How does the technical audit check sitemap completeness?

The audit compares URLs in your sitemap.xml against pages discovered by crawling. It checks for missing URLs, stale lastmod timestamps that don't reflect actual changes, incorrect priority values, and orphaned entries pointing to deleted pages. A complete, accurate sitemap ensures AI crawlers discover every page you want indexed.

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.

What does the RSS feed audit check?

The audit verifies your site has a discoverable RSS or Atom feed with proper metadata. It checks feed existence at common paths, a link tag in the HTML head, adequate item count, and pubDate per item. RSS feeds let AI indexing systems detect new content automatically without waiting for a full crawl.

What is content cannibalization and how does it hurt AI visibility?

Content cannibalization happens when multiple pages on your site target the same topic, forcing AI to guess which one to cite. The scorer compares page titles and content similarity across your site. Fix it by consolidating competing pages into one authoritative resource with 301 redirects from the old URLs. When Topic Coherence is low, the cannibalization penalty becomes more aggressive.

How does canonical URL strategy affect AI visibility?

When multiple URLs serve the same content — with/without www, HTTP/HTTPS, trailing slashes — AI crawlers split signals across duplicates. The audit checks every page for a rel=canonical link pointing to the correct URL. Missing or conflicting canonicals confuse crawlers about which version to index, diluting your AI visibility.

serifhealth.com - AEO Audit Report | 56/100

WINTER 2022 serifhealth.com

Moderate AI visibility with 29 of 48 criteria passing. Biggest gap: sitemap completeness.

Healthcare & Patient Advocacy Healthcare Technology

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.

Moderate 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%3/10+3.0

Original Data10%8/10+8.0

Content Freshness7%2/10+1.4

Direct Answer Paragraphs7%2/10+1.4

Fact & Data Density5%6/10+3.0

Definition Patterns4%7/10+2.8

Query-Answer Alignment8%7/10+5.6

Content Cannibalization5%10/10+5.0

Subtotal71%+34.7

Structure5 criteria

Schema.org JSON-LD15%10/10+15.0

Clean, Crawlable HTML10%8/10+8.0

Semantic HTML55%9/10+4.5

Table & List Extractability7%7/10+4.9

Schema Coverage3%7/10+2.1

Subtotal40%+34.5

Discovery5 criteria

llms.txt10%10/10+10.0

robots.txt for AI5%5/10+2.5

Internal Linking10%8/10+8.0

Sitemap Completeness5%0/10+0.0

RSS/Atom Feed3%0/10+0.0

Subtotal33%+20.5

Trust Signals6 criteria

Entity Authority10%6/10+6.0

Content Licensing4%2/10+0.8

Author & Expert Schema4%2/10+0.8

Canonical URL4%0/10+0.0

Content Velocity3%0/10+0.0

Visible Date Signals4%5/10+2.0

Subtotal29%+9.6

Overall Score100%56/100

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 v6

Citation Avg

Answer Readiness

~40% weight

8/10

Content Structure

~25% weight

5/10

Trust & Authority

~15% weight

5/10

Technical Foundation

~10% weight

6/10

AI Discovery

~10% weight

5/10

Verdict

Below-average AEO readiness at 56/100 - multiple areas need attention. Key strengths include llms.txt File, Schema.org Structured Data, and Content Cannibalization. Priority gaps: Sitemap Completeness, RSS/Atom Feed, and Canonical URL Strategy.

Top priorities

Sitemap CompletenessDiscovery+10 pts

RSS/Atom FeedDiscovery+10 pts

Canonical URL StrategyDiscovery+10 pts

#1478of 13300

#145of 1359 in Healthcare & Patient Advocacy

Ahead of you

covenantcareathome.org56

brightsidedental.com56

View full rankings →

How to Improve

Current

56/100

Projected

82/100

35Total Fixes

5Quick Wins

~71hEst. Effort

Quick Wins

Configure robots.txt for AI crawlersAdd ai.txt and content licensingFix canonical URL strategyAdd visible date signalsReduce extraction friction

Fix

Impact

Effort

Create complete sitemap.xml

Generate a comprehensive sitemap with lastmod dates for all important pages.

critical

medium

Create complete sitemap.xml

critical|medium

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

Fix canonical URL strategy

Add rel="canonical" tags to all pages to prevent duplicate content confusion.

critical

low

Fix canonical URL strategy

critical|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

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

Unlock Full Improvement Plan

Top Opportunities10

Unlock Opportunities

Fix It With AI39

Unlock AI Fix Prompts

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

Score Breakdown

Criteria

Status

Potential

Score

Sitemap Completeness

critical+10 pts0/10

RSS/Atom Feed

critical+10 pts0/10

Canonical URL Strategy

critical+10 pts0/10

Content Publishing Velocity

critical+10 pts0/10

Speakable Schema

critical+10 pts0/10

Image Context for AI

critical+9 pts1/10

Content Freshness Signals

critical+8 pts2/10

Direct Answer Paragraphs

critical+8 pts2/10

Content Licensing & AI Permissions

critical+8 pts2/10

Author & Expert Schema

critical+8 pts2/10

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

www.serifhealth.com/blogBlog - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

D47

content

4,088

www.serifhealth.com/blogD47

Blog - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

www.serifhealth.com/inventory/payersPayer Inventory List - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

F31

content

896

www.serifhealth.com/inventory/payersF31

Payer Inventory List - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

www.serifhealth.com/our-data/nationwide-claims-dataNationwide Claims Data - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

F38

content

658

www.serifhealth.com/our-data/nationwide-claims-dataF38

Nationwide Claims Data - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

www.serifhealth.com/solutions/employers-and-benefits-part...Solutions for Employers and Benefits Partners - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

F39

content

658

www.serifhealth.com/solutions/employers-and-benefits-part...F39

Solutions for Employers and Benefits Partners - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

www.serifhealth.com/solutions/life-sciencesSolutions for Life Sciences - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

F37

content

612

www.serifhealth.com/solutions/life-sciencesF37

Solutions for Life Sciences - Healthcare Price Transparency Made Easy | Serif Health

Unlock Full Page Analysis

Changes since v6Last audited 6 days ago

→

-7

View full comparison →

Improve Your Score

Guides for the criteria with the most room for improvement

Criteria0/10

Sitemap Completeness

Your sitemap says 500 pages exist. Our crawl finds 700. Those 200 missing URLs? AI crawlers will never know they exist.

Beginner·5 min readRead guide →

Criteria0/10

RSS Feed Presence & Quality

Sitemaps tell crawlers what exists. RSS feeds tell them what changed. If you don't have one, your new content waits days -or weeks -to be discovered.

Beginner·3 min readRead guide →

Criteria0/10

Canonical URL Strategy

Same content, three URLs, zero canonical tags. Congratulations -you just split your authority three ways and gave AI crawlers a headache.

Intermediate·5 min readRead guide →

Criteria0/10

Content Publishing Velocity

You published a great blog post in January. It's now February and nothing else has appeared. AI engines notice -and they're crawling less often because of it.

Advanced·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 AI39

Unlock AI Fix Prompts

Score Breakdown

Unlock Full Audit Report

Your competitors are already optimizing for AI

Site Pages

Unlock Full Page Analysis

Improve Your Score

Related Questions

Want us to improve your score?