You can run a free AEO audit yourself in about 30 minutes, or book a free SEO strategy session and have Julian's team look at your AI visibility with you. This guide shows you exactly how to do the free AEO audit on your own, step by step, using only free tools.
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No paid software. No sign-ups to fancy dashboards. Just a list of prompts, four AI engines, a spreadsheet and a few free Google tools.
If you'd rather skip straight to the expert option, get a free SEO strategy session. It's a call, not a report. We look at where you stand in Google and AI answers and talk through what to fix first.
What You're Checking in a Free AEO Audit
AEO, answer engine optimisation, is about getting your brand mentioned and cited inside AI answers from ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode, Claude and Copilot. A free audit answers three simple questions:
- When buyers ask AI about what you sell, are you mentioned?
- If not, who is, and which sources is the AI pulling from?
- Is anything on your own site stopping AI from reading or trusting you?
If you want the full 8-part framework behind this, read my guide to the AEO audit. This page is the fast, free, do-it-today version.
Why bother? Because more buyers now ask an AI before they ever click a search result. If the AI names three of your competitors and not you, you lose that customer before they even see your site. And most business owners have no idea it's happening, because they've never looked.
The good news is that checking costs nothing but half an hour. And once you've done it once, you'll have a repeatable process you can run every month. If you want to learn the wider AI SEO side as you go, I teach it inside the AI Profit Boardroom ($69/mo).
Before You Start
Have these ready so you don't lose time mid-audit:
- A blank Google Sheet
- Logins for ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity (free accounts are fine)
- Access to your Google Search Console property
- Your homepage URL and your two or three most important service pages
- A list of your top three to five competitors
The 30-Minute Free AEO Audit, Step by Step
Set a timer. Open a blank spreadsheet. Here's the order.
Step 1: Write Your Prompt List (5 minutes)
Write 20 to 30 questions your buyers would actually type into ChatGPT. Think like a customer, not an SEO.
- "Best [your service] in [your city]"
- "[Your service] for [type of customer]"
- "Alternatives to [big competitor]"
- "How do I [problem you solve]?"
- "Is [your brand] any good?"
Short on ideas? My 200+ AI SEO Prompts will help you generate a solid list fast.
Step 2: Test in 4 Engines (12 minutes)
Run your prompts in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google (check the AI Overview at the top and try AI Mode). If you're tight on time, run your top 10 prompts in all four and the rest in just one.
Use a logged-out or fresh session where you can. Personal history can skew what you see.
Step 3: Log It in a Spreadsheet (5 minutes)
Make these columns: Prompt, Engine, Are we mentioned (yes/no), Competitors mentioned, Cited URLs. Fill them in as you go.
The cited URLs column is the gold. Perplexity and Google's AI features show their sources. When the same review site, directory or "top 10" list keeps appearing, write it down. Those are the pages you need to get onto.
Step 4: Check Google Search Console (3 minutes)
Open Search Console. Look at the Pages report to make sure your key pages are indexed. Then look at the Performance report for question-style queries you're getting impressions on. If Google doesn't index a page, AI built on Google's index has a harder time using it.
Step 5: Run the Rich Results Test (3 minutes)
Paste your homepage and one key service page into Google's Rich Results Test. Check whether you have valid Organization, Article or FAQ schema. Note any errors. Schema helps engines understand who you are and what the page covers.
Step 6: Check robots.txt (2 minutes)
Go to yoursite.com/robots.txt. Make sure you're not accidentally blocking pages or crawlers you want to reach your content. Some sites block more than they mean to after a developer change or a plugin update.
Found something confusing already? Book a free SEO strategy session and we'll go through it with you.
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Free AEO Audit Tool Table
Here's every step, the free tool and what it tells you, in one place.
| Step | Free tool | What you learn |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Prompt list | Notepad or a spreadsheet | The real questions your buyers ask AI |
| 2. Test engines | ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Google AI Overviews and AI Mode | Whether you get mentioned and who beats you |
| 3. Log results | Google Sheets | Your mention rate and the sources AI cites |
| 4. Indexing and queries | Google Search Console | Which pages are indexed and which questions you show for |
| 5. Schema | Google Rich Results Test | Whether your structured data is valid |
| 6. Crawler access | Your robots.txt file | Whether you're blocking anything you shouldn't |
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How to Read Your Results
Once the 30 minutes are up, look at your spreadsheet and sort it into three buckets.
You're mentioned and recommended. Good. Protect it. Keep those pages fresh and keep showing up on the sources being cited.
You're mentioned but not recommended. The AI knows you exist but prefers someone else. Usually that means competitors have more third-party mentions, better reviews or clearer pages answering the exact question.
You're not mentioned at all. Check the cited URLs. If you're missing from every source the AI is pulling from, that's your priority list. Off-site mentions and links on those sites tend to matter a lot. My free link building book covers how to earn those placements.
One thing to watch: don't panic over a single prompt. AI answers vary from run to run. Look for patterns across your whole list. If you're missing on most "best X" prompts but showing up on brand prompts, that tells you the AI knows you but doesn't see enough outside proof to recommend you.
Then look at your own site findings. Fix indexing issues first, then robots.txt mistakes, then schema errors, then rewrite key pages so the first sentence answers the question directly.
The Free Expert Option
The DIY audit tells you what's happening. It doesn't always tell you what to do first, or how to get onto the sites AI keeps citing.
That's where the free SEO strategy session comes in. To be clear about what it is: it's a call, not a report. You won't get a PDF or a score. You get Julian's team looking at your AI visibility with you, live, and mapping out a plan you can act on.
I've been doing SEO for 10+ years, run Goldie Agency, and teach AI SEO and AEO daily to 430K+ YouTube subscribers. My team does this every day. Book your free strategy session and bring your spreadsheet if you've done the DIY version first. It makes the call far more useful.
Prefer to write up your findings into a proper document? Here's what a free AEO report should contain, with a template you can build yourself.
Keep It Going Every Month
One audit is a snapshot. AI answers change. Rerun your prompt list monthly in the same spreadsheet so you can see whether your mention rate is going up or down.
If you want to automate the boring bits, I use AI agents to rerun prompts and log results. The Agent OS guide shows how that's set up. And if you're picking which AI model to use for research tasks like this, see how they compare in Goldie Bench.
Want to learn this alongside other people doing the same thing? Join the AI Profit Boardroom ($69/mo), where I share AI SEO and AEO workflows each week.
Also working on generative search more broadly? The free GEO audit guide covers the same idea from the GEO angle.
Ready for a second pair of eyes? Get a free SEO strategy session.
FAQ
Is a free AEO audit actually useful?
Yes. Thirty minutes of prompt testing and a few free Google tools will show you whether AI engines mention you, which competitors they prefer and which sources they cite. That's enough to build a priority list.
Do I need paid tools to do an AEO audit?
No. ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Google, Search Console, the Rich Results Test and a spreadsheet are all you need to start. Paid tools mainly save time on tracking.
How many prompts should I test?
Aim for 20 to 30 real buyer prompts. Fewer than that and you might miss the questions that actually drive sales.
What do I get from the free strategy session?
A call with Julian's team where we look at your AI visibility with you and map out a plan. It's not a written report. Book your free strategy session or book a free SEO strategy session here.
