A well-crafted digital experience should be understandable to people and machines. Start with these fundamentals.
An effective website has two audiences. People need to understand what you offer and what to do next. Search engines and some AI systems need to retrieve information from its pages. You don't need to sacrifice design to make both possible.
01 — Make the content readable
- Put essential messaging in accessible text, not only in images or video.
- Use clear heading levels that describe the page rather than decorative labels alone.
- Check that important content can be rendered and retrieved by relevant crawlers.
- Review robots rules so you understand which crawlers can access which pages.
- Keep canonical URLs and an accurate sitemap for the pages you want discovered.
02 — Make the offer understandable
- Explain what the business does in language a newcomer understands.
- Give important services and products their own useful context.
- Replace generic claims with specific explanations and appropriate evidence.
- Put the most helpful answer close to the question it addresses.
03 — Make it credible
- Keep business identity and contact details consistent across legitimate profiles.
- Make it clear who is behind the business and how to reach them.
- Label conceptual or speculative work as such, rather than presenting it as real customer results.
- Review important content regularly and show accurate publication or update dates where useful.
04 — Make the next step simple
- Give visitors a relevant path forward on each key page.
- Test the experience on mobile, including speed, accessibility and form usability.
What about schema and llms.txt?
Structured data can help describe your organisation, articles and services. An llms.txt file is an optional proposed convention, not a guarantee that AI systems will use it. Neither replaces clear content and strong technical fundamentals.
Use this checklist as a first review, not as a promise of AI recommendations. Our homepage scanner can help identify a few technical considerations for an entered website URL.