20-Point Checklist

2026 AI Search & GEO Readiness Checklist

The definitive technical verification checklist to ensure your website is primed for AI search engines, citation retrieval, and answer overviews.

[Technical]Enforce HTTPS with modern TLS certificates and valid HSTS headers

[Technical]Explicitly allow User-agent: GPTBot in robots.txt

[Technical]Explicitly allow User-agent: ClaudeBot in robots.txt

[Technical]Explicitly allow User-agent: PerplexityBot in robots.txt

[Technical]Ensure <link rel="canonical"> exactly matches the requested HTTPS origin

[Technical]Verify robots meta does not contain noindex, nofollow, or none

[Technical]Declare XML Sitemap URL in robots.txt

[Technical]Deliver core text in raw HTML rather than client-only JavaScript

[Content]Include exactly one clear H1 heading with explicit product/service entity

[Content]Follow structured sequential heading hierarchy (H1 -> H2 -> H3)

[Content]Provide clear value proposition within the first 300 words

[Content]Provide at least 450 words of substantive explanatory text on core pages

[Content]Add direct question-and-answer pairs for common user questions

[Content]Provide distinct descriptive title tag between 30 and 65 characters

[Content]Provide unique meta description summarizing key capabilities

[Structured Data]Embed valid JSON-LD without syntax or parser errors

[Structured Data]Provide Organization schema with name, url, and sameAs links

[Structured Data]Provide WebSite schema with potentialAction

[Structured Data]Provide FAQPage schema matching visible on-page questions

[Structured Data]Maintain consistency between visible page copy and schema properties

Our audit engine tests these rules automatically and generates customized fix templates.