What are the 48 AEO criteria?

The 48 criteria are organized into 5 pillars with fixed target shares: Answer Readiness 40%, Content Structure 25%, Trust & Authority 15%, Technical Foundation 10%, and AI Discovery 10%. Inside those pillars, criteria cover topic coherence, original data, depth, fact density, direct answers, Q&A structure, entity authority, freshness, visible dates, schema, semantic HTML, extraction friction, llms.txt, robots.txt, licensing, canonicals, sitemap coverage, and RSS. Each criterion is scored 0–10, converted into an effective weight after confidence and overlap controls, then rolled into the final score.

Do I need technical skills to improve my AEO Site Rank?

Some improvements — writing FAQ content, adding author bios — require zero technical skills. Others — deploying JSON-LD schema, modifying robots.txt — require basic HTML knowledge or developer access. Our Knowledge Base guides include code examples for each criterion. For hands-on help, we offer professional services.

What is the fastest way to improve my AI visibility?

Start with high-impact, low-effort wins: (1) Create an llms.txt file, (2) Add Organization JSON-LD to your homepage, (3) Update robots.txt to allow AI crawlers, (4) Add FAQPage schema to existing FAQ content. These four changes take under a day and typically produce noticeable improvements within weeks.

Can I implement AEO improvements on WordPress?

Yes. WordPress has excellent AEO support. Use Yoast SEO for schema markup, create llms.txt via FTP or a custom plugin, edit robots.txt through Yoast or directly, and build FAQ pages with Gutenberg blocks. Most WordPress themes already produce clean, crawlable HTML.

What is the minimum viable AEO setup for a new website?

Four things on day one: (1) Organization JSON-LD schema on every page, (2) a well-structured llms.txt at your domain root, (3) robots.txt explicitly allowing GPTBot, ClaudeBot, and PerplexityBot, (4) at least one FAQ page with FAQPage schema. This baseline takes a few hours and establishes the foundation everything else builds on.

notedsource.io - AEO Audit Report | 55/100

notedsource.io

Moderate AI visibility with 32 of 48 criteria passing. Biggest gap: comprehensive faq section.

HR & Workforce HR & Payroll Platforms

Scoring Methodology

How Your AEO Site Rank Is Calculated

A weighted average of 48 deterministic criteria. Each scored 0-10, each with a specific weight. No AI judgment calls - every point is traceable.

Weak visibilityOut of 100 possible points

The Formula

Score = sum(criterion_score / 10 * weight * 100) / sum(weights)

Each criterion is scored 0-10 by deterministic checks, multiplied by its weight, and summed to produce a 0-100 overall score.

Your Score Breakdown

Content9 criteria

Q&A Content Format15%3/10+4.5

FAQ Sections10%0/10+0.0

Original Data10%8/10+8.0

Content Freshness7%7/10+4.9

Direct Answer Paragraphs7%4/10+2.8

Fact & Data Density5%10/10+5.0

Definition Patterns4%9/10+3.6

Query-Answer Alignment8%0/10+0.0

Content Cannibalization5%10/10+5.0

Subtotal71%+33.8

Structure5 criteria

Schema.org JSON-LD15%9/10+13.5

Clean, Crawlable HTML10%9/10+9.0

Semantic HTML55%7/10+3.5

Table & List Extractability7%6/10+4.2

Schema Coverage3%9/10+2.7

Subtotal40%+32.9

Discovery5 criteria

llms.txt10%10/10+10.0

robots.txt for AI5%5/10+2.5

Internal Linking10%10/10+10.0

Sitemap Completeness5%10/10+5.0

RSS/Atom Feed3%10/10+3.0

Subtotal33%+30.5

Trust Signals6 criteria

Entity Authority10%6/10+6.0

Content Licensing4%2/10+0.8

Author & Expert Schema4%8/10+3.2

Canonical URL4%8/10+3.2

Content Velocity3%10/10+3.0

Visible Date Signals4%9/10+3.6

Subtotal29%+19.8

Overall Score100%55/100

Score Ranges

86-100AI-first content architecture

71-85Strong AI visibility

56-70Moderate visibility

41-55Weak visibility

26-40Minimal visibility

0-25Not on the radar

Key Points

Topic Coherence carries the highest weight at 14%, followed by Original Data at 10%, across 48 total criteria.

No HTTPS means Clean HTML is capped at 3/10, costing approximately 3-4 overall points.

Every criterion uses deterministic checks. Same site, same audit, same score - every time.

Read full scoring methodology →

↓7 since v11

Citation Avg

Answer Readiness

~40% weight

7/10

Content Structure

~25% weight

4/10

Trust & Authority

~15% weight

6/10

Technical Foundation

~10% weight

6/10

AI Discovery

~10% weight

8/10

Verdict

Below-average AEO readiness at 55/100 - multiple areas need attention. Key strengths include llms.txt File, Internal Linking Structure, and Sitemap Completeness. Priority gaps: Comprehensive FAQ Section, Speakable Schema, and Query-Answer Alignment.

Top priorities

Comprehensive FAQ SectionStructure+10 pts

Speakable SchemaTechnical+10 pts

Query-Answer AlignmentStructure+10 pts

#1886of 13300

#24of 173 in HR & Workforce

Ahead of you

getro.com55

wesolv.co55

View full rankings →

How to Improve

Current

55/100

Projected

82/100

35Total Fixes

7Quick Wins

~54hEst. Effort

Quick Wins

Configure robots.txt for AI crawlersAdd direct answer paragraphsAdd ai.txt and content licensingIncrease content depth and structureImprove citation-ready writing qualityClarify entity boundariesReduce extraction friction

Fix

Impact

Effort

Configure robots.txt for AI crawlers

Update robots.txt to explicitly allow AI crawlers and include sitemap directive.

high

trivial

Configure robots.txt for AI crawlers

high|trivial

Add internationalization signals

Implement hreflang tags and lang attributes so AI engines serve the correct language version when answering queries.

critical

medium

Add internationalization signals

critical|medium

Reduce render-blocking resources

Minimize blocking scripts and stylesheets in <head> to improve content availability for AI crawlers.

medium

low

Reduce render-blocking resources

medium|low

Reduce document weight

Trim oversized HTML, excessive DOM nodes, and large inline payloads that slow AI crawlers.

medium

low

Reduce document weight

medium|low

Fix HTML structure and meta tags

Ensure clean, well-structured HTML with proper meta tags, HTTPS, and parseable content for AI crawlers.

low

Fix HTML structure and meta tags

low|low

Unlock Full Improvement Plan

Top Opportunities10

Unlock Opportunities

Fix It With AI38

Unlock AI Fix Prompts

38 copy-paste prompts ready - sign in to access.

Score Breakdown

Criteria

Status

Potential

Score

Comprehensive FAQ Section

critical+10 pts0/10

Speakable Schema

critical+10 pts0/10

Query-Answer Alignment

critical+10 pts0/10

First-Hand Experience Signals

critical+9 pts1/10

Creator Transparency

critical+9 pts1/10

Image Context for AI

critical+9 pts1/10

Content Licensing & AI Permissions

critical+8 pts2/10

Answer Capsule Pattern

critical+8 pts2/10

Q&A Content Format

critical+7 pts3/10

Methodology Transparency

critical+7 pts3/10

Unlock Full Audit Report

See all 48 criteria with detailed findings and actionable fix recommendations.

Your competitors are already optimizing for AI

Every day without action is traffic your site loses to AI-ready competitors. We fix that.

Fix My Score

Site Pages

URLCitationSiteIn-linksCategoryIssuesWords

notedsource.io/resourcesNotedSource Blog

F36

resources

791

notedsource.io/resourcesF36

NotedSource Blog

notedsource.io/research-compass-knowledge-engineResearch Compass Knowledge Engine | NotedSource

F37

content

569

notedsource.io/research-compass-knowledge-engineF37

Research Compass Knowledge Engine | NotedSource

Changes since v11Last audited 8 days ago

→

-7

View full comparison →

Criterion

v11

v12

Delta

Definition Patterns

7/10

9/10

Visible Date Signal

3/10

9/10

Topic Coherence

5/10

7/10

Content Depth

4/10

5/10

First-Hand Experience Signals

2/10

1/10

-1

Creator Transparency

0/10

1/10

Evidence Packaging

5/10

7/10

Cross-Page Duplicate Content

7/10

9/10

Sentence Atomicity

6/10

4/10

-2

Improve Your Score

Guides for the criteria with the most room for improvement

Criteria0/10

FAQ Sections: 87 Questions Turned Our Score Into 88

Our site runs 87 FAQ items across 9 categories with FAQPage schema on every one. That's not excessive -it's how we hit 88/100. Each Q&A pair is a citation opportunity AI can extract in seconds.

Intermediate·8 min readRead guide →

supplementary0/10

Speakable Schema Markup

Voice assistants need to pick which paragraph to read aloud from your page. Without Speakable markup, they guess -and they frequently guess wrong, reading your cookie notice.

Beginner·3 min readRead guide →

Criteria0/10

Query-Answer Alignment: Does Your Content Match What People Actually Ask?

You wrote a 3,000-word guide on "customer support automation." But people ask AI "how do I reduce support ticket volume?" If your content doesn't match the actual queries, AI can't connect the dots.

Beginner·8 min readRead guide →

Criteria1/10

First-Hand Experience Signals: Prove You Actually Did the Thing

AI engines increasingly prioritize content from people who have direct experience with their topic. Generic "top 10 best" listicles written from secondhand research score poorly. Pages with specific actions taken, limitations discovered, and numeric results earned score well. First-Hand Experience Signals measure whether your content shows evidence of real-world involvement.

Intermediate·5 min readRead guide →

Want us to improve your score?

We build citation-ready content that AI engines choose as the answer.

Let's Talk

Verdict

How to Improve

Unlock Full Improvement Plan

Top Opportunities10

Unlock Opportunities

Fix It With AI38

Unlock AI Fix Prompts

Score Breakdown

Unlock Full Audit Report

Your competitors are already optimizing for AI

Site Pages

Improve Your Score

Related Questions

Want us to improve your score?