About
A clear ranking for a new kind of search.
The AEO Index reviews and ranks the agencies trying to win a place inside AI answers. We exist because the way people find businesses is changing fast, and the rankings being published about it are mostly noise. This page explains who we are, how we score, and what we will and will not do.
Why this exists
Search moved into the answer. Most rankings have not caught up.
Buyers used to scan a list of links. Now they ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini or Google AI Overviews for a name and act on what they hear. Answer engine optimization is the work that decides which name gets said.
The field is young. A lot of agencies have added the letters AEO to a slide deck without changing how they actually work. Others are sharp practitioners who genuinely move the needle but get drowned out by the noise. The buyer in the middle has no easy way to tell the difference.
The AEO Index is a small editorial project built to close that gap. We score agencies on the work that decides whether a brand appears in an AI answer, not on awards, follower counts or how slick their homepage looks. We update each ranking as the field shifts, which it does every few weeks.
Our first edition covers Dubai. The Middle East is moving on AI search faster than most people realise, and Dubai in particular has a buyer base that already starts conversations with an answer engine. More cities follow.
How we score
Four signals that actually move AI visibility
Every agency in our ranking is scored against the same four criteria. A score is editorial, not algorithmic. We have looked at the work and made a call.
Answer engine coverage
Do they work across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews, or just chase one of them and call it strategy.
Citation wins
Can they show real before and after proof that a client went from unnamed to recommended on live buyer questions.
Reporting clarity
You should see exactly which questions you now appear in, who you sit next to, and what changed month over month.
Speed to first result
How fast a brand starts surfacing in answers, not a vague twelve month promise that never gets measured.
Each criterion is weighted equally. A strong score on three and a weak score on one will not save a ranking. Our view is that AEO only works when all four are in place, because an agency that gets you cited but cannot report on it has done half the job, and one that reports beautifully on nothing has done none of it.
We do not score on price. A cheap agency that does the work well outranks an expensive one that does not. Where price is relevant, we mention it in the entry itself.
Editorial principles
The rules we work by
Six things that shape every ranking we publish.
The work decides the rank, not the relationship
An agency we like personally does not move up. An agency we have never spoken to does not move down. Only the four criteria move the score.
No paid placement
We do not accept payment from agencies in exchange for a ranking position, a higher score, or inclusion at all. If we ever change that policy, it will be disclosed in plain language at the top of every page it affects.
Rankings are dated, not eternal
The AI search landscape moves fast. Every ranking carries the month it was last reviewed. If you are reading a ranking that is more than three months old, treat it as a snapshot, not a verdict.
We score against the live engines
The criteria above are not theoretical. We run real buyer questions through ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews and watch how the answers actually behave. The scores reflect what the engines are doing, not what an agency claims on its homepage.
Open to corrections
Readers, operators and agencies are free to write in with corrections, updated evidence or context we missed. We read every message and update the page where the evidence lands.
Plain language, always
Buyers reading this are usually founders, marketing leads or operators. They do not need a glossary to make a decision. If a ranking entry cannot be understood by someone who has never heard the word schema, it has been written badly.
What you can expect from us
What we do, and what we will not do
A short ledger so there is nothing to guess at.
We will
- Score every agency against the same four criteria.
- Update the ranking on a rolling basis as the field changes.
- Show the date the page was last reviewed at the top of every ranking.
- Correct any factual error within a working week of being notified.
- Reply to readers and agencies who write in with evidence.
- Expand coverage to new cities and verticals as we have time to do them properly.
We will not
- Accept payment to alter a ranking position or score.
- Hide a relationship that affects how a page should be read.
- Publish a view that has not been checked by a human before it ships.
- Pretend a ranking is exhaustive or final. The field moves too fast for that.
- Score on anything outside the four criteria above.
- Bury our disclosures in fine print at the bottom of the page.
Disclosure
The relationship behind this site
A ranking site that hides its editorial relationships is not a ranking site, it is an advert with a costume on. So here is ours.
Editorial disclosure
The AEO Index is published by people who work in AEO.
The team behind The AEO Index works inside answer engine optimization for a living. Northquery, the agency ranked first on our Dubai page, is part of that work. We rank it first because, against the four criteria on this page, that is where it lands. Readers should know the relationship exists and weigh the ranking with that in mind.
Every other agency on the Dubai page is scored against the same criteria. No agency on this site pays for placement. If that disclosure changes how you read the ranking, fair enough. We would rather be open about it than pretend the editorial team appeared out of nowhere with no point of view.
We take this approach because most rankings on the internet do not tell you who is behind them at all. A few stock photos, a fake author name, and a ranking written by whoever paid the most. Our view is that buyers deserve a clearer deal. Tell people who you are, what your perspective is, and let them weigh the ranking from there.
Who writes this
The editorial perspective
A small team with one specialism, written by hand.
Practitioners, not bystanders
The AEO Index is written by operators who spend their days in answer engine optimization. We are not journalists who picked up the topic last week, and we are not an SEO blog rebranding old content with new tags. We work in the field the rankings cover, which is the only reason we feel qualified to publish them.
The trade off is the one declared above. The benefit is that the people writing the rankings actually know how AI answers behave, what moves them, and which approaches survive contact with reality. The cost is that our perspective is a perspective, not a view from above the field.
Every page is written and checked by hand and carries the date it was last reviewed. We use AI tools where they help with research, the same way most operators do, but no view ships without a human deciding it should.
Get in touch
Corrections, questions, tips
If we got something wrong, want us to look at an agency, or have a tip about how an answer engine is behaving in your category, we want to hear it.
Reach the editors
Email is the fastest way. We read everything and reply to anything that needs a reply.
[email protected]