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AI & GEO

What Is Information Gain?

Information gain is how much genuinely new information a page adds beyond what already ranks for the same query. Search and AI systems increasingly favour sources that contribute something the existing results do not, rather than sources that restate the consensus competently.

Why Information Gain matters for SEO

It explains why a well-optimised page that says exactly what the current top ten say can rank and still earn nothing. In AI answers the effect is sharper: a model constructing an answer has no reason to cite a source that adds nothing it already has from three other pages.

Pro tip on Information Gain

Add something only you can supply: original data, a first-hand test, a specific number, a defensible position. Before publishing, read the current top five results and ask what your page contains that none of them do. If the answer is nothing, the page has no information gain regardless of its optimisation.

Related terms

Atomic FactsAtomic facts are the extractable units information gain is measured inAI CitationInformation gain is one of the strongest predictors of whether a page gets cited

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LLM SEO: ranking in AI answers

Information gain is a content property, but it only pays if the page is crawlable and indexed. CrawlRaven checks the technical foundation underneath it.

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