Yes — traditional SEO is still the foundation AI answer engines build on. Most AI assistants and AI Overviews source from the same organic index Google has always used, so rankings, backlinks, and technical health still drive whether you get pulled into an answer at all. GEO doesn't replace SEO; it adds a layer on top: structuring what's already ranking so it's easy for a model to extract and quote.
In our experience with Kando clients, the sites that show up in AI answers are almost always ones that were already ranking well organically. Skipping SEO to chase GEO tends to leave you with neither.