---
name: aeo-readiness
description: Make pages answer specific user questions clearly and completely.
---

# AEO readiness

Use this skill when a CanAgentUse report flags `aeo-readiness`. The goal is to implement the exact public signal the scanner evaluates, not to perform a broad redesign. Treat the report evidence as the failing test case and make the smallest production-quality change that turns that evidence into a pass.

## What This Check Evaluates

The AEO Readiness check evaluates whether a public HTML page exposes visible, structured, trustworthy answer content that answer engines, search answer surfaces, and assistants can extract and attribute.

## Pass Criteria

- Meaningful visible explanatory text.
- Major answer-relevant sections that begin with clear, concise answers where natural.
- Headings that expose the page's answer structure without confusing hierarchy.
- Natural question headings, FAQ/Q&A pairs, lists, or tables where they improve clarity.
- Clear entity/topic alignment across title, h1, description, and visible copy.
- At least one direct definition or equivalent explanatory sentence.
- Source, author, publisher, date, sameAs, about/contact, or policy evidence where relevant.
- Snippet controls that do not remove text needed for answer extraction.
- Retrieval and user-triggered answer crawlers allowed for public content when robots evidence is available.

## Failure And Warning Signals

**Failures usually mean:**

- No meaningful visible answer text is present.
- No answer-relevant headings, definitions, or passages can be found.
- Structured Q&A markup materially conflicts with visible content.
- `nosnippet` or `max-snippet:0` removes snippet eligibility for a page intended for answer surfaces.
- Retrieval or user-triggered answer crawlers are blocked for public answer content.
- The page is primarily hidden, blocked, or client-only in a way that prevents answer extraction.

**Warnings usually mean:**

- Visible copy exists but is thin or difficult to extract.
- Sections have headings but bury or omit direct answer openings.
- Question headings are absent on a page that clearly answers common questions.
- FAQ/Q&A markup exists but is incomplete or only partially visible.
- Title, h1, description, and definitions are weakly aligned.
- Missing source/date/author/publisher evidence on advice, review, legal, medical, financial, or factual pages.
- Low non

## Implementation Workflow

1. Start from the failed CanAgentUse evidence: URL, status code, content type, parsed fields, and failed criterion ID.
2. Locate the route, static asset, metadata generator, schema component, server config, or API endpoint that owns that public signal.
3. Implement the missing or malformed signal with real production values. Keep it same-origin unless the check explicitly supports external URLs.
4. Validate locally with direct HTTP requests, JSON/XML parsing, schema validation, or header inspection before relying on a full rescan.
5. Re-run the scan and compare the new evidence with the original failed criterion.

## Fix The Reported Criterion

- **AEO visible answer copy is thin or not extractable** (fail): Render meaningful answer-oriented visible copy in the initial HTML. Avoid hiding the primary answer behind late client-side rendering or inaccessible UI.
- **AEO answer-first passages are missing or weak** (warning): Start relevant sections with concise direct answers before elaboration. Keep answer blocks clear, specific, and scoped to their heading.
- **AEO question and answer structure is incomplete** (warning): Use natural question headings, visible Q&A pairs, lists, tables, or FAQ-style sections where they help users and agents extract answers.
- **AEO entity or definition clarity needs improvement** (warning): Align title, h1, description, definitions, and opening copy around the main entity or topic. Add plain definitions for key terms.
- **AEO evidence and trust signals are weak** (warning): Add visible evidence such as sources, dates, statistics, authorship, publisher identity, citations, or update timestamps where relevant.
- **AEO answer surface controls block extraction** (fail): Remove no-snippet, restrictive snippet limits, or data-nosnippet wrappers from content intended to appear in answer surfaces.

## Implementation Pattern

- Make important content available in raw HTML or a reliable server-rendered fallback.
- Use semantic elements, accessible names, labels, headings, and landmarks to expose page intent.
- Keep visible content and machine-readable metadata aligned.
- Test keyboard and accessibility-tree behavior for interactive flows.

## Validate Before Rescanning

Validate through the CanAgentUse MCP server when the agent can use MCP tools:

1. Connect to the hosted Streamable HTTP MCP endpoint:

   ```text
   https://canagentuse.com/api/mcp
   ```

   This endpoint uses MCP Streamable HTTP. Configure it in the agent's MCP client as an HTTP/streamable HTTP server.

2. For stdio-based MCP clients, install and run the npm package:

   ```bash
   npx -y @canagentuse/mcp
   ```

3. Use the MCP tools to verify the specific fix.

   - Run `scan_website` with the public production or preview URL.
   - Use `list_checks` to confirm the check id and public docs URL.
   - Use `get_fix_guidance` with `aeo-readiness` if the scan still reports a failure or warning.
   - Use `get_skill` with `aeo-readiness` to reload this skill after updates.
   - Compare the new scan evidence for `aeo-readiness` with the original failed criterion.

Validate through HTTP by creating and reading a hosted scan when MCP is unavailable:

```bash
SCAN_ID=$(curl -sS -X POST https://canagentuse.com/api/scans \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"url":"https://YOUR-SITE.com"}' | jq -r '.scanId // .id')

curl -sS "https://canagentuse.com/api/scans/$SCAN_ID/result" | jq .
```

After deployment, re-run the same check and verify the report evidence now satisfies the pass criteria.

## Common Mistakes To Avoid

- Do not ship sample domains, placeholder names, fake dates, fake prices, fake reviews, or unsupported capabilities.
- Do not fix a scanner warning by hiding the signal; make the public evidence accurate and parseable.
- Do not change unrelated SEO, auth, security, or commerce behavior just to satisfy this one check.

## Public Check Documentation

- https://canagentuse.com/suites/2026.06.10/checks/aeo-readiness/1.0.0