SEO and GEO Guide
Complete SEO and GEO Checklist 2026
Every action you need to take to rank in traditional search and get cited by AI engines. Covers Generative Engine Optimisation, technical SEO, keyword research, on-site content, off-site SEO, and schema markup. Plain lists, no filler.
M
Mike
Technical SEO Specialist: 20 years in the industry
Updated April 2026
12 min read
70+
Checklist items across all 7 categories
3x
Higher AI citation rate with FAQPage schema
2026
Updated to include GEO alongside traditional SEO
100%
Free: no tool required to use this checklist
This is the checklist I use when onboarding new clients. It covers every meaningful SEO action, ranked by impact, with GEO signals integrated throughout rather than bolted on at the end. Work through it top to bottom or jump to the section most relevant to your current situation.
GEO items are marked with a GEO tag. These are actions that specifically improve your visibility in AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Claude, and Gemini: distinct from traditional organic search rankings.
🤖 GEO: Generative Engine Optimisation New Priority
GEO is no longer optional. AI engines now handle a significant and growing share of informational queries. If your site is not optimised for AI citation, you are invisible to a large and growing portion of your target audience.
- Allow all major AI crawlers in robots.txt GPTBot, ChatGPT-User, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended, Amazonbot. A single Disallow: / rule under any of these user agents cuts you off from that AI engine entirely.
- Add FAQPage JSON-LD schema to every page with a FAQ section This is the highest single-impact GEO action. AI engines are question-answering machines. FAQPage schema hands them pre-formatted Q&A pairs that map directly to user queries.
- Write direct answers in the first paragraph Use the inverted pyramid: answer the question first, then explain. AI engines extract the opening paragraph more than any other section.
- Use question-style H2 and H3 headings "What Is a Bug Out Bag?" outperforms "Overview" because it matches how users phrase queries to AI engines.
- Add Organization schema with sameAs to your homepage List your LinkedIn, Twitter/X, Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Crunchbase URLs. This is how AI engines verify your brand identity across the web.
- Create a /llms.txt file The emerging standard for helping AI engines understand your site structure. Include your site name, description, and key page links.
- Add Article or BlogPosting schema to all editorial content Include author name, datePublished, and dateModified. AI engines favour attributed, recently updated content.
- Add HowTo schema to step-by-step content AI assistants regularly extract step-by-step instructions. HowTo markup makes your content the preferred extraction target.
- Build content clusters around core topics AI engines prefer comprehensive authority sources over single pages. A pillar page plus 8 to 15 cluster pages covering subtopics signals deep expertise.
- Identify AI-cited competitors in your niche Search your primary topic in ChatGPT and Perplexity. Note which sites are cited. Analyse their content structure and schema setup. These are your real GEO competitors.
- Make critical informational pages publicly accessible AI engines cannot access paywalled or login-gated content. Key pages that should drive AI citations must be freely crawlable.
- Test for JavaScript rendering issues Many AI crawlers do not execute JavaScript. Critical content must exist in the HTML source, not just rendered on the client.
🔎 SEO Basics
The foundation that everything else depends on. These items must be done before any other optimisation work, because without them search engines cannot properly find, crawl, or index your site.
- Set up and verify Google Search Console Use DNS verification for reliability. GSC tells you which queries drive impressions, which pages are indexed, and flags manual actions, coverage errors, and Core Web Vitals issues.
- Set up Bing Webmaster Tools Bing powers Microsoft Copilot. Import your GSC sitemap directly. Bing data is increasingly important for GEO because of Copilot's search volume.
- Install Google Analytics 4 Connect to GSC for unified traffic and keyword data. Set up at least one conversion event matching your primary goal.
- Generate and submit an XML sitemap Submit to GSC and Bing Webmaster Tools. Only include canonical, indexable URLs. Never include noindex pages or staging content.
- Configure your robots.txt Block admin areas, staging paths, and internal search results. Explicitly allow all AI crawlers for GEO. Validate at yourdomain.com/robots.txt.
- Check for and fix manual actions in GSC A manual penalty overrides all other ranking signals. Check Security and Manual Actions in GSC immediately. Fix any issues before proceeding.
- Choose and enforce www vs non-www Pick one and 301 redirect the other. Set your preferred domain in GSC. Both versions pointing to the same content creates unnecessary duplicate content.
- Confirm the site is indexed Run site:yourdomain.com in Google. If critical pages are missing, investigate robots.txt directives, noindex tags, and canonical configurations.
- Install and configure an SEO plugin WordPress: Yoast SEO, Rank Math, or The SEO Framework. Configure default title formats, meta description templates, XML sitemap settings, and schema output defaults.
🎯 Keyword Research
Keyword research informs every other SEO decision: site architecture, content calendar, internal linking, and, critically, which questions to answer in your FAQ sections. This is where your content strategy begins.
- Identify your top 5 to 10 organic competitors These are the sites ranking for your target keywords, not necessarily your business competitors. Use Ahrefs, Semrush, or Google Search itself.
- Run a keyword gap analysis Find keywords your competitors rank for that you do not. Sort by traffic potential and relevance. These represent the fastest route to incremental ranking.
- Identify AI-cited competitors GEO Search your primary topics in ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews. Note which domains are cited. These are your GEO competitors, and they may differ from your organic SEO competitors.
- Find head keywords and long-tail variations Head keywords drive volume but take time to rank. Long-tail keywords convert better, are faster to rank, and are easier to be cited for in AI responses.
- Compile a list of questions your audience asks GEO Use Google's People Also Ask, AnswerThePublic, AlsoAsked, Reddit, and Quora. Every question is a potential FAQ answer, a potential AI citation, and a potential featured snippet.
- Analyse AI engine prompts in your niche GEO Ask ChatGPT and Perplexity "best [your product/service] recommendations" and "what is [your topic]?". The questions AI surfaces are your GEO keyword targets.
- Create a keyword map Assign one primary keyword to each page. No two pages should target the same primary keyword. Map secondary keywords to supporting sections.
- Check keyword difficulty and search intent For each target keyword, review the top 10 results. Match your content format to the dominant intent: informational, transactional, or navigational. New sites should prioritise keywords with difficulty below 30.
- Identify featured snippet opportunities GEO Question-based keywords where a direct, structured answer could win the snippet. Featured snippets are a primary signal AI engines use when forming citations for AI Overviews.
⚙ Technical SEO
Technical SEO creates the conditions for everything else to work. Poor technical health limits crawl budget, creates indexation gaps, and signals low quality to both search engines and AI engines.
- Enforce HTTPS on every page Confirm SSL is valid and not expiring. Fix mixed-content warnings. HTTP sites are flagged as untrustworthy by Chrome, Google, and AI engines alike.
- Eliminate duplicate site versions One canonical version of the domain must resolve (www or non-www, HTTP or HTTPS). Redirect all others with permanent 301s.
- Use clean, SEO-friendly URL structures Lowercase, hyphen-separated, human-readable, concise. Avoid URL parameters for navigational pages where possible.
- Run a full technical crawl Use Screaming Frog, Sitebulb, or Ahrefs Site Audit. Export all URLs, status codes, redirect chains, missing titles, duplicate content, and broken links.
- Fix all crawl errors Priority order: 5xx server errors, 4xx broken pages, soft 404s, redirect loops, and redirect chains of 3+ hops.
- Fix broken internal and external links Internal broken links waste crawl budget. External broken links harm credibility. Update or remove both.
- Check and fix page depth No important page should be more than 3 clicks from the homepage. Deep pages are crawled less frequently and carry less authority.
- Audit and correct redirect types Use 301 for permanent moves, 302 for temporary. 302s do not pass PageRank. Most redirects you set up should be 301s.
- Optimise Core Web Vitals GEO Target LCP under 2.5s, INP under 200ms, CLS under 0.1. Use PageSpeed Insights and the GSC Core Web Vitals report. Slow pages are penalised in rankings and crawled less by AI engines.
- Implement server-level caching and a CDN Cloudflare or similar reduces time to first byte and improves crawl efficiency.
- Validate your XML sitemap No 404s, 301s, or noindex URLs in the sitemap. Use GSC to identify sitemap errors.
📝 On-Site and Content SEO
On-site SEO determines what you rank for, how you are understood by AI, and whether visitors convert. This is where the bulk of your ongoing work lives.
- Ensure every page has a unique, keyword-optimised title tag 50 to 60 characters. Primary keyword near the start. No two pages should share the same title tag.
- Write compelling meta descriptions 140 to 160 characters. Not a direct ranking factor, but meta descriptions drive click-through rate. Front-load the strongest value proposition.
- Use exactly one H1 per page GEO The H1 should contain the primary keyword and closely match the page title tag. Multiple H1s confuse both crawlers and AI engines.
- Use a logical H2 to H6 heading hierarchy GEO H2s are section headers. H3s are subsections within H2s. Never skip levels. A clear hierarchy is how AI engines understand your page structure.
- Write descriptive, keyword-rich headings GEO "Introduction" is not useful. "How Emergency Food Storage Works" is. Every heading should stand alone as a meaningful label.
- Perform and act on a content audit Categorise every indexed page as keep, update, consolidate, or remove. Pages with no rankings, traffic, or links after 12 months should be evaluated for consolidation.
- Update outdated content GEO Refresh statistics, tool references, screenshots, and recommendations. Update dateModified in Article schema. AI engines favour recently updated pages.
- Resolve keyword cannibalisation If multiple pages target the same primary keyword, consolidate or differentiate. Use canonical tags to indicate the preferred version.
- Add FAQ sections with FAQPage schema to key pages GEO FAQ content is the most cited format in AI responses. Every service page, product page, and blog post should have a relevant FAQ section.
- Write direct answers at the start of pages GEO Answer the primary question in the first paragraph. Then expand. AI engines favour the inverted pyramid structure and frequently cite opening paragraphs.
- Add author attribution and bio links GEO Every article should display the author name with a link to their bio page. Author credentials are a core E-E-A-T and AI trust signal.
- Improve internal linking GEO Every important page should receive internal links from related content. Use descriptive anchor text. Internal links distribute authority and help AI engines understand content relationships.
- Add descriptive alt text to all images Required for accessibility and helps image search indexing. Every img element must have an alt attribute.
🌐 Off-Site SEO
Off-site SEO is how other sites perceive and reference you. Backlinks and brand mentions remain the strongest external authority signals for both traditional search and AI citation engines.
- Audit your existing backlink profile Use Ahrefs, Semrush, or Google Search Console. Identify your strongest links (to understand what's working) and any toxic links that might require disavowal.
- Build links from authoritative, relevant domains Guest posts on industry publications, podcast appearances, tool directories, and resource page placements. Relevance and authority both matter.
- Earn brand mentions on credible sites GEO Unlinked brand mentions (your brand name without a hyperlink) are a strong AI trust signal. Press coverage, industry roundups, podcast mentions, and directory listings all count.
- Claim and complete directory listings Google Business Profile, Yelp, G2, Capterra, Trustpilot, and industry-specific directories. NAP consistency (Name, Address, Phone) matters for local and AI local search.
- Earn and respond to customer reviews GEO AI engines aggregate review platforms as part of their brand understanding. Active review management on Google Business Profile, G2, and Trustpilot signals legitimacy.
- Create linkable assets Original research, surveys, data studies, free tools, and comprehensive guides attract natural backlinks. These also make excellent AI citation sources.
- Fix unlinked brand mentions Use tools like Ahrefs Content Explorer to find where your brand is mentioned without a link. Reach out and request attribution. Each conversion is an easy backlink.
- Build a social and community presence GEO LinkedIn, Twitter/X, Reddit, and niche communities where your audience asks questions. Social signals feed AI engine brand understanding and drive unlinked mentions.
Note on link building: Quality over quantity, always. One link from a DA 70+ relevant publication is worth more than 100 links from irrelevant low-authority sites. Focus on earning links through genuine value: publish content other sites want to reference.
📄 Schema Markup
Structured data is the bridge between your content and machine understanding. For GEO specifically, schema markup is the most technical and highest-leverage signal category available.
- Add Organization schema to the homepage GEO Include name, URL, logo, description, and sameAs links to LinkedIn, Twitter/X, Wikipedia, Wikidata, and Crunchbase. This is how AI engines verify your brand identity.
- Add WebSite schema to the homepage Enables the sitelinks search box in Google Search. Include name, URL, and a SearchAction if applicable.
- Add Article or BlogPosting schema to every article GEO Include headline, description, author (with @type: Person), datePublished, and dateModified. Update dateModified when you refresh content.
- Add FAQPage schema to every FAQ section GEO: Critical The single highest-yield GEO schema type. Every page with a FAQ section must have matching FAQPage JSON-LD. Questions should be phrased exactly as AI users would ask them.
- Add HowTo schema to step-by-step content GEO Any page with numbered steps, instructions, recipes, or tutorials should have HowTo JSON-LD. AI assistants use HowTo schema to extract step-by-step answers directly.
- Add BreadcrumbList schema to all pages Helps AI engines understand site hierarchy and page context. Enables breadcrumb rich results in Google Search.
- Add Product schema to product pages Include name, description, price, availability, and review aggregate. Enables price and rating rich results.
- Add Review or AggregateRating schema Enables star rating rich results. Source reviews from real customers. Never manufacture fake reviews.
- Use sameAs in all schema types where applicable GEO The sameAs property links your schema to authoritative external profiles. It is one of the clearest AI brand verification signals available.
- Validate all schema with Google Rich Results Test Check for errors and warnings. Validate after every new schema implementation and every site migration.
- Keep schema consistent with visible content Schema that does not match visible page content is treated as spam by Google. Every FAQ in JSON-LD must be visible in the HTML. Every HowTo step must appear on-page.
M
About Mike
Mike has been a Technical SEO Specialist for 20 years, working with brands ranging from early-stage startups to Fortune 500 companies. He has been tracking and implementing GEO signals since the first versions of AI search launched in 2023. This checklist is based on his hands-on implementation work across hundreds of sites.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the most important SEO item to complete first? ⌄
The single most important first step is ensuring your site is accessible: HTTPS, a clean robots.txt that does not block search and AI crawlers, a submitted XML sitemap, and no manual actions in Google Search Console. Without these in place, nothing else you do will have full effect.
What is the difference between SEO and GEO? ⌄
SEO optimises your site for traditional search results from Google and Bing. GEO optimises for AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Claude, and Gemini. SEO is the foundation: sites with strong SEO are more likely to be cited by AI. GEO adds specific signals like FAQPage schema, explicit AI bot access, llms.txt, and structured answer formatting that traditional SEO alone does not address.
How long does SEO take to show results? ⌄
Technical fixes such as HTTPS, crawl error resolution, and schema markup show results in 2 to 6 weeks as crawlers re-index your site. Content and link building results typically take 3 to 12 months. GEO citation visibility in AI engines tends to respond faster: some sites see improvements within 4 to 8 weeks of adding FAQPage schema and allowing AI crawlers.
Do I need to do both SEO and GEO? ⌄
Yes. They are complementary, not alternatives. Strong traditional SEO (crawlability, content quality, backlinks, E-E-A-T) makes AI engines more likely to trust your site. GEO-specific actions increase your citation rate for AI-generated responses. Skipping SEO weakens GEO, and skipping GEO leaves AI citation visibility entirely to chance.
How do I know if my site is being cited by AI engines? ⌄
The most reliable method is manual testing: search your primary topics in Perplexity, ChatGPT with browsing enabled, and Google. Check whether your domain appears in cited sources. Do this weekly and record the results. Some monitoring tools are beginning to track AI citations automatically, but manual testing remains the most reliable method in 2026.