What content should I prioritize for AI visibility? Can't optimize everything at once

Here’s the prioritization framework I use:

Tier 1: Optimize first (Week 1-4)

Tier 2: Optimize second (Month 2-3)

Tier 3: Consider for optimization (Month 3+)

Tier 4: Deprioritize or ignore

Start with Tier 1. Prove results. Then scale.

Always existing content first. Here’s why:

Existing content advantages:

• Already indexed and trusted
• Has backlinks and authority
• Proven topic/keyword relevance
• Faster to restructure than create

ROI comparison:

When to create new:

1. Major gap in your content library
2. Competitors dominating a topic you should own
3. New category/product launch
4. Emerging topic with low competition

The 80/20 rule: 80% of effort on existing content optimization 20% on strategic new content

For your 2,000 pages: You probably have 50-100 pages that deserve AI optimization. The other 1,900 can wait or be consolidated.

Prioritize by business value, not just traffic:

Value-based scoring framework:

Calculation: Score = (Conv × 0.30) + (Traffic × 0.25) + (Rank × 0.20) + (AI × 0.15) + (Gap × 0.10)

Example:

• Product comparison page: 5 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 3 = 4.35 (HIGH PRIORITY)
• Old blog post: 2 + 2 + 3 + 2 + 1 = 2.15 (LOW PRIORITY)

Apply to all pages, sort by score, work top-down.

This ensures you’re optimizing for business impact, not just AI visibility.

For convincing a skeptical boss, here’s the strategy:

The proof package you need:

1. Baseline documentation

   • Screenshot current AI responses for 10 key queries
   • Document “we don’t appear anywhere”
   • Note competitors who DO appear

2. Quick win execution

   • Optimize 5 high-value pages
   • Track changes weekly in Am I Cited
   • Document every improvement

3. Value translation

   • AI referral traffic value = 4.4x organic
   • Calculate traffic × conversion rate × order value
   • Project based on visibility improvements

The pitch: “We optimized 5 pages over 4 weeks. We’re now cited in 3 AI platforms for queries that drive $X in annual revenue. Here’s the plan to scale this.”

What bosses care about:

• Revenue impact
• Competitive advantage
• Minimal resource investment
• Proven results, not theory

Start small. Prove fast. Scale with permission.

Here’s how to audit 2,000 pages efficiently:

Step 1: Automated filtering (1 hour) Export from CMS or crawl with Screaming Frog. Filter for:

• Pages with >100 monthly sessions
• Pages ranking positions 1-20
• Pages with conversions Result: ~100-200 candidate pages

Step 2: Content type classification (2 hours) Categorize remaining pages:

• Comparison/listicle (HIGH priority)
• How-to/guide (HIGH priority)
• FAQ/Q&A (HIGH priority)
• Product/service (MEDIUM priority)
• Blog/news (MEDIUM priority)
• About/policy (LOW priority)

Step 3: AI opportunity assessment (2 hours) For top 50 pages, ask:

• Is this topic commonly asked to AI?
• Are competitors being cited for this?
• Is the query informational (AI prefers these)?

Step 4: Final prioritization (1 hour) Create ranked list based on:

• Business value (from earlier framework)
• Optimization potential (how much can we improve?)
• Effort required (quick wins first)

Total: 6 hours to prioritize 2,000 pages

Consider format-based prioritization:

High-priority formats (optimize these first):

• Product comparison pages
• Feature/pricing comparison tables
• “Best of” roundup pages
• FAQ and help center pages
• How-to guides and tutorials

Medium-priority formats:

• Definitive guides
• Data/research reports
• Case studies
• Product pages

Lower-priority formats:

• News/announcement posts
• Opinion/thought leadership
• Event recaps
• Company updates

Why format matters: AI citation rates vary dramatically by format. Comparison content gets cited at 32.5% vs opinion at 5.7%.

Quick assessment: Go through your top 100 pages. How many are high-priority formats?

If most are low-priority formats, you might need to CREATE high-priority content rather than just optimize.

This is incredibly helpful. Here’s my plan:

Week 1: Discovery and Audit

• Set up Am I Cited monitoring
• Export all pages, filter for >100 sessions
• Classify by content type
• Score using business value framework

Week 2-3: Top 10 Optimization Selected my top 10:

1. Main product comparison page
2. Pricing page
3. Feature comparison vs competitors
4. Primary “how to” guide
5. Key FAQ page
6. Top-ranking blog post (how-to format)
7. Case study with data
8. Integration guide
9. Getting started guide
10. Best practices guide

Optimization checklist for each:

• Add FAQ section (3-5 questions)
• Convert H2s to questions
• Add direct answer summary
• Create/improve tables
• Implement FAQPage schema
• Verify proper HTML structure

Week 4-6: Measure and Iterate

• Track citation changes
• Document what worked
• Refine approach

Week 7-12: Scale to Top 50

• Apply proven optimizations
• Build out comparison content gaps
• Create missing high-priority format content

Metric for boss: AI visibility improvement + estimated traffic value for optimized pages

Starting tomorrow!

Thanks everyone for the frameworks.