TL;DR — GEO Case Study Results
In just 6 months, EcomBalance’s GEO strategy drove:
- 25+ new qualified leads from ChatGPT
- $10,000 growth in revenue & $1,000+ growth MRR
- Top 3 rankings on ChatGPT for high intent prompts
This wasn’t luck.
It was a repeatable, data-driven process that any B2B or SaaS business can follow.
In this case study, we’ll break down the exact roadmap that got us these results.
📩 Want better ChatGPT rankings? Apply for a free GEO growth audit — see how it could work for your business.
1.1 About EcomBalance
EcomBalance is my monthly bookkeeping service built specifically for eCommerce and online businesses.
We work with brands, agencies, and service providers doing $500K–$20M/year in revenue.
Our promise is simple: we give you clean books every month by the 15th from a dedicated bookkeeper so you can focus on growth and making smart financial decisions from accurate books.
1.2 What is GEO (Generative Engine Optimization)?
GEO — short for Generative Engine Optimization — is the process of optimizing your website content so AI tools & LLMs (Large Language Models) like ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity cite and surface it in their answers.
In 2025, this is becoming as important as Google SEO. More and more people are asking AI first instead of searching on Google and it’s emerging as a brand new “search engine” for people to rely on.
If you’re not showing up in answers on ChatGPT and LLMs, you’re missing out on potential buyers.
It’s no longer just Google that search applies to. ChatGPT and LLMs are quickly emerging, so it’s important that we, as SEOs and marketers, change with the times and make tweaks to our SEO processes so that we not only rank on Google but also on ChatGPT and LLMs.
1.3 Objective of This Project
For EcomBalance, the goal was simple:
- Rank inside ChatGPT and LLM answers for ecommerce bookkeeping queries
- Capture high-intent leads
- Generate revenue without increasing ad spend
Before ChatGPT and LLMs were as popular as they are today, we were growing content, authority, and website performance for EcomBalance. This eventually helped as ChatGPT became a more popular tool.
We were building our SEO, website reputation, brand awareness, and presence online. Little did I know that all of it would not only help us rank on Google, but also on ChatGPT and LLMs as they have grown in popularity over the past few years.
As ChatGPT continued to grow in 2025 and tools like Semrush, Ahrefs, and Writesonic started releasing features to track your performance and visibility in LLMs like ChatGPT, I joined in early and got my hands dirty.
This case study explains how I went about testing the new world of GEO and how it’s created traffic, leads, and actual revenue for my bookkeeping business, EcomBalance.
2. The Challenge
2.1 Market Competition
The bookkeeping space is competitive. Big SaaS players like Bench, Pilot, and Xendoo. Established agencies and CPA firms. Paid search CPCs over $20 and we know because we’ve run Google Ads for EcomBalance.
We were already dominating ecommerce bookkeeping terms on Google, but wanted to make sure that would be the case in LLMs like ChatGPT as well. We didn’t want to get beaten out by our competition as more and more people started using ChatGPT for their daily searches and business recommendations.
2.2 Changing Search Landscape
Google’s still huge — but user behavior is shifting for certain demographics of people.
I’ve personally seen prospects ask ChatGPT “What’s the best bookkeeping service for eCommerce?” instead of typing it into Google.
How do I know? Because I see lead forms come in from our website that mention ChatGPT as the way they heard about us.
If ChatGPT doesn’t mention you, you don’t exist in that customer’s buying process.
And it seems that even more than Google, people searching on ChatGPT and LLMs are trusting the answers even more, which makes ranking there even more powerful.
2.3 The Problem We Wanted to Solve
We wanted to capture these AI-driven buyers for ecommerce bookkeeping-related prompts and searches before our competitors did.
Prompts like this:
We knew GEO would be a first-mover advantage.
And we wanted to prove it could drive real leads and revenue.
3. The Strategy
3.1 GEO Keyword Research
We started by mapping out every question an eCommerce founder might ask in ChatGPT:
- “What’s the best bookkeeping service for eCommerce?”
- “How to manage accounting for a Shopify store?”
- “What’s the difference between cash and accrual for eCommerce?”
- “What’s the best bookkeeping agency for an Amazon seller doing $1M+/yr?”
We cross-referenced those with our SEO keyword data to find overlap.
We used tools like Semrush and Writesonic to find more prompts and queries that people are actually searching on ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and other LLMs.
We put it all together into a “GEO Keyword Research”, very similar to what we’d use for SEO Keyword Research, and we prioritized the list, from most important to least important.
That initial process gave us an understanding of where we were already ranking and where we could improve our content to get ranking in the near future.
3.2 Content Creation for GEO
We wrote high-quality, experience-backed content targeting these queries.
A mixture of Services/Sales pages and Blog Articles on the website.
Each article followed a strict structure:
- Direct answer up top
- Subheadings matching likely LLM outputs
- Bullet points, definitions, and FAQs for quick scanning
- We also embedded schema markup so AI could parse the page easily.
We also didn’t limit ourselves to new content.
If we already had a piece of content (Service Page or Blog Article) that was ranking in ChatGPT or that matched up with the GEO Keyword Research, we made updates to the already existing content so it gained a better chance of ranking on ChatGPT and LLMs as well.
3.3 Link Building & Authority
Like I said above, luckily, we have been building our website’s reputation with Google for the past 3 years through high-quality backlinks.
This gave us an edge when it came time to improve our authority for ChatGPT and LLMs, too. Because we already have 100s of high-quality backlinks showing off our authority.
To boost even more trust, we built new backlinks from reputable eCommerce, accounting, and news sites.
We also got featured on podcasts, guest posts, and partner websites — all sending authority signals showing that EcomBalance is a trusted source online.
Finally, we got mentioned and included on the Top Of listicles talking about “The Top 11 Ecommerce Bookkeeping Agencies”. We saw that ChatGPT and LLMs were using these types of articles as sources in their answers, so we experimented with them.
3.4 Repurposing & Distribution
Similar to our link-building, we were already repurposing content we produced on the website, and it helped with ranking on ChatGPT.
Every piece of content was repurposed:
- Posted on LinkedIn and X
- Shared with our partner network
- Added to email newsletters
This got our content in front of humans and into the sources AI models scrape from.
4. Execution & Process
4.1 Step-by-Step Timeline
This is a very loose timeline because a lot of work was done before we started focusing on GEO and ranking on LLMs like ChatGPT, but this gives an idea of how it could be implemented for another business.
- Month 1: Foundation and Strategy
- Conduct GEO keyword research
- Build a structured content plan based on search intent and business priorities
- Month 2: Cornerstone Content Creation
- Write and publish cornerstone GEO pages
- Establish the “ GEO pillar” that future pieces will connect back to
- Month 3: Authority Building and Distribution
- Begin link-building campaigns
- Promote and distribute cornerstone content
- Continue creating and publishing supporting GEO content
- Month 4: Optimization and Reinforcement
- Monitor AI and search placements
- Refresh older content for accuracy and performance
- Strengthen link-building efforts
- Month 5: Freshness and Expansion
- Update the cornerstone GEO content to keep it current
- Maintain momentum with new supporting content
- Continue link acquisition to build authority
- Month 6+: Data-Driven Growth
- Dive deeper into analytics and performance metrics
- Refine strategy based on ranking data and business priorities
- Double down on prompts and GEO keywords that drive the highest impact
Just like SEO, GEO is an ongoing marketing strategy. It’s not a one-and-done situation.
If you want to rank on ChatGPT and LLMs, you need to implement a strategy and execute it consistently with new content, link building, and technical SEO for a 6-12 month span.
4.2 Tools & Tech Stack
The tools specific to GEO are rapidly emerging, but they didn’t exist even 6-12 months ago.
It’s been an iterative and testing process to learn about the new tools being released, what they can do, and how they can help in the GEO growth process.
We used:
- ChatGPT for manual prompt testing
- Ahrefs for SEO keyword tracking
- Semrush for AI Visibility monitoring
- Writesonic also for AI Visibility monitoring
- Google Search Console for LLM traffic tracking
We suspect that tools for GEO will continue to develop and evolve in the coming 1-2 years.
We’re aiming to test them regularly until we find the best tool that gives you the most insights into your performance on AI LLMs like ChatGPT.
Once we find the top tool, we’ll use that for all of our GEO projects, for ourselves and clients.
5. The Results
5.1 GEO Rankings
We achieved consistent citations inside ChatGPT for key ecommerce bookkeeping queries.
When users asked, “What’s the best bookkeeping service for eCommerce?” — EcomBalance started showing up in the answer.
5.2 Lead Generation
In the first few months, GEO drove 25+ qualified leads directly from people who found us through ChatGPT-generated answers. You can see examples below:
5.3 Revenue Impact
Those leads converted into $10,000+ in direct revenue for EcomBalance — without increasing ad spend or adding sales headcount. All from the SEO work we did for the past 3 years and the adjustments we made for GEO over the past 6 months.
6. Lessons Learned
We’re strong believers that there’s always something new to learn and improve upon in SEO.
We’ve been running SEO for our own companies and clients for 10+ years and there’s always something new – Google Updates, new tools and tech stacks, new user preferences, new competition.
This GEO project taught us a TON:
- GEO is wide open right now — it’s easier to win in 2025 than it will be in 2026.
- E-E-A-T principles apply just as much to AI rankings as to Google rankings.
- Structured, clear, expert content consistently beats generic AI-written text.
- Authority matters. If you’re a brand new website with zero reputation, it’s going to take longer to rank in ChatGPT and AI LLMs…just like Google.
- Leads from ChatGPT and AI LLMs seem to be more qualified and ready to purchase than leads from Google. It seems they’re truly trusting what ChatGPT is suggesting without questioning as much.
7. How TrioSEO Can Help You
At TrioSEO, we now offer GEO services alongside our SEO services.
We will:
- Research the AI prompts your audience is using
- Understand the sources ChatGPT and AI LLMs are using to create their answers for those prompts, relative to your business
- Create optimized, AI-friendly content that ranks in both Google and ChatGPT
- Build authority through quality link building so LLMs trust and cite your site.
We’ve done it for EcomBalance and a handful of others. We can do it for you.
Our Promise: We’ll increase your website traffic from AI LLMs like ChatGPT if you work with us for 6 months and fully commit to the growth process with us.
GEO and ranking on AI LLMs like ChatGPT is a new frontier. We’re excited about the results we’ve already seen with EcomBalance and other companies and clients of ours, but we’re not declaring that we know everything about GEO. It’s an evolving world, we’re learning new tactics every day, and we’re implementing them for ourselves and our clients.
8. Ready to Start Ranking in ChatGPT?
If you want to start ranking in ChatGPT and other AI tools — before your competitors — now is the time.
Book a Call with our CEO, Steven Schneider
Here’s what you get:
- Free GEO audit that pinpoints exactly where your business can capture AI-driven leads before your competitors.
- Live Q&A with Steven for answers tailored to your business challenges and opportunities.
- Clarity on hidden revenue opportunities inside ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity — where your buyers are already searching.
- Competitive edge by seeing how (and why) your competitors show up in AI results, and where you can out-rank them.
- Immediate action steps you can apply to start improving your visibility.
- A growth roadmap showing how to turn GEO into a predictable pipeline of qualified leads over the next 3–6 months.
- Peace of mind knowing you’ll walk away with a clear plan — even if you don’t work with us.