Free cheat sheet · September 2026 edition
26 concepts that decide whether AI cites you or names your competitor.
Get The Search Engine Cheat Sheet, free. SEO, AEO, and GEO in plain English, plus a new-article checklist built on LinkedIn’s own August 2026 guidance for AI search visibility.
You get it instantly. No spam, one-click unsubscribe, and I never sell your address. Privacy policy here.
Why this matters now
60% of Google searches now end without a click.
AI referral traffic jumped 357% in a year. When someone asks ChatGPT who’s best in your category, the AI either names you or names your competitor.
What you get
A Rosetta Stone for the three search engines you now compete on.
The 26 terms you need to speak fluently.
SEO, SERP, SXO, indexing, bounce rate, site health — defined in language you can use in a meeting tomorrow, not a glossary you have to decode.
The difference between being on the page and being quoted.
SEO gets you onto the results page. AEO gets your answer pulled into the AI response itself. The cheat sheet shows you where each one lives.
The GEO layer most teams haven’t staffed yet.
Generative Engine Optimization — how your content gets structured so AI-powered tools surface it instead of a competitor’s.
A new-article checklist you can actually run.
Built on LinkedIn’s own August 2026 guidance on AI search visibility and the structural analysis behind it. Publish with it open.
Why it matters now
Optimize for one engine and you’re invisible where it counts.
Google still processes billions of searches a day, but “search” no longer means just Google. Your content now competes across traditional search engines, AI answer platforms, and LinkedIn’s 360Brew algorithm. Each plays by different rules.
The bigger shift isn’t that a trend died. It’s that the job changed. You can’t just rank anymore — you have to be the source the answer is built from.
60%
of Google searches now end without a click
+357%
AI referral traffic growth in a year
3,000 → 300
typical LinkedIn article views per Tom’s own account
Who wrote it
Someone who has shipped the work, not just read about it.
Tom’s portrait
Headshot asset to be supplied by Tom.
Tom Doherty is a GTM strategist and product marketing expert with three decades in the trenches at Hewlett-Packard, Cisco, Microsoft, Workday, and Automation Anywhere. He is the author of The AI-Accelerated Playbook Series™, published in the Product Marketing Alliance, and writes to roughly 31,000 people on LinkedIn.
- Pragmatic Institute–trained · Certified Scrum Product Owner · PMA AI for Product Marketing Certified
- Author of The AI-Accelerated Search Playbook (SEO, AEO, and LinkedIn 360Brew)
- “An RPA Primer” was the most downloaded eBook ever for Automation Anywhere
What happens next
Instant access, then four short emails.
Enter your details and the cheat sheet is yours immediately. After that you’ll get a short series from the Monday Morning Marketer that walks through how to use it — then the weekly newsletter and Tom’s AI Tools Review.
Step 1. Get the PDF immediately.
Step 2. Four short emails showing you how to apply it.
Step 3. Optional weekly newsletter. Unsubscribe in one click, any time.
Straight answers
Before you enter your email.
Is it actually free? What’s the catch?
It’s free. The catch is that you’ll hear from me by email — a short series, then the weekly newsletter. If that isn’t useful, unsubscribe in one click.
How long is it, and how long does it take to read?
It’s a cheat sheet, not a book. Twenty-six concepts plus a checklist — you can read it in one sitting and keep it open while you publish.
Is this just for SEO specialists?
No. It’s written for the person who has to make the content show up — product marketers, content leads, founders, and marketing managers. Zero jargon you can’t act on.
Do you sell or share my email?
Never. It’s used to send you the cheat sheet and the follow-up emails. You can unsubscribe at any time, and the privacy policy is short and readable.
Get it now
Be the source AI pulls from.
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. I never sell your address.