How we score

On-Page Content

Title, meta description, H1, heading structure, content length and image alt text.

• Title tag: Present; a single tag; roughly 30–60 characters (about 580px in search results); includes your target keyword if you entered one.
• Meta description: Present; roughly 70–160 characters; not empty or boilerplate; includes your target keyword if you entered one.
• H1 heading: Exactly one H1, not empty, and it includes your target keyword (or matches the page topic when no keyword is given).
• Heading structure: A logical H2/H3 hierarchy with no skipped levels, used to organise content rather than for styling.
• Content length: Word count of the main content (excluding navigation and footer where detectable), as a guide rather than a rule.
• Image alt text: The share of meaningful images with descriptive alt text. Decorative images with an empty alt are not penalised.

Technical SEO

Indexability, canonical, URL structure, sitemap, structured data, language and broken links.

• Indexability: HTTP status, meta robots and X-Robots-Tag noindex, and whether robots.txt blocks search engines from the page.
• Canonical tag: A canonical tag that points to this page itself, or to a valid URL that loads.
• URL structure: Readable, lowercase, hyphen-separated, a reasonable length and depth, and no excessive parameters or session IDs.
• XML sitemap: A sitemap listed in robots.txt or at a standard path, and whether this page is in it.
• Structured data: JSON-LD or microdata on the page, the schema.org types used, and whether the JSON-LD parses. We don't claim rich-result eligibility.
• Language & charset: An html lang attribute and a declared character set, plus well-formed hreflang tags if you use them.
• Broken links (sample): A capped sample of links on the page (up to 25, internal and external) checked for errors.

Speed & Mobile

Mobile friendliness, Google PageSpeed scores and Core Web Vitals.

• Mobile friendliness: A correct viewport meta tag, plus Lighthouse mobile signals for text size, tap targets and content width where Google reports them.
• PageSpeed score (mobile): Google PageSpeed Insights performance score for a simulated mobile visit.
• PageSpeed score (desktop): Google PageSpeed Insights performance score for a desktop visit.
• Core Web Vitals (LCP, CLS, INP): Largest Contentful Paint, Cumulative Layout Shift and Interaction to Next Paint — real-visitor (Chrome UX Report) data when Google has it, otherwise lab data.
• Server response time (TTFB): Time to first byte, from real-visitor data when available, otherwise measured by our scanner.
• Speed opportunities: Common issues Lighthouse flags: render-blocking resources, unoptimized images and a heavy total page weight.

Trust & Links

HTTPS/SSL, internal linking and social sharing tags.

• HTTPS / SSL: Served over HTTPS with a valid certificate that isn't near expiry, HTTP redirecting to HTTPS, and no obvious mixed content.
• Internal linking: Links to other pages on the same site, and how descriptive their anchor text is.
• Open Graph & social tags: og:title, og:description, og:image and a Twitter card tag, so shared links look right.

Speed

• PageSpeed score (mobile)
• PageSpeed score (desktop)
• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)
• Interaction to Next Paint (INP)
• Time to First Byte (TTFB)

Security

• SSL/TLS certificate
• SSL Labs grade
• HTTP → HTTPS redirect
• Strict-Transport-Security (HSTS)
• Content-Security-Policy
• Clickjacking protection (X-Frame-Options)
• X-Content-Type-Options
• Malware & blocklist status

Domain Health

• Site availability
• Domain registration
• Nameservers & DNS
• Email (MX records)

WordPress Health

• WordPress core version
• Known plugin, theme & core vulnerabilities
• wp-config.php & debug exposure
• XML-RPC endpoint
• Default readme.html / license.txt files

AI Access & Crawlability

Can AI crawlers and AI search bots reach and read your site?

• AI search & retrieval bots: Your robots.txt rules for AI search/retrieval crawlers (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Googlebot, Bingbot, Applebot…).
• AI user-triggered fetchers: Your robots.txt rules for agents that fetch a page when a person asks an assistant about it (ChatGPT-User, Claude-User, Perplexity-User).
• AI training crawlers: Your robots.txt rules for training crawlers (GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Google-Extended, Applebot-Extended, CCBot…). Informational only — blocking training is a legitimate business choice.
• CDN / firewall blocking: Whether your homepage returns an error or bot challenge to requests that identify as AI crawlers, compared with a normal request.
• Indexability (status & noindex): The homepage HTTP status, robots meta tags and X-Robots-Tag header.
• Canonical tags: Whether key pages declare a canonical URL that points at the page itself on your domain.
• Content in server-rendered HTML: How much readable text is in the raw HTML your server sends, before any JavaScript runs. Many AI crawlers don't run JavaScript.
• XML sitemap: Whether a valid sitemap exists, is listed in robots.txt, and has believable lastmod dates.
• llms.txt: Whether /llms.txt exists. Informational only — an emerging convention with no confirmed effect on AI citations.

Structured Data & Entity

Can AI systems tell exactly who you are, what you do and which profiles are yours?

• Organization / LocalBusiness schema: JSON-LD on your homepage that names your business, its URL and logo (and address/phone for local businesses).
• WebSite schema: A WebSite JSON-LD node that ties your site name to your domain.
• Article / BlogPosting schema: Article markup with author and dates on a sample blog post. Only applies if you publish articles.
• Product / Service schema: Product or Service markup describing what you sell. Products only apply if you sell products online.
• FAQPage & BreadcrumbList schema: FAQPage markup where you have FAQs, and BreadcrumbList markup on inner pages.
• Structured data is valid: Whether every JSON-LD block on the sampled pages parses and declares a schema.org type.
• sameAs profile links: sameAs links in your Organization markup that connect your brand to its official profiles (LinkedIn, Wikidata, Crunchbase, social, Google Business Profile).
• Wikidata / Wikipedia presence: Whether Wikidata has an entry for your brand that points at your website, and whether it links to a Wikipedia article. Informational only.
• Google Business Profile link: For local businesses: a link from your site or schema to your Google Business Profile / Maps listing. We can't check the profile itself.
• Name, phone & description consistency: Whether your business name, phone number and description match across your page titles, Open Graph tags, schema and visible text.
• Title, meta description & Open Graph: Title tags, meta descriptions and Open Graph tags on key pages: present, descriptive and a sensible length.
• HTTPS & valid certificate: Whether the site loads over HTTPS with a valid certificate and redirects HTTP to HTTPS.
• Basic security headers: HSTS and X-Content-Type-Options headers (lightweight — this is not the Hosting Health Check).
• Reviews & third-party profiles: aggregateRating/Review markup and links to review platforms (Google, Trustpilot, Yelp, G2, Capterra…).

Answerable Content (AEO)

Is your content structured so an answer engine can lift a clear, direct answer from it?

• Question-oriented content: FAQ sections and question-style headings ("How much does…?") with a short, direct answer right after them.
• Direct answer near the top: Whether the homepage opens with a concise, self-contained statement of what you do.
• Heading hierarchy & semantic HTML: A single H1, logical H2/H3 nesting, and lists or tables for scannable facts.
• What / who / where / how statements: Whether your homepage or About page clearly says what you are, who you serve, where you operate, and your pricing or process — extractable from a single page.
• Author, dates & sources on articles: Author attribution, publish/updated dates and cited sources on a sample article. Only applies if you publish articles.
• Content freshness: How recently your pages were updated, from your sitemap and on-page dates.

AI Visibility (GEO)

When people ask an AI assistant about you or your category, are you mentioned and cited? (A sample, not a ranking.)

• AI mention rate: In a small sample of AI answers to questions about you and your category, how often your brand is mentioned.
• AI citation rate: In the same sample, how often your own website is cited as a source.
• How AI describes you: Whether AI answers about your brand match what your own website says (inaccuracies are flagged).

Brand

How clearly you define who you serve, and how consistently you show up.

• How clearly have you defined your target audience and positioning?
• How consistent are your brand and messaging across your website, social profiles and sales materials?

Channels

Whether your marketing channels are chosen on purpose, owned, and backed by a website that converts.

• Which best describes the marketing channels you use (for example SEO, paid ads, email, social, Google Business Profile)?
• Does each marketing channel have a defined goal and someone responsible for it?
• How ready is your website to turn visitors into leads or customers?

Content

How you plan content, whether it serves buyers at every stage, and the proof assets you can reuse.

• How do you plan and publish content such as blog posts, videos, social posts or newsletters?
• Does your content help buyers at every stage, from first discovering you to deciding to buy?
• Which reusable marketing assets do you have, such as case studies, testimonials, reviews or lead magnets (guides, checklists)?

Measurement

Whether you track the right things, review them, and can connect marketing to leads and revenue.

• What tracking do you have in place on your website and marketing?
• How do you measure marketing results and connect them to leads and revenue?