MY THOUGHTS

How to fix your website for AI search (AEO)

JUL 14, 2025

8 Quick Wins to Make Your Website AI-Ready (AEO Edition)

If you want your site to show up in ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google's AI results, you need more than old-school SEO. Here's what you actually need to do, explained in plain English—no technical background required.

1. Pick the Right Framework (Don't Build on Sand)

What's a framework?

A framework is basically the foundation and toolkit your website runs on.

Why it matters:

AI search engines (like ChatGPT and Perplexity) need to read your site like a book, not just look at the cover. Some frameworks let you write the whole story, others only let you decorate the cover.

⚠️ Limited Options

Webflow, Framer, Squarespace, Wix

  • ✅ Easy drag-and-drop setup
  • ✅ Beautiful templates
  • ✅ Fast to launch
  • ❌ Limited schema control
  • ❌ Can't customize loading
  • ❌ SEO ceiling exists

Good for: Quick launches, portfolios, simple sites

🚀 Full Control Options

Next.js, Gatsby, Custom Development

  • ✅ Complete schema control
  • ✅ Custom loading strategies
  • ✅ Advanced SEO features
  • ✅ AI-friendly structure
  • ❌ Requires developer
  • ❌ More complex setup

Good for: Long-term growth, serious businesses

🎯 Decision Framework

Choose builders (Webflow/Framer) if:

  • You need to launch quickly (under 2 weeks)
  • Budget is tight
  • Site is simple (under 20 pages)

Choose custom framework (Next.js) if:

  • Long-term business investment
  • Want to rank competitively
  • Planning to add features
  • Have developer access

2. Add Structured Data (Schema) So Bots Understand Your Content

What is schema?

Schema is a special code ("structured data") you add to your pages to tell search engines exactly what's on the page: who you are, what you sell, reviews, FAQs, product details, etc.

Why it matters:

Google, ChatGPT, and others use schema to "see" your business. No schema = you're invisible or misunderstood.

📋 Example: Local Business Schema

Copy this template and customize for your business:

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "LocalBusiness",
  "name": "Happy Teeth Dental",
  "description": "Family dental practice in downtown",
  "url": "https://happyteeth.com",
  "telephone": "+1-555-123-4567",
  "address": {
    "@type": "PostalAddress",
    "streetAddress": "123 Main St",
    "addressLocality": "City",
    "addressRegion": "State",
    "postalCode": "12345"
  },
  "openingHours": "Mo-Fr 9:00-17:00"
}
</script>

🛠️ What to do:

3. Meta Tags & Open Graph: The First Impression

What are meta tags?

Meta tags are hidden notes in your website code that describe each page—like a headline and summary.

  • Title tag: The name of the page (shows up in Google search results)
  • Meta description: A short summary (shows under your title in Google)
  • Open Graph/Twitter tags: Make your site look good when people share it on social media

Why it matters:

Search engines and AI use this info to decide what your page is about—and how to display it. No tags or bad tags? You're either ignored, or your info looks messy.

📝 Copy-Paste Meta Tags Template

<!-- Basic Meta Tags -->
<title>Your Page Title | Your Brand Name</title>
<meta name="description" content="Compelling 150-160 character description that makes people want to click">
<meta name="keywords" content="primary keyword, secondary keyword, related terms">

<!-- Open Graph (Facebook, LinkedIn) -->
<meta property="og:title" content="Your Page Title">
<meta property="og:description" content="Same description as above">
<meta property="og:image" content="https://yoursite.com/social-image.jpg">
<meta property="og:url" content="https://yoursite.com/current-page">
<meta property="og:type" content="website">

<!-- Twitter Card -->
<meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image">
<meta name="twitter:title" content="Your Page Title">
<meta name="twitter:description" content="Same description as above">
<meta name="twitter:image" content="https://yoursite.com/social-image.jpg">

🔍 Quick Check Method

Right-click your page → "View Page Source" → Ctrl/Cmd+F and search for:

  • <title>
  • meta name="description"
  • property="og:title"

Pro tip: Use OpenGraph.xyz to preview how your page looks when shared.

4. Keep a Clean Sitemap and Robots.txt (Navigation for Bots)

What is a sitemap?

A sitemap is a file that lists all the pages on your site you want search engines to find.

What is robots.txt?

A file that tells search engines which pages not to look at (like admin or test pages).

Why it matters:

Without these, search engines may miss important pages—or waste time on stuff you don't want seen.

🗺️ Sample robots.txt

Place this at yoursite.com/robots.txt:

User-agent: *
Allow: /

# Block admin areas
Disallow: /admin/
Disallow: /wp-admin/
Disallow: /login/
Disallow: /private/

# Allow important files
Allow: /sitemap.xml
Allow: /*.css
Allow: /*.js

Sitemap: https://yoursite.com/sitemap.xml

📋 Sitemap Checklist

  • ✅ Include all important pages
  • ✅ Update automatically when you add pages
  • ✅ Submit to Google Search Console
  • ✅ Keep under 50MB / 50,000 URLs
  • ❌ Don't include blocked pages
  • ❌ Don't include redirect URLs

🔧 Quick Setup Tools

For any website:

For developers:

  • Next.js: next-sitemap
  • WordPress: Yoast SEO plugin
  • Check: yoursite.com/robots.txt

5. Check If Your Site Is Crawlable

What does "crawlable" mean?

Crawling is how search engines and AI read your site. If something blocks them (a login, a script, or a missing link), they'll skip you.

🕷️ Google Search Console Setup (Free)

  1. Go to search.google.com/search-console
  2. Add your website property
  3. Verify ownership (HTML file or DNS record)
  4. Submit your sitemap
  5. Check for crawl errors weekly

🚫 Common Crawl Blockers

  • Broken internal links
  • Noindex tags on important pages
  • Server errors (500, 503)
  • Robots.txt blocking too much
  • Slow page load times
  • Missing navigation links

✅ Quick Fixes

  • Test all your main page links
  • Remove "noindex" from public pages
  • Fix 404 errors promptly
  • Add breadcrumb navigation
  • Create an HTML sitemap
  • Internal linking between pages

🔍 Manual Crawl Test

Try this simple test:

  1. Open your homepage in "incognito/private" mode
  2. Can you navigate to all your important pages using only links?
  3. No broken images or "page not found" errors?
  4. Pages load in under 5 seconds?

If you can't easily navigate your site, neither can bots.

6. Test Your Site's AI Search Presence

What does this mean?

See if you show up in AI search engines when people ask about your business, industry, or services.

Why it matters:

If you don't show up, you're missing traffic and credibility. Time to fix your fundamentals.

🤖 Copy These Queries to Test Your Visibility

Test on ChatGPT:

"What is [Your Company Name]?"
"Who is [Your Name]?"
"Best [your service] companies"
"[Your industry] experts to follow"

Test on Perplexity:

"[Your Company] reviews"
"How to [problem you solve]"
"Top [your niche] in [your city]"
"[Your main keyword] guide"

📊 What to Look For

✅ Good signs:

  • Your site is mentioned
  • Accurate information
  • Direct links to your pages
  • Recent content referenced

⚠️ Warning signs:

  • Outdated information
  • Only social media links
  • Competitors mentioned instead
  • Generic industry info

❌ Red flags:

  • No mention at all
  • Wrong information
  • "I don't have info about..."
  • Only mentions competitors

7. Speed Up Your Site and Use Clean Code

Why speed matters:

Fast sites get crawled (and ranked) more often. Slow or messy sites get skipped by both humans and AI.

⚡ Speed Test Tools (Copy these URLs)

PageSpeed Insights:https://pagespeed.web.dev/
GTmetrix:https://gtmetrix.com/
Pingdom:https://tools.pingdom.com/

Target: Load time under 3 seconds, Core Web Vitals in green

🚀 Quick Wins

  • Compress images (use WebP format)
  • Enable GZIP compression
  • Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN)
  • Minimize plugins/widgets
  • Clean up unused CSS/JavaScript

🎯 Target Metrics

  • LCP: Under 2.5 seconds
  • FID: Under 100ms
  • CLS: Under 0.1
  • Mobile score: 90+
  • Desktop score: 95+

8. Keep an Eye on Things and Iterate

Why monitor?

SEO and AEO aren't set-and-forget. As AI search evolves, so do best practices.

📊 Monthly Monitoring Checklist

📈 Analytics to Track:

  • Organic traffic growth
  • AI search mentions
  • New keyword rankings
  • Page crawl errors
  • Site speed scores

🔧 Tools to Use:

🎯 Bottom Line

Even if you're not technical, these 8 steps will help you get found in the new era of AI search.

Start with these 3 priorities:

  1. Test your AI visibility (Section 6) - See where you stand
  2. Add basic schema (Section 2) - Make bots understand you
  3. Fix meta tags (Section 3) - Control your first impression

💡 Want a step-by-step guide or website template optimized for AI search?

DM me or comment "AEO" for a free download with checklists, code snippets, and implementation guides.

Sam Hogan

Sam Hogan

online

design/gtm engineer

•

1 exit, making the internet beautiful.