AI SEO Audit Checklist: 15 Things to Check Before You Hire an Agency
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Here’s a scenario that’s becoming common. A business owner searches for a service on Google, then asks ChatGPT the same question just to compare. Two different answers come back, and your competitor is named in both. You aren’t.
That’s the problem an AI SEO audit is meant to find. And honestly, it’s also a good test of any agency you’re thinking of hiring. If they can’t explain what they’d check, they probably can’t fix it either.
So before you sign anything, here are 15 things to look at. Some are basic. A few get skipped more often than you’d think.
So, What Is an AI SEO Audit?
It’s a check-up on two things at once: how your site performs in regular search and whether it has any presence in AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google’s AI Overviews.
The word that matters there is “useful”. Anyone can run a tool and export 80 pages of warnings. A real audit tells you what’s hurting you most and what to do on Monday morning.
The 15-Point Checklist
1. Can Google Actually Reach Your Pages?
Start here, because nothing else matters if this fails. Open Google Search Console and look for indexing errors, wrong canonical tags, blocked pages and sitemap trouble. It’s surprisingly easy for a main service page to sit under a stray “noindex” tag for months while nobody notices.
2. Technical Health
Slow loading, broken links, clumsy navigation, and a bad mobile experience – all of it adds friction. A good audit covers page speed, Core Web Vitals, redirects, HTTPS and site structure.
One tip. Be wary of any report that treats every tiny warning as an emergency. Good agencies sort the big problems from the noise. If you’d like to see where technical work sits in a full plan, here’s an overview of SEO services.
3. Keywords and Search Intent
Ask what your customers are really after. Someone typing “what is SEO?” wants to learn. Someone typing “SEO agency near me” wants to hire. Those need different pages.
Look for pages that compete with each other, topics you’ve never covered and keywords that don’t fit your business. Every key page should have one clear job.
4. Your Visibility in AI Search
This one takes ten minutes and tends to be eye-opening. Ask Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity the questions your customers would ask. Write down whether you’re mentioned, whether your site is cited, and who shows up in your place.
Then do it again next month. AI answers shift a lot, so one check proves very little.
If you want help turning those findings into a plan, a focused AI SEO strategy is a good place to start.
5. Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO)
GEO sounds technical, but the idea is simple. Make your content worth quoting.
That means clear explanations, real examples, reliable facts and a few ideas that are actually yours. If your article says what every other article says, an AI tool has no reason to pick yours. And no, stuffing “AI” into every second sentence won’t help.
6. Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO)
AEO is about being the page that gives the direct answer. Read your own service pages as a stranger would. Do they say what the service is, who it’s for and how you’d measure success? Or do they dance around it?
Plain headings and straight answers go a long way. For a deeper look, see our guide to Answer Engine optimisation.
7. Content Quality and Coverage
Fifty mediocre blog posts won’t beat ten excellent ones. Check for outdated articles, posts that overlap, customer questions you’ve never answered and claims with nothing behind them.
Before you write anything new, see what you can improve. Updating a decent old post is usually faster than starting over, and it often works better too.
8. Internal Linking
Internal links are easy to ignore, and they matter. Do your blog posts point to the right service pages? Do related articles link to each other?
Use anchor text that tells people where they’re going. A post about AI search should lead to your AI SEO page. A post about backlinks should lead to your link building page. If a link doesn’t help the reader, leave it out.
9. Backlinks and Link Building
More links aren’t better. Better links are better.
Look at who links to you, whether those sites are relevant, and which pages they point to. Odd patterns are a red flag. So is any agency promising hundreds of backlinks a month without telling you how. Real links usually come from useful content, good PR and genuine relationships. If you want to see how that fits into a wider plan, take a look at our link building services.
10. Brand Mentions and Reputation
Search for your own business. What comes up? Check directories, review sites and industry publications, and make sure your name, address, services and descriptions match everywhere.
Real customer reviews help. But a pile of mentions from irrelevant sites doesn’t mean much. Where you’re mentioned matters more than how often.
11. Structured Data
Schema markup gives search engines a tidy summary of your page. Depending on the page, that might be Organisation, Article or BreadcrumbList.
Check that it’s valid and matches what visitors can see. Google’s Rich Results Test will tell you. But be realistic: schema helps engines understand a page. It doesn’t guarantee rankings or a place in an AI answer, whatever anyone tells you.
12. Who’s Behind the Content?
Would you trust an article with no author and no company behind it? Probably not. Show who wrote it and where it makes sense, and show their experience. Add real case studies and clear business details.
And please, no made-up testimonials. They’re easy to spot, and they cost you trust you can’t easily win back.
13. Competitor Check
Look at who’s winning your customers’ attention. What topics do they cover? How good are their service pages? Where do they show up in AI answers?
You’re not looking to copy them. You’re looking for gaps; the questions they answer badly or don’t answer at all.
14. Tracking Leads, Not Just Rankings
Rankings feel good, but they don’t pay the bills. Track impressions, clicks, keyword positions, form fills, qualified leads and conversions. If AI tools send you visitors, note that too, and keep a fixed set of queries so you can compare month to month.
Search Console and analytics cover regular search. AI visibility often needs extra tools or some manual checking.
15. What the Agency Will Actually Do
Here’s where you separate talkers from doers. Ask:
Will the audit give prioritised technical and content recommendations?
How will progress be measured?
How do they approach GEO, AEO and link building?
Can they share relevant case studies or references?
What gets done each month?
How do reports tie the work to leads and revenue?
And walk away from anyone who guarantees rankings or promises you’ll appear in every AI answer. Nobody controls that. Not us, not anyone.
What a Good Audit Report Should Contain
When the report lands, it should leave you clear on where you stand. Look for:
Technical issues affecting crawling and indexing.
Keyword opportunities and content gaps.
Internal linking and backlink quality.
AI search visibility and competitor observations.
GEO and AEO recommendations.
A prioritised action plan with measurable goals.
It should also feel written for your business. If it reads like the same template sent to every client, that’s a bad sign.
Final Thoughts
The best audits don’t leave you overwhelmed. They leave you knowing what to fix first.
So start simple. Make sure your key pages can be indexed. Improve content that isn’t helping people. Add internal links that make sense. Track results the same way every month. After that, decide where GEO, AEO and the rest belong in your plan.
If you’d like a hand, you can explore Green Web Media’s AI SEO services, look through the SEO packages, or see how link building services could support the work.
A good agency will tell you what needs fixing, why it matters and how you’ll know it worked. If yours can’t, keep looking.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does an AI SEO audit check?
It covers technical SEO, content quality, keyword targeting, internal links, backlinks, brand credibility and how visible you are in AI-powered search.
How is AI SEO different from traditional SEO?
Traditional SEO aims to improve your organic search performance. AI SEO builds on that and also looks at how your content might be found and referenced by AI tools.
Can an agency guarantee Google AI Overview visibility?
No. An agency can strengthen your site and build a solid strategy, but Google alone decides which sources appear in AI Overviews.
How often should you run an AI SEO audit?
Do a full one before starting a new campaign or when serious site problems appear. After that, check technical performance, content, backlinks and AI visibility regularly, based on what your site needs.
