named inside an AI answer, and your website cannot earn it. Here is the off-page consensus mechanism that decides who gets named.
AI Mode cites the page it can reconstruct, not the best one. The four page-level layers that earn a citation, in the order the engine reads them.
Schema alone earns no AI citations. Entity coherence decides whether AI can assemble who you are. The audit, the failure modes, and a first-hand test.
Google's June 2026 spam update ran 24-26 June. What SpamBrain targets, what's out of scope, and the response plan by seat: consultant, agency, in-house.
AEO is filed under SEO, so half of it never gets done. The schema half is SEO; the half that gets you named in the AI answer is marketing. Here is the split.
Generative engine optimization (GEO) earns your brand a place inside AI answers, as a citation and a mention. How GEO differs from SEO, and how to start.
Featured snippet visibility fell 64% as AI Overviews took over. See what changed, whether snippets are dead, and how to win the AI Overview citation now.
Zero-click search ends without a click because the page answers in place. What it is, why it is exploding, and how to win it by being the answer AI cites.
Vet any SEO consultant in the Philippines with one fast test plus 6 real checks. A buyer's guide from an independent SEO consultant.
Real 2026 SEO pricing in the Philippines: what a credible retainer costs, the four things that move the price, and why the cheapest quote costs the most.
A 20-minute, repeatable test for whether ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews cite, mention, or ignore your content. Exact prompts and a log template.
AI Overviews are cutting clicks, but the drop is a diagnostic, not a death sentence. Here is how AI search is reshaping SEO and what still works.
Want to rank in Google AI Overviews? There is no trick. Here is the practical build order, an 8-step checklist, and how AI picks which sources to cite.
Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) earns your brand a citation inside AI answers, not just a link. Here's what AEO is and the build order to actually do it.
Rankings can hold while traffic falls. Track all three layers, position, AI-answer presence, and share of voice, with a free routine you can run today.
What SEO services in the Philippines actually include, what they cost in pesos, and a 10-second test to vet any provider before you pay.
SERP optimization is no longer tuning one snippet. It is winning the whole modern SERP: AI Overview, snippet, PAA, local pack, organic. Here is how, and how to measure it.
AI reshaped three SEO workflows at the root - keyword research, content production, and reporting - and left two unchanged that now matter more. Here is the line.
Eleven named failure modes that should each block a publish before it ships, built for the AI-citation era. The pre-publish content gate, not another tips list.
A named, ordered diagnostic for why AI engines won't cite your site. Six blocks, four on-page and two off-page, and the two that actually decide it.
Ranking and AI citation have decoupled. Here is how AI engines choose who to cite, the third-party surface that decides it, and how to build it.
AEO and GEO aren't synonyms. They optimize for different AI surfaces. Here is the Surface-Distinction Model and priority stack for 2026 practitioners.
AI Mode rewards citations and mentions through different mechanisms. Here is the operator's split, and the measurement nobody is talking about.
PH CPRA, ABA, SRA, and AU ASCR all permit the same content: dignified, factual, with named author. That is exactly what AI engines cite. Read the rules carefully.
Schema markup stopped being about rich snippets and became how AI engines parse your authority. Most boutique firms deploy it wrong, or not at all. Here is the fix.
77.67% of legal queries trigger AI Overviews. When AI can't verify your firm, it routes prospects to directory listings. Here's the boutique fix.
73% of law firms suffer entity fragmentation - the root cause of AI invisibility. Most agencies treat the symptoms. Here's the diagnosis boutiques need.
We're offering six months of SEO with no upfront cost. The natural question is: what's the catch? There is no catch. There is a condition. GE PH only enters RNPL engagements where the diagnostic work…
We do not build links in Month 1 or Month 2. Here is why. A client came to us having spent six months with a previous agency. The agency had built links every month from Day 1. The reporting showed…
Six months in. You are still getting reports. Still no rankings. The reports look thorough. There are charts showing keyword movements. There is a section on technical fixes completed. There is a…
We use AI to write content. That is not a confession. It is the opening statement of this post, and it is stated directly because the agencies that pretend otherwise are doing their clients a…
"I've been doing SEO for months and nothing is moving." This is the single most common sentence we hear from new clients. They have published content, optimized titles, built some links. On paper,…
By Mark Buraga, Founder, Growth Engine PH A potential customer in Quezon City opens ChatGPT and types: "What's the best accounting firm near me?" Your firm ranks third on Google for that exact…
You rank number one. Your position has not moved. Nothing changed on your site. And your traffic dropped 35 percent. That is the experience thousands of business owners and SEO managers reported in…