Aeo Audit

/digital-marketing-pro:aeo-audit

Purpose

Evaluate the brand's visibility and accuracy across AI answer engines. Analyze how the brand is cited, described, and recommended by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode (the conversational search surface that became Google's default at I/O 2026 — ~1B MAUs as of May 2026), Google AI Overviews, Gemini, and Microsoft Copilot. Produce optimization recommendations to improve AI visibility.

AI Mode vs AI Overviews — why both matter: AI Overviews are the summary block at the top of a classic Google SERP and trigger on a subset of queries. AI Mode is a conversational tab (and now the default search experience for opted-in users) backed by Gemini 3.5 Flash with deeper reasoning, follow-ups, and a different citation pattern. The two surfaces select different sources for the same query in a large share of cases (internal observation, 05/2026 — "40–60%" is a rough estimate; re-verify against your own probe set). Audit both.

Cross-reference with GSC AI Performance Report (rolled out 3 June 2026): The Google Search Console AI Performance Report (UK rollout first, global to follow) gives you actual impressions in AI Overviews + AI Mode for verified properties. Synthetic probe results from this skill should be reconciled against GSC actuals — see /digital-marketing-pro:gsc-ai-performance for the workflow. Important caveat: the GSC report intentionally excludes click data; click-through attribution must come from GA4 (the new AI Assistant channel group, added 13 May 2026, captures Medium=ai-assistant referrals from ChatGPT/Gemini/Claude; see /digital-marketing-pro:analytics-insights).

Google's official position on AI optimization (Google AI Optimization Guide, updated 15 May 2026): no llms.txt, no AI-specific schema, no separate AI eligibility gate. Pages eligible for snippets in classic Search are eligible for AI Features. Don't manufacture work around fictional ranking factors — /digital-marketing-pro:aeo-geo documents what does work (entity consistency, citation-worthy snippets, knowledge graph alignment).

Information Agents (Google AI Pro / Ultra, summer 2026 launch): Google announced at I/O 2026 a new class of persistent agents that continuously monitor web / news / real-time data for subscribers and deliver synthesized updates with actionable capabilities. Once these go live, they become a 7th probe target for this skill (alongside ChatGPT / Perplexity / AI Mode / AI Overviews / Gemini / Copilot). Until then, treat AI Mode as the proxy — agents are powered by the same Gemini 3.5 Flash backbone. Source: blog.google/search-io-2026.

Input Required

The user must provide (or will be prompted for):

• Brand name: The brand to audit
• Website URL: Primary domain
• Key queries: 5-10 queries a potential customer might ask that should surface the brand
• Competitors: 2-3 competitors for comparison
• Product/service categories: What the brand should be known for

Process

1. Load brand context: Read ~/.claude-marketing/brands/_active-brand.json for the active slug, then load ~/.claude-marketing/brands/{slug}/profile.json. Apply brand voice, compliance rules for target markets (skills/context-engine/compliance-rules.md), and industry context. Also check for guidelines at ~/.claude-marketing/brands/{slug}/guidelines/_manifest.json — if present, load restrictions and relevant category files. Check for custom templates at ~/.claude-marketing/brands/{slug}/templates/. Check for agency SOPs at ~/.claude-marketing/sops/. If no brand exists, ask: "Set up a brand first (/digital-marketing-pro:brand-setup)?" — or proceed with defaults.
2. Define a test query set: branded queries, category queries, comparison queries, "best of" queries, problem-solution queries
3. Analyze how the brand appears in AI responses for each query type
4. Check citation accuracy: Are facts correct? Are URLs valid? Is the description current?
5. Compare brand mention frequency and sentiment against competitors
6. Assess source authority: Which sources are AI engines pulling brand info from?
7. Evaluate structured data and knowledge panel presence
8. Identify content gaps where the brand should appear but does not
9. Generate optimization recommendations for improved AI visibility

Output

A structured AEO audit report containing:

• AI visibility scorecard across platforms (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Microsoft Copilot)
• Query-by-query results showing where the brand appears, how it is described, and citation sources
• Competitor comparison matrix for AI visibility
• Citation accuracy assessment with corrections needed
• Source authority analysis — which pages/sites drive AI mentions
• Content gap list — queries where the brand is absent but should appear
• Optimization playbook: structured data, content strategy, authority building, and entity optimization

Numbered output convention

All AEO audit outputs go to ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_DATA}/{brand}/seo/aeo-audit/{YYYY-MM-DD}/:

00-input.md                 brand identity, target query set, competitor list, AI platforms probed
01-query-set.md             the 10-25 queries probed, with intent classification
02-probe-results.json       raw probe responses per platform per query (the data layer)
03-platform-scorecard.md    visibility scorecard per AI platform (1-10) with diff vs prior run
04-citation-accuracy.md     fact-by-fact accuracy check of AI descriptions; what to correct
05-source-authority.md      which pages/sites are driving AI mentions; topical entity map
06-content-gaps.md          queries where brand is absent but should appear
07-competitor-matrix.md     side-by-side AI presence vs competitors
08-quality-scorecard.md     the gates below
09-optimization-playbook.md  structured data, content, authority, entity work — sequenced
PLAN.md                     single-page deliverable

Reconcile 03-platform-scorecard.md against /digital-marketing-pro:gsc-ai-performance actuals — probe results show what AI could surface; GSC shows what it actually surfaced.