Entity-based SEO
Entity-based SEO is optimizing around the things search engines and AI recognize, like your brand and products, as well as the words people type.
Entity-based SEO is optimizing your site and your presence around entities, the distinct things search engines and AI models recognize and keep facts about, as well as around keywords. Your brand is an entity. So are your products, your founders, your location and the category you sell in.
Keyword SEO asks "which words should this page rank for?" Entity-based SEO asks whether search engines know who you are, what you sell and what you're connected to. For AI search, the second question matters more, because the platforms describe brands from what they know about them.
How it differs from keyword SEO
A keyword approach builds a page for each phrase people search. An entity approach makes sure the facts about each thing are clear, consistent and connected. Search engines then match your pages to many ways of asking, including phrasings you never targeted, because they understand what the page is about.
For example, Kestrel Roasters used to have a separate page for each way people search for a roaster in Leeds or Yorkshire. Now it has one clear page about Kestrel the roaster, with its address, its founders, the farms it buys from and links to its listings elsewhere. Search engines and AI platforms can tie it all to one entity.
What the work involves
- Describing your brand, products and people plainly and the same way everywhere
- Adding structured data, such as Organization and Product markup, so machines can read the facts
- Connecting your profiles, directory listings and reference entries, like Wikidata, so they point to the same entity
- Writing about the things you're related to, such as your category, materials and places, in clear terms
- Earning mentions on other sites that describe you accurately
Why it matters for AI answers
AI platforms answer from what they know about the entities in the question, plus what they read when they search. If they're clear about who you are and what you do, they can name you for questions you never wrote a page for. If they're not, they may confuse you with someone else or leave you out.
In AnswerOrbit
Add every name and spelling your customers use under Names in Settings. If another business shares your name, open Matching to tell us which answers are about you. Claims checks what the answers say about you against your facts. See Settings and Claims.