As AI-powered search continues to evolve, businesses and SEO professionals are racing to understand how to rank in Google AI Overviews and other generative search experiences (SGE). In July 2025, Google made an official clarification at its Search Central Deep Dive event in the Asia-Pacific region that directly impacts the SEO community.

Key takeaway: To rank in AI Overviews, you don’t need new frameworks like LLMS.txt, GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), or LLMO. What you need is normal SEO — the same core strategies Google has always encouraged for traditional organic search.

In this article, we break down everything you need to know about Google’s recent position, what it means for your current SEO strategy, how AI Overviews ingest and rank content, and why normal SEO is still the most powerful strategy.

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Google’s Official Position on SEO for AI Overviews

At the Search Central Deep Dive event, Google’s Gary Illyes stated clearly: “To get your content to appear in AI Overview, simply use normal SEO practices. You don’t need GEO, LLMO, or anything else.“

This quote was shared publicly by Kenichi Suzuki on LinkedIn and confirms that Googlebot continues to crawl, index, and rank content for AI Overviews the same way it does for regular organic results.

While there has been a lot of speculation about new file types like LLMS.txt or emerging frameworks like Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), Google is keeping things simple — at least for now.

This reinforces Google’s long-standing position that SEO best practices based on content quality, technical crawlability, semantic structure, and user intent are still the foundation of success.

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What is LLMS.txt and Why Google Won’t Use It

The idea behind LLMS.txt (Large Language Model Systems text) is to give site owners a way to control how AI models crawl or use their content. It’s a proposed standard — similar in concept to robots.txt — but targeted at AI crawlers like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Perplexity.

According to Illyes, Google will not support LLMS.txt. During the Q&A, he stated, “Google doesn’t support LLMS.txt and isn’t planning to.“ This confirms that Google AI Overviews do not depend on LLMS.txt, and that Googlebot is still the gatekeeper.

That said, other LLM-based engines — like OpenAI’s crawler — do appear to be pinging LLMS.txt. Ray Martinez posted log file evidence showing OpenAI crawling LLMS.txt every 15 minutes.

This suggests that LLMS.txt may be relevant for ChatGPT, Perplexity, or other AI systems, but not for Google’s AI Overviews.

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How Content Gets into Google AI Overviews

To rank in an AI Overview snippet, your content must meet the same fundamental requirements used in Google Search:

• Crawlability: Googlebot must be able to access and render your content
• Indexability: Pages should be indexed and discoverable
• Authority & Trust: E-E-A-T (Expertise, Experience, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) remains essential
• Clarity of Intent: The content should answer common questions clearly and concisely
• Structured Formatting: Headers, schema markup, and semantic language help with summarization

While AI Overviews may present content in a more synthesized or conversational format, the ranking signals are not fundamentally different from standard Google Search.

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What This Means for GEO and Advanced SEO Frameworks

Over the past year, SEO professionals have embraced concepts like Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) and Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) to prepare for LLM-driven search. These strategies often involve:

• Optimizing for semantic relationships
• Using question-based headers and answer-first content
• Implementing multi-type schema markup (e.g., Article + FAQ + HowTo)
• Structuring site-wide topical clusters for AI interpretation

So do these frameworks still matter?

Yes — but not because Google requires them. Instead, these techniques can improve how well your content is understood, especially in voice search, ChatGPT Search, or Perplexity. While Google AI Overviews don’t require GEO, the principles of clarity, structure, and topical authority complement Google’s normal SEO expectations.

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Should You Still Use LLMS.txt for Other AI Engines?

Although Google won’t crawl LLMS.txt, other LLMs might. OpenAI has been seen actively reading LLMS.txt files to determine what content it can crawl, summarize, or train on.

If you’re concerned about how your content is used by generative AI models, it’s worth adding a well-structured LLMS.txt file to your root directory. But again, this has no impact on Google rankings.

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What SEO Professionals Should Do Now

Here’s what you should focus on moving forward:

• Stick to Google’s core SEO principles: Clean technical structure, helpful content, good UX
• Use schema and structured content: Schema may help your content get pulled into AI formats
• Don’t abandon emerging frameworks: GEO and AEO strategies are useful across platforms, even if not mandatory for Google
• Track AI visibility: Use server logs to monitor AI crawlers and check for visibility in SGE, AI Overviews, and tools like ChatGPT

The bottom line: If you’re already doing good SEO, you’re already optimizing for AI Overviews.

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Dexora Digital’s Perspective on SEO After Google’s July 2025 Clarification

At Dexora Digital, we welcomed Google’s July 2025 confirmation that normal SEO is all that’s needed to rank in AI Overviews. As an agency at the forefront of AI-first search strategies, our stance has always been rooted in foundational SEO — enriched by clarity, context, and structured data.

This clarification validates our ongoing approach: helping businesses win in both traditional and AI-powered environments using E-E-A-T-driven frameworks, schema-enhanced content, and entity-linked topical authority. While many in the industry rushed to embrace new speculative formats like LLMS.txt, we continued refining structured, human-first content optimized for real intent — the type Google continues to reward.

Dexora remains focused on three pillars:

1. Solid SEO Infrastructure: Clean crawl paths, mobile performance, and technical accessibility remain our baseline.
2. Semantic Structuring: Internal linking strategies, NLP-based keyword clusters, and question-answer formatting help both Google and users make sense of site content.
3. Cross-AI Optimization: While Google ignores LLMS.txt, platforms like ChatGPT and Perplexity are increasingly AI-crawling and surfacing brand content. We tailor site architecture and metadata for visibility in both verticals.

In our post-July 2025 roadmap, we advise clients to:

• Continue implementing structured data on all content types
• Build domain-level topical authority by linking content clusters logically
• Avoid overengineering content for AI with unnecessary file types that Google does not support
• Focus on clarity, expertise, and verifiability above gimmicks

Our goal remains unchanged: make your site the best result available, no matter which engine is answering the query.

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FAQs About Normal SEO, AI Overviews, and LLMS.txt

Do I need to create an LLMS.txt file for Google?
No. Google confirmed it does not crawl or support LLMS.txt. Focus on standard SEO instead.

Will normal SEO really help me rank in AI Overviews?
Yes. Google confirmed that AI Overviews rely on the same crawl/index/rank process used in traditional Google Search.

What about SGE and other AI search features — do they require special formatting?
While not required, structured content (like FAQ schema or HowTo blocks) can improve the chance of being featured.

Should I stop using GEO or AEO strategies now?
No. These strategies still enhance content clarity and performance in non-Google LLMs. They also align with Google’s principles.

Is LLMS.txt useful for OpenAI or ChatGPT?
Yes. Evidence shows that OpenAI crawls LLMS.txt to determine what to access or exclude from summaries or training.

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Final Thoughts: Normal SEO Still Reigns

Despite the hype around new file formats and optimization frameworks, Google has made one thing clear — AI Overviews are powered by the same search ecosystem that traditional rankings come from.

So if you’re wondering how to appear in AI Overviews, stop overthinking it. Focus on what already works:

• High-quality content that serves the user
• Technical SEO that enables crawling and indexing
• Structured formatting that supports clarity

Normal SEO isn’t dead — in fact, it’s more relevant than ever.

If you’re ready to audit your current strategy or need help aligning your site with Google’s latest standards for AI and search, Dexora Digital offers E-E-A-T driven, future-proof SEO strategies that perform across both traditional and AI-powered platforms.

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