An AEO agency helps a business improve how it appears in answer-based search. In a useful engagement, that means finding the questions potential customers ask and improving the information available to answer them. It also means checking whether those efforts produce anything your business values.
The name on the proposal tells you surprisingly little about the work underneath it.
One agency may spend most of its time rewriting your website. Another may sell you a dashboard and a monthly call. Both can describe the offer as answer engine optimization. Before you sign anything, find out what changes after the first invoice.
The agency needs to understand the sale
Imagine you sell software for commercial cleaning companies. A broad question about running a business might bring you some attention. A question about scheduling recurring jobs across several locations is much closer to the problem your software solves.
That distinction should shape the engagement.
Ask the agency which questions it would investigate and why. It should be able to connect them to a customer you want. Your sales team can help here. The questions that keep coming up before a deal closes are a better starting point than a spreadsheet of every phrase containing your category name.
For this hypothetical software company, the agency might investigate how buyers compare scheduling options and whether the website explains recurring-job support. It should also check whether the answer depends on the customer’s plan. Publishing an enthusiastic “yes” that applies to only your most expensive tier creates a new problem.
You should receive a record of the starting point
An agency can test relevant questions in ChatGPT or another agreed platform and record what appears. It should preserve enough context that someone else can understand the observation later.
A useful record includes the question and date, with the answer and cited sources. Where a platform offers different modes, the record should identify the mode used. Repeated observations are more informative than the single answer that made the best slide.
This is a sample of behavior under those conditions. It doesn’t establish what every prospective customer sees.
You also need a record of the website itself. If the agency proposes rewriting a page, save the original and note the change. Otherwise, a later improvement becomes difficult to connect even tentatively to the work performed.
The work has to reach your website
An audit can identify a missing comparison page. Someone still needs to write it and get it published.
This is where scope gets slippery. “Content optimization” could mean the agency writes finished copy. It could also mean you receive a list of suggestions and your already-busy marketing manager gets another job.
Ask for a sample deliverable. It can be anonymized. You want to see how a recommendation turns into an action someone can complete.
For the cleaning-software example, a useful assignment might be to revise the recurring-jobs documentation so it states which plans support the feature and shows an approved example. The agency should identify who supplies the facts and who approves the copy. Publication needs an owner as well.
Five new articles are easy to count. A corrected explanation on a page buyers already visit may be the better use of the budget.
Reporting should help you make the next decision
In February 2026, Microsoft introduced an AI Performance report with citation data in Bing Webmaster Tools. That provides one source of first-party evidence for supported Microsoft experiences. It doesn’t represent the whole AI search market. Microsoft’s announcement explains what the report covers.
Your agency should be clear about the source and limits of the numbers it presents. A citation count can show that content was referenced. It cannot tell you whether the visitor became a good customer.
A useful discussion might be that a page is being cited but attracting the wrong inquiries. You could then revise the page’s explanation of who the service fits. That is a decision the work can support.
A practical way to compare proposals
Ask each provider to answer the same questions in writing. A concise proposal should make the work, ownership and limits easy to compare.
| What to compare | What the proposal should say |
|---|---|
| Scope | Which buyer questions, platforms, pages and sources are included, and what is outside the engagement. |
| Approval | Who supplies product facts, reviews claims and approves copy before publication. |
| Implementation owner | Who writes, edits, publishes and makes technical changes, including any work assigned to your team or another provider. |
| Measurement | What observations will be recorded, how often they can be repeated, and how visibility will be distinguished from visits and qualified inquiries. |
| Exit deliverables | Which finished copy, research records, change logs and account data you keep if the engagement ends. |
For example, a defined first 30 days might include an agreed question set, a dated record of baseline answers and cited sources, review of three priority pages, one approved page rewrite, and a handoff note identifying follow-up work. Those are example deliverables, not a standard package or a promise that the pages will be cited within 30 days. A proposal should replace the example with the work your team has actually agreed to buy.
Put responsibilities in the proposal
Before signing, have the agency name the person responsible for implementation and the outputs included in the fee. Agree on how you’ll review the work and what you retain if the engagement ends.
If you already employ an SEO agency, introduce the teams before they start changing the same pages. Your business shouldn’t have to referee conflicting instructions after both invoices arrive.
You can use our AEO services page to see how an engagement can be divided into specific pieces. Whatever provider you choose, make sure the proposal gives your team enough detail to decide whether those pieces are worth buying.