Technical SEO audit with GEO-specific checks — crawlability, indexability, security, performance, SSR, and AI crawler access

GEO Technical SEO Audit Purpose Technical SEO forms the foundation of both traditional search visibility and AI search citation. A technically broken site cannot be crawled, indexed, or cited by any platform. This skill audits 8 categories of technical health with specific attention to GEO requirements — most critically, server side rendering (AI crawlers do not execute JavaScript) and AI crawler access (many sites inadvertently block AI crawlers in robots.txt). How to Use This Skill 1. Collect the target URL (homepage + 2 3 key inner pages) 2. Fetch each page using curl/WebFetch to get raw HTML and HTTP headers 3. Run through each of the 8 audit categories below 4. Score each category using the rubric 5. Generate GEO TECHNICAL AUDIT.md with results Category 1: Crawlability (15 points) 1.1 robots.txt Validity Fetch https://[domain]/robots.txt Check for syntactic validity: proper User agent , Allow , Disallow directives Check for common errors: missing User agent, wildcards blocking important paths, Disallow: / blocking entire site Verify XML sitemap is referenced: Sitemap: https://[domain]/sitemap.xml 1.2 AI Crawler Access (CRITICAL for GEO) Check robots.txt for directives targeting these AI crawlers: Crawler User Agent Platform GPTBot GPTBot ChatGPT / OpenAI Google Extended Google Extended Gemini / Google AI training Googlebot Googlebot Google Search + AI Overviews Bingbot bingbot Bing Copilot + ChatGPT (via Bing) PerplexityBot PerplexityBot Perplexity AI ClaudeBot ClaudeBot Anthropic Claude Amazonbot Amazonbot Alexa / Amazon AI CCBot CCBot Common Crawl (used by many AI models) FacebookBot FacebookExternalHit Meta AI Bytespider Bytespider TikTok / ByteDance AI Applebot Extended Applebot Extended Apple Intelligence Scoring for AI crawler access: All major AI crawlers allowed: 5 points Some blocked but Googlebot + Bingbot allowed: 3 points GPTBot or PerplexityBot blocked: 1 point (significant GEO impact) Googlebot blocked: 0 points (fatal) Important nuance : Blocking Google Extended does NOT block Googlebot. Google Extended only controls AI training data usage, not search indexing. However, blocking Google Extended may reduce presence in AI Overviews. Recommend allowing Google Extended unless there is a specific data licensing concern. 1.3 XML Sitemaps Fetch sitemap (check robots.txt for location, or try /sitemap.xml , /sitemap index.xml ) Validate XML syntax Check for <lastmod dates (should be present and accurate) Count URLs — compare to expected number of indexable pages Check for sitemap index if large site (50,000+ URLs per sitemap max) Verify all sitemap URLs return 200 status codes (sample check) 1.4 Crawl Depth Homepage = depth 0. Check that all important pages are reachable within 3 clicks (depth 3) Pages at depth 4+ receive significantly less crawl budget and are less likely to be cited by AI Check internal linking: are key content pages linked from the homepage or main navigation? 1.5 Noindex Management Check for <meta name="robots" content="noindex" on pages that SHOULD be indexed Check for X Robots Tag: noindex HTTP headers Common mistakes: noindex on paginated pages, category pages, or key landing pages Category Scoring: Check Points robots.txt valid and complete 3 AI crawlers allowed 5 XML sitemap present and valid 3 Crawl depth within 3 clicks 2 No erroneous noindex directives 2 Category 2: Indexability (12 points) 2.1 Canonical Tags Every indexable page must have a <link rel="canonical" href="..." tag Canonical must point to itself (self referencing) for the authoritative version Check for conflicting canonicals (canonical in HTML vs. HTTP header) Check for canonical chains (A canonicals to B, B canonicals to C — should be A to C) 2.2 Duplicate Content Check for www vs. non www (both should resolve, one should redirect) Check for HTTP vs. HTTPS (HTTP should redirect to HTTPS) Check for trailing slash consistency (pick one pattern and redirect the other) Check for parameter based duplicates ( ?sort=price creating duplicate pages) 2.3 Pagination If paginated content exists, check for rel="next" / rel="prev" (note: Google ignores these as of 2019, but Bing still uses them) Preferred: use rel="canonical" on paginated pages pointing to a view all page or the first page Ensure paginated pages are not noindexed if they contain unique content 2.4 Hreflang (international sites) Check for <link rel="alternate" hreflang="xx" tags Validate: reciprocal hreflang (if page A points to page B, B must point back to A) Validate: x default fallback exists Check for language/region code validity (ISO 639 1 / ISO 3166 1) 2.5 Index Bloat Estimate number of indexed pages (check sitemap count, use site:domain.com estimate) Compare indexed pages to actual valuable content pages Flag if indexed pages significantly exceed content pages (index bloat from thin/duplicate/parameter pages) Category Scoring: Check Points Canonical tags correct on all pages 3 No duplicate content issues 3 Pagination handled correctly 2 Hreflang correct (if applicable) 2 No index bloat 2 Category 3: Security (10 points) 3.1 HTTPS Enforcement Site must load over HTTPS HTTP must redirect to HTTPS (301 redirect) No mixed content warnings (HTTP resources on HTTPS pages) SSL/TLS certificate must be valid and not expired 3.2 Security Headers Check HTTP response headers for: Header Required Value Purpose Strict Transport Security max age=31536000; includeSubDomains Forces HTTPS Content Security Policy Appropriate policy Prevents XSS X Content Type Options nosniff Prevents MIME sniffing X Frame Options DENY or SAMEORIGIN Prevents clickjacking Referrer Policy strict origin when cross origin or stricter Controls referrer data Permissions Policy Appropriate restrictions Controls browser features Category Scoring: Check Points HTTPS enforced with valid cert 4 HSTS header present 2 X Content Type Options 1 X Frame Options 1 Referrer Policy 1 Content Security Policy 1 Category 4: URL Structure (8 points) 4.1 Clean URLs URLs should be human readable: /blog/seo guide not /blog?id=12345 No session IDs in URLs Lowercase only (no mixed case) Hyphens for word separation (not underscores) No special characters or encoded spaces 4.2 Logical Hierarchy URL path should reflect site architecture: /category/subcategory/page Flat where appropriate — avoid unnecessarily deep nesting Consistent pattern across the site 4.3 Redirect Chains Check for redirect chains (A redirects to B redirects to C) Maximum 1 hop recommended (A redirects to C directly) Check for redirect loops All redirects should be 301 (permanent), not 302 (temporary), unless intentionally temporary 4.4 Parameter Handling URL parameters should not create duplicate indexable pages Use canonical tags or robots.txt Disallow for parameter variations Configure parameter handling in Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools Category Scoring: Check Points Clean, readable URLs 2 Logical hierarchy 2 No redirect chains (max 1 hop) 2 Parameter handling configured 2 Category 5: Mobile Optimization (10 points) Critical Context As of July 2024 , Google crawls ALL sites exclusively with mobile Googlebot. There is no desktop crawling. If your site does not work on mobile, it does not work for Google. Period. 5.1 Responsive Design Check for <meta name="viewport" content="width=device width, initial scale=1" Content must not require horizontal scrolling on mobile No fixed width layouts wider than viewport 5.2 Tap Targets Interactive elements (buttons, links) must be at least 48x48 CSS pixels Minimum 8px spacing between tap targets Check that navigation is usable on mobile 5.3 Font Sizes Base font size should be at least 16px No text requiring zoom to read Sufficient contrast ratio (WCAG AA: 4.5:1 for normal text, 3:1 for large text) 5.4 Mobile Content Parity All content visible on desktop must also be visible on mobile No hidden content behind "read more" toggles that Googlebot cannot expand (though Google has improved at expanding these as of 2025) Images and media must load on mobile Category Scoring: Check Points Viewport meta tag correct 3 Responsive layout (no horizontal scroll) 3 Tap targets appropriately sized 2 Font sizes legible 2 Category 6: Core Web Vitals (15 points) 2026 Metrics and Thresholds Core Web Vitals use the 75th percentile of real user data (field data) as the benchmark. Lab data is useful for debugging but field data determines the ranking signal. Metric Good Needs Improvement Poor Notes LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) < 2.5s 2.5s 4.0s 4.0s Measures loading — time until largest visible element renders INP (Interaction to Next Paint) < 200ms 200ms 500ms 500ms Replaced FID in March 2024. Measures ALL interactions, not just first CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift) < 0.1 0.1 0.25 0.25 Measures visual stability — unexpected layout movements How to Assess Without CrUX Data When real user data is unavailable, estimate from page characteristics: LCP : Check largest above fold element. Is it an image (check size/format)? Is it text (check web font loading)? Server response time (TTFB)? INP : Check for heavy JavaScript on page. Long tasks ( 50ms) block interactivity. Check for third party scripts. CLS : Check for images without explicit width/height. Check for dynamically inserted content above the fold. Check for web fonts causing layout shift (FOUT/FOIT). Common LCP Fixes 1. Optimize hero images: WebP/AVIF format, correct sizing, preload with <link rel="preload" 2. Reduce server response time (TTFB < 800ms) 3. Eliminate render blocking CSS/JS 4. Preconnect to critical third party origins Common INP Fixes 1. Break up long tasks ( 50ms) into smaller chunks using requestIdleCallback or scheduler.yield() 2. Reduce third party JavaScript 3. Use content visibility: auto for off screen content 4. Debounce/throttle event handlers Common CLS Fixes 1. Always include width and height attributes on images and videos 2. Reserve space for ads and embeds with CSS aspect ratio or explicit dimensions 3. Use font display: swap with size adjusted fallback fonts 4. Avoid inserting content above existing content after page load Category Scoring: Check Points LCP < 2.5s 5 INP < 200ms 5 CLS < 0.1 5 Category 7: Server Side Rendering (15 points) — CRITICAL FOR GEO Why SSR Is Mandatory for AI Visibility AI crawlers (GPTBot, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, etc.) do NOT execute JavaScript . They fetch the raw HTML and parse it. If your content is rendered client side by React, Vue, Angular, or any other JavaScript framework, AI crawlers see an empty page. Even Googlebot, which does execute JavaScript, deprioritizes JS rendered content due to the additional crawl budget required. Google processes JS rendering in a separate "rendering queue" that can delay indexing by days or weeks. Detection Method 1. Fetch the page with curl (no JavaScript execution): curl s [URL] 2. Compare the raw HTML to the rendered DOM (via browser) 3. If key content (headings, paragraphs, product info, article text) is MISSING from the curl output, the site relies on client side rendering What to Check Main content text : Is the article body / product description / page content in the raw HTML? Headings :

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