3.2 AEO Content Auditing: Finding Quick Wins

In this episode, we're diving into AEO content auditing—finding the quick wins hiding in your existing pages. You don't need to start from scratch. Most sites are sitting on content that's already close to working in AI systems; it just needs tightening and smarter structure. We walk through a practical, six-step audit framework you can run in a spreadsheet: - **Step 1:** Build your audit tracker with columns for URL, Page Title, Primary Topic, Word Count, and Last Updated - **Step 2:** Add structural health checks—Schema Status, H1 Present, H2/H3 Structure, and Internal Links - **Step 3:** Run the "answer location test" to see if your best answer sits above or below the fold - **Step 4:** Test AI citation behavior with columns for AI Citation Status, Summary Accuracy, Fact Extraction Quality, and What Broke - **Step 5: Check RAG optimization—Will lifting your content in chunks preserve its meaning?** Add columns for chunking status and reason. - **Step 6:** Audit evidence and attribution—does your page give AI systems a reason to trust and cite you? This isn't glamorous work, but it's where the easiest wins are hiding. Fix the pages that are close but failing, and you'll start seeing citations, quotes, and visibility—without rewriting your entire site. **Spreadsheet Labels Mentioned:** - URL - Page Title - Primary Topic - Word Count - Last Updated - Schema Status - H1 Present - H2/H3 Structure - Internal Links - Answer Location - AI Citation Status - Summary Accuracy - Fact Extraction Quality - What Broke? - Chunking (Step 5 Result) - Chunking Reason (Step 5 Reason)