Our AI visibility score is terrible despite good SEO. What's the fastest path to improvement?

A score of 23 means you’re probably missing fundamentals. Good news: fundamentals are fixable quickly.

The Diagnostic:

Low scores typically come from:

1. Technical blockers (AI can’t access content)
2. Missing entity signals (AI doesn’t recognize you)
3. Poor content structure (AI can’t extract answers)
4. Weak authority signals (AI doesn’t trust you enough)

Quick Diagnosis:

Technical Check (5 minutes):

• Is robots.txt blocking AI crawlers?
• Are pages server-rendered (not JS-only)?

Entity Check (10 minutes):

• Do you have Organization schema?
• Is your Wikidata entry current?

Structure Check (15 minutes):

• Do top pages have clear answers in first paragraphs?
• FAQ sections with schema?

Authority Check (15 minutes):

• Author information on content?
• Citations to sources?

The 80/20 for fast improvement:

Most low-scoring sites are missing:

1. AI crawler access (fix in 1 hour)
2. Organization schema (fix in 3 hours)
3. FAQ schema on key pages (fix in 1 hour each)
4. Direct answer formatting (fix in 2-3 hours per page)

These alone can push you from 23 to 50+ within a month.

Here’s the prioritized quick wins list:

Day 1-2 (Technical Foundation):

1. Verify robots.txt allows GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot
2. Add Organization schema to site
3. Create/update Wikidata entry
4. Create LLMs.txt file

Time: ~8 hours total Expected impact: 10-20 points

Week 1 (Schema Implementation): 5. [ ] Add FAQ schema to top 10 pages by traffic 6. [ ] Add Article schema to blog posts 7. [ ] Add Product/Service schema if applicable

Time: ~6 hours total Expected impact: 10-15 points

Week 2-3 (Content Structure): 8. [ ] Add TL;DR to top 10 pages 9. [ ] Restructure H2s as questions 10. [ ] Add comparison tables where relevant 11. [ ] Put direct answers first in each section

Time: ~20 hours total Expected impact: 15-25 points

Week 4 (Authority Signals): 12. [ ] Add author bios to all content 13. [ ] Add citations to claims 14. [ ] Update “last modified” dates

Time: ~10 hours total Expected impact: 5-10 points

Total 30-day investment: ~45 hours Expected improvement: 23 → 60-70 (conservative estimate)

Real case study - our improvement path:

Starting Point:

• AI visibility score: 28
• Good SEO (ranked well)
• No AI-specific optimization

What We Did:

Month 1:

• Fixed robots.txt (was inadvertently blocking GPTBot)
• Added Organization schema
• Added FAQ schema to 15 pages
• Restructured 10 top pages

Month 2:

• Created comprehensive pillar content (3 pillars)
• Consolidated cannibalizing pages
• Added author pages with Person schema

Month 3:

• Built topic clusters around pillars
• Consistent content updates with freshness signals
• Started monitoring competitors

Results:

The biggest single impact:

Robots.txt fix + content restructuring. These alone got us from 28 to ~50.

Schema and authority built on top of that foundation.

Before you fix anything, diagnose properly:

Run this diagnostic:

1. Technical Access Test

curl -A "GPTBot" -I https://yoursite.com/

Look for: 200 status code, no redirects to captcha

2. Robots.txt Check

curl https://yoursite.com/robots.txt

Look for: No “Disallow” for AI user agents

3. Schema Check Google Rich Results Test: Is Organization schema valid?

4. Content Structure Test Open your top page. First 100 words:

• Is there a direct answer to the page’s main question?
• Or is it intro fluff?

5. AI Citation Test Ask ChatGPT/Perplexity 5 relevant questions:

• Do you appear in any responses?
• Who does appear?

Common findings:

Score 0-30: Usually technical blockers + missing schema + poor structure Score 30-50: Structure issues + weak authority Score 50-70: Need comprehensive coverage + authority building Score 70+: Optimization and competitive positioning

Your 23 likely has technical issues. Fix those first.

Limited resource prioritization:

If you can only do ONE thing: Restructure your top 5 pages with TL;DR, direct answers, and FAQ schema.

This single effort hits multiple improvement areas and focuses on your most important content.

If you can do TWO things:

1. Top 5 page restructuring
2. Organization schema + robots.txt fix

If you can do THREE things:

1. Top 5 page restructuring
2. Organization schema + robots.txt fix
3. FAQ schema on 10 additional pages

What to defer if resources are limited:

• Authority building (important but slower)
• Comprehensive coverage (important but slower)
• Advanced schema types
• LLMs.txt (nice but not critical)

The principle:

Technical foundation → High-traffic page optimization → Expand from there

Don’t spread thin across everything. Go deep on the highest-impact items first.

This thread gave me a clear path forward. Here’s my 30-day plan:

Week 1: Foundation

• Day 1: Audit robots.txt, fix if needed
• Day 2: Implement Organization schema
• Day 3: Create Wikidata entry
• Day 4-5: Add FAQ schema to top 10 pages

Week 2-3: Content Structure

• Restructure top 10 pages:
  • Add TL;DR with direct answer
  • Convert H2s to questions
  • Answer first in each section
  • Add comparison tables where relevant
  • FAQ section at bottom

Week 4: Authority + Measurement

• Add author information to all content
• Add citations to claims
• Update “last modified” dates
• Measure progress vs baseline
• Plan next 30 days

Expected Result: 23 → 55-70 within 30 days

Key insight:

Low score with good SEO = missing AI-specific fundamentals. The fixes are known and achievable. Just need to execute.

Thanks everyone for the diagnosis frameworks and quick wins list!