AEO Audit Checklist

Identify the primary search intent for every important page.

Research the questions people ask before, during, and after choosing your product or service.

Include relevant “who,” “what,” “when,” “where,” “why,” “how,” and “can” questions where they naturally fit.

Target conversational queries rather than relying only on short keywords.

Map important questions to the correct pages instead of answering the same question across multiple URLs.

Cover informational, comparison, commercial, and decision-stage questions.

Review Google search results, People Also Ask questions, customer conversations, and internal search data for additional question opportunities.

Give a clear answer immediately after important question-based headings.

Keep the first answer concise before providing additional explanation.

Avoid long introductions before answering the user's primary question.

Write definitions that clearly explain what a product, service, process, or concept is.

Give specific answers instead of vague statements such as “it depends” without further explanation.

Include important conditions, limitations, exceptions, or qualifications when necessary.

Make important answers understandable even when they are extracted from the surrounding page.

Use one descriptive H1 that accurately communicates the page's main subject.

Organize supporting topics under descriptive H2 and H3 headings.

Use question-based headings when users genuinely search for those questions.

Break long sections into smaller, focused answer blocks.

Use numbered lists for instructions, processes, rankings, and sequential information.

Use bullet lists for requirements, benefits, features, symptoms, options, and key takeaways.

Use HTML tables when comparing prices, features, services, specifications, or other structured information.

Add useful FAQs to important service, product, location, and informational pages where appropriate.

Answer real customer questions instead of creating FAQs only to insert keywords.

Keep each FAQ focused on one primary question.

Provide a direct answer in the opening sentence of each FAQ response.

Avoid repeating information already answered identically elsewhere on the page.

Include relevant follow-up questions that naturally occur during the customer journey.

Keep FAQ content visible to users rather than adding questions only through structured data.

Clearly identify the company, organization, professional, or author responsible for the information.

Create detailed author or expert profiles for important informational content.

Include relevant qualifications, licenses, certifications, professional experience, or subject expertise where appropriate.

Support factual or high-stakes claims with authoritative sources.

Add original experience, examples, case studies, research, or expert commentary where possible.

Display accurate published and updated dates on content where those dates are useful to users.

Keep business, author, service, and location information consistent throughout the website.

Add Organization or the most appropriate LocalBusiness structured data.

Use Person schema for relevant authors and subject-matter experts when appropriate.

Add Article or BlogPosting schema to applicable editorial content.

Use Service or Product schema where it accurately represents the page.

Use FAQPage schema only when appropriate and when the corresponding FAQ content is visible on the page.

Validate structured data using Google's supported testing tools and Schema.org validation.

Check for duplicate, conflicting, invalid, or outdated structured data across the website.

Test your highest-value questions in Google and relevant AI-powered search experiences.

Record whether your website appears as a traditional result, featured answer, citation, or source.

Track which questions trigger competitor answers instead of yours.

Review the pages and domains repeatedly being used as sources for your target questions.

Identify content gaps where competitors provide clearer, more specific, or better-supported answers.

Track organic performance for question-based queries in Google Search Console.

Re-audit priority answers after significant content, search, or AI-platform changes.