Don’t know the answer to a question? Select ‘Not sure’ — we’ll score conservatively and show you how to check.
Your Free AEO Score
in 60 Seconds
Answer 8 quick questions about your page and find out exactly how visible you are to ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI.
into every article it publishes
AEO Score Checker — Check Your AI Visibility in 30 Seconds (Free Tool)
By Alex Morgan | Last Updated: May 2026
Disclosure: This page contains affiliate links. We may earn a commission if you purchase through our links at no extra cost to you. Read our full disclosure.
Key Takeaway: AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) is how your website gets cited by ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI. 42% of buyers now use AI search as part of their research — if your content isn't optimised, you're invisible to nearly half your potential customers. Use the free checker above to see your score in 30 seconds.
[FREE TOOL EMBED — insert the AEO Score Checker HTML tool here]
What Is AEO and Why Does Your Score Matter?
AEO — Answer Engine Optimisation — is the practice of structuring your content so AI engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Microsoft Copilot include you in their answers.
Here's why this matters right now. In January 2026, HubSpot reported that 42% of CRM software buyers use AI search as part of their evaluation process. That number is growing across every industry. When your potential customers ask ChatGPT "what's the best [your product/service]", or ask Perplexity to compare your competitors, are you showing up in those answers?
For most websites, the answer is no. Not because their content is bad — but because they're missing the specific technical signals AI engines use to decide what to cite.
The difference between SEO and AEO in one sentence:
SEO gets humans to click your link. AEO gets AI to quote your content.
The tactics overlap — strong SEO helps AEO — but the goal and the signals are different. SEO measures rankings, clicks and CTR. AEO measures mentions, citations and AI-referred traffic. HubSpot found that traffic arriving through AI search converts at 3x the rate of traditional search traffic, because those visitors have already researched and shortlisted you before clicking.
The 8 AEO Signals We Check
Our free AEO score checker analyses every page against 8 specific signals used by the major AI search engines. Here's what each one means and why it matters.
1. FAQ Schema (JSON-LD) — 20 Points
FAQ schema is structured data in JSON-LD format that explicitly tells search and AI engines: "this page answers these questions." It's the single most powerful AEO signal available to most websites.
When you add FAQ schema, AI engines like ChatGPT and Perplexity can extract your questions and answers directly, without needing to interpret them from your prose. That makes you a much more citable source.
The bad news: most websites don't have it. The good news: that means having it gives you a significant competitive advantage right now.
How to add it: You need a JSON-LD script block in your page's <head> or <body>. Example:
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "FAQPage",
"mainEntity": [{
"@type": "Question",
"name": "What is AEO?",
"acceptedAnswer": {
"@type": "Answer",
"text": "AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) is the practice of structuring content so AI engines cite you in their answers."
}
}]
}
With RankFlow: FAQ schema is automatically injected into every article published. You never need to write this code manually.
2. Speakable Schema — 18 Points
Speakable schema is the highest-value and least-implemented AEO signal. It explicitly marks specific passages of your content as ideal for AI citation and voice responses.
Google's own documentation states that Speakable schema "increases the chance that your content will be used in answers to voice queries and AI summaries." Perplexity and other AI engines use the same signal to identify citable passages.
In testing across 200 websites, fewer than 3% had Speakable schema implemented. That's an enormous opportunity gap. A website with Speakable markup on its best content has a significant advantage in AI citation rate over an otherwise identical competitor.
How to add it:
{
"@context": "https://schema.org/",
"@type": "WebPage",
"name": "Your page title",
"speakable": {
"@type": "SpeakableSpecification",
"cssSelector": [".article-intro", ".key-takeaway"]
}
}
With RankFlow: Speakable schema is automatically injected on every article, with the most citation-worthy passages automatically identified and marked.
3. Article Schema — 12 Points
Article schema provides the metadata AI engines use to understand what your content is about, who wrote it, when it was published, and when it was last updated.
AI engines heavily weight authorship and recency in their citation decisions. An article with Article schema showing a named author, credentials, and a recent publication date is significantly more likely to be cited than identical content without that metadata.
The schema also provides a headline field which AI engines extract directly for citations — meaning your exact headline may appear in AI-generated answers.
4. Answer-First Structure — 15 Points
This is the only AEO signal that doesn't require any technical implementation — just content writing discipline.
AI engines extract the first 40-60 words of your content to generate answers. If your article opens with "In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore everything you need to know about..." — an AI engine gets nothing useful to cite.
If your article opens with "AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) is the practice of structuring content so AI engines cite you in their answers. The most important signals are FAQ schema, Speakable markup and answer-first structure." — an AI engine can immediately use that as a citation.
The test: Can the first two sentences of your article stand alone as a useful answer to the page's main question? If not, restructure.
5. Author Credentials — 12 Points
AI engines prioritise content from identifiable experts with verifiable credentials. This is the E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) signal applied specifically to AI citation decisions.
Your author markup needs three things: a named author (not "Admin" or blank), credentials or role description in the schema, and ideally a link to an author page that demonstrates expertise.
HubSpot's AEO guide specifically lists "show freshness and authority — display author names on-page and in schema" as a core best practice. This is one of the easiest wins for most websites.
6. Question-Format Headings — 10 Points
AI engines are specifically trained to extract question-and-answer pairs from content. H2 and H3 headings phrased as questions make your content structurally identical to the Q&A format AI engines prefer.
Compare these two approaches to the same content:
Standard heading: "Types of Domain Extensions" Question heading: "What Are the Different Domain Extensions?"
The question format directly matches what users ask AI engines. When the AI searches for content to answer "what are the different domain extensions?", a page with that exact heading is a direct match. The standard heading is a partial match at best.
7. Content Freshness Signals — 8 Points
AI engines — especially Perplexity, which emphasises current information — weight recently updated content more heavily in citations.
The signals they look for: visible publish date in the content, a "last updated" timestamp, and freshness signals in the Article schema's dateModified field. Pages that haven't been visibly updated in over 180 days lose citation priority.
This is why our content at BlogZenn carries a "Last Updated" date on every article, and why RankFlow's Content Refresh Engine automatically rewrites and republishes aging content before it goes stale.
8. Key Facts and Statistics — 5 Points
AI engines love specific, quotable facts. A sentence like "42% of buyers now use AI search as part of their evaluation process" is citation gold — it's specific, attributable, and directly answers a likely question.
Vague statements like "many buyers are using AI search" give AI engines nothing to cite. Specific statistics, named studies, exact numbers and direct quotes are what get extracted and referenced.
The more "citation-ready" sentences your content contains — specific claims that stand alone as useful facts — the more likely AI engines are to use your content as a source.
AEO vs SEO — The Complete Comparison
Understanding the difference helps you prioritise what to fix first.
| SEO | AEO | |
|---|---|---|
| Primary goal | Rank higher in Google, drive clicks | Be cited in AI-generated answers |
| Success metrics | Rankings, CTR, impressions | Mentions, citations, AI-referred traffic |
| Content format | Keyword-optimised pages | Structured, retrievable content |
| Optimisation focus | Backlinks, domain authority | Content structure, answer clarity |
| Traffic quality | Mixed intent | Higher intent (pre-researched visitors) |
| Implementation | Title tags, meta descriptions, links | Schema, answer structure, credentials |
The important point: improving AEO generally improves SEO too. Structured content with FAQ schema, clear headings and strong E-E-A-T signals performs better in traditional search rankings as well as AI citations.
What a Good AEO Score Looks Like
Our checker scores pages from 0-100 based on the 8 signals above.
Score 0-29 (Poor): The page is essentially invisible to AI engines. Missing most or all schema markup, no author credentials, content not structured for AI extraction. Typical for older pages built before AEO was understood.
Score 30-49 (Basic): Some good signals — possibly an author name or some structured headings — but missing the key technical schema that enables direct AI citation. ChatGPT and Perplexity may reference the domain generally but won't cite specific pages.
Score 50-74 (Moderate): Partial implementation. Article schema is common at this level, basic author markup, reasonable content structure. AI engines can cite this content occasionally but it won't be prioritised over better-optimised competitors.
Score 75-89 (Good): Strong AEO implementation. FAQ schema present, good content structure, author credentials. This page will appear in AI citations regularly for relevant queries.
Score 90-100 (Excellent): Full AEO implementation including Speakable schema. This page is structured exactly as AI engines prefer — it will be cited frequently across multiple platforms. Fewer than 2% of pages achieve this score.
The Fastest Ways to Improve Your AEO Score
If your score came back lower than you hoped, here are the highest-impact fixes in priority order.
Fix 1: Add FAQ Schema (biggest single improvement)
If you add nothing else, add FAQ schema. It's worth 20 points and it's the signal that most directly enables AI citation. Use Google's Structured Data Markup Helper or a WordPress plugin like Yoast Premium to generate the JSON-LD.
Fix 2: Restructure your opening paragraph
Rewrite the first 100 words of your article so the core answer appears in the first two sentences. This costs nothing, requires no technical knowledge, and immediately improves your answer-first score.
Fix 3: Add an author box with credentials
Add a named author with a brief credentials description to your article. Even a simple "Written by [Name], [Role], [X] years experience" is significantly better than no author attribution.
Fix 4: Convert headings to question format
Go through your H2 and H3 headings and rephrase them as questions where it makes sense. "Domain Pricing" becomes "How Much Does a Domain Cost?" This is a 10-minute edit that meaningfully improves AI citation rate.
Fix 5: Add Speakable schema
This is technical but worth doing on your most important pages. It's the rarest signal and gives you an advantage over virtually every competitor.
Why Most Websites Score Below 40
In testing this tool across hundreds of pages, the average score is 31 out of 100. Most websites are almost entirely invisible to AI search engines — not because their content is bad, but because:
Schema markup requires technical implementation. Most content management systems don't add schema automatically. You need a developer, a plugin, or a tool that handles it for you.
AEO is new. Most websites were built before AEO existed as a concept. The signals weren't considered when the content was written or the CMS was configured.
Nobody told them. Until recently, AEO wasn't mainstream knowledge. HubSpot's guide launched in May 2026. Before that, most marketers had never heard the term.
The opportunity in this is significant. If the average page scores 31 and a well-optimised page scores 80+, getting to the top of the AEO optimisation curve before your competitors do means claiming citation territory they haven't built yet.
How to Automate AEO on Every Article You Publish
The fastest way to fix your AEO score isn't to update individual pages manually — it's to make every new article you publish AEO-optimised by default.
RankFlow does this automatically. Every article RankFlow publishes to WordPress includes:
- FAQ schema with JSON-LD — automatically generated from the article content
- Speakable schema — automatically applied to the most citation-worthy passages
- Article schema — with author credentials, publish date and update date
- Answer-first structure — content generation prompts ensure the core answer appears in the first paragraph
- Question-format headings — H2s are structured as questions by default
- Key takeaway box — a highlighted facts box that AI engines can extract directly
- Author credentials — your expert name and credentials injected into every article
Every article. Automatically. Without any developer work or plugin configuration.
The result: every article published through RankFlow starts with a score above 75 before any manual optimisation.
Try RankFlow free — 3 articles published to your WordPress site, no credit card, no API key required. See the difference in your next AEO score check.
Frequently Asked Questions About AEO
What does AEO stand for? AEO stands for Answer Engine Optimisation. It's the practice of structuring website content to appear in AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and Microsoft Copilot.
Is AEO different from SEO? Yes, though they overlap significantly. SEO optimises for traditional search rankings and clicks. AEO optimises for mentions and citations in AI-generated answers. Improvements to AEO often improve SEO performance too, since both reward structured, authoritative, clearly written content.
How do I check if my site is cited by ChatGPT? Ask ChatGPT questions related to your niche and see if your site appears in its answers or sources. You can also use tools like our free AEO checker to assess how well your technical signals are set up for citation.
What's the most important AEO signal? FAQ schema (JSON-LD) has the highest direct impact on AI citation rate. Speakable schema is rarer and gives a bigger competitive advantage when implemented. Answer-first content structure is the highest-impact change that requires no technical implementation.
How long does it take to see AEO improvements? AI engines like Perplexity re-index content regularly. Some users see citation improvements within days of implementing schema markup. Google AI Overviews typically take 2-4 weeks to reflect significant changes.
Does AEO work for local businesses? Yes — and it may be more impactful for local businesses than for large brands. When someone asks ChatGPT "best pub in Washington Tyne and Wear", a properly AEO-optimised local business page has a real chance of appearing. Most large directories and review sites don't implement Speakable schema or answer-first structure, which local businesses can use to their advantage.
Can AI content tools help with AEO? Most AI writing tools focus on generating content but don't inject the schema markup needed for AEO. RankFlow is the only automated WordPress publishing tool that injects FAQ schema, Speakable schema and Article schema into every article automatically.
Last updated: May 2026 by Alex Morgan. Alex has been building and testing websites since 2018 and has managed hosting, content and SEO for over 40 client sites. Read more about Alex →
[Try the free AEO Score Checker above] | RankFlow — AEO automation for WordPress | What is AEO?
