As SEOs, we used to optimize for “Google.” Now we optimize for “The Models.” But GPT-4 (OpenAI) and Claude (Anthropic) behave differently. They have different “personalities” and retrieval preferences.

GPT: The Structured Analyst

GPT models tend to prefer highly structured data.

• Loves: Markdown tables, bullet points, JSON chunks, clear headers.
• Hates: Long-winded ambiguity.
• Optimization: Use key: value pairs in your text. “Price: $50.” “Speed: Fast.”

Claude: The Academic Reader

Claude models have a massive context window and are fine-tuned for “Helpfulness and Honesty.”

Claude, the AI model from Anthropic, is designed differently from GPT. It is built with Constitutional AI, a framework that prioritizes being “Helpful, Harmless, and Honest.” Optimizing for Claude means aligning with these values.

The Harmlessness Filter

Claude is extremely sensitive to safety and harmlessness. Content that is overly aggressive, salesy, potentially manipulative, or adversarial often triggers Claude’s safety refusals or down-ranking.

Claude-EO Strategy: Soften the tone.

• Avoid: “Dominating the market,” “Crushing the competition,” “Exploiting loopholes.”
• Use: “Leading the market,” “Outperforming peers,” “Leveraging efficiencies.”

The Honesty Filter

Claude is trained to reject hallucination and unverified claims. It prefers uncertainty markers (“It is likely that…”) over false confidence (“It is 100% certain…”). If your content makes wild claims without citation, Claude might flag it as “potentially misleading” during its internal reasoning process and choose a safer source.