Technical Audit: AI Readiness & Link Analysis
AI citation readiness, link validation, and image integrity. The machine-readable layer between your content and search engines.
Why AI readiness and link integrity belong together.
AI is reshaping search. Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT citations, Perplexity answers — your content either shows up in these or it does not. Phase 7 checks whether your site is structured to be cited by AI systems. Phase 8 validates every link and image on the page because broken resources are the most common technical issue we find. Together they cover the technical layer that sits between your content and how machines interpret it.
- AI structured data and citation readiness scored
- Every link crawled — 404s, redirects, and chains flagged
- Every image checked for alt text, loading, and broken sources
Two phases. The machine-readable layer.
Phase 7 checks if AI can cite you. Phase 8 checks if your links and images work.
AI citation and structured data
Phase 7 — AI Readiness
Structured data for AI Overviews, FAQ and HowTo schema, content organization for LLM extraction, entity disambiguation, and citation-worthiness scoring. This phase checks whether your content is structured to appear in AI-generated answers.
- AI Overview eligibility assessment
- LLM-friendly content structure scoring
- Entity and citation readiness analysis
Every link and image validated
Phase 8 — Links & Images
Every link on the page crawled for status codes. Every image checked for alt text, loading attributes, file size, and broken sources. Redirect chains identified. Orphan links flagged. The most common technical issues on the web, checked exhaustively.
- Every link status-checked (404, 301, 302, chains)
- Image alt text and loading attribute audit
- Broken resource and mixed content detection
Machine-readable layer intact
Why They Are One Category
AI readiness requires clean technical infrastructure. Broken links and missing images make your site look abandoned to both humans and AI systems. The technical category ensures the machine-readable layer of your site is intact.
- Both phases run on every free audit
- The fastest-growing category as AI search expands
- Catches issues invisible to visual inspection
Technical, common questions
AI Readiness and Links & Images — the machine-readable layer.
What is AI readiness and why does it matter now?
AI Overviews appear on 30%+ of Google searches. If your content is not structured for extraction by AI systems, you are invisible in the fastest-growing search format. Phase 7 checks this.
- AI Overviews now appear in 30%+ of searches
- Structured content gets cited, unstructured content gets ignored
How many links does Phase 8 actually check?
Every link on the page. Internal, external, anchor, image source, stylesheet, script — all of them. One audit found 47 broken image links on a page that looked fine visually.
- Every resource type checked, not just visible links
- CSS fallback backgrounds can hide broken images
Does Phase 7 check for ChatGPT and Perplexity specifically?
Phase 7 checks the structural patterns that make content extractable by any LLM system. This includes Google AI Overviews, ChatGPT Browse, Perplexity, and future AI search tools.
- Structural patterns work across all AI systems
- Future-proof against new AI search tools
What is a redirect chain?
When link A redirects to B, which redirects to C. Each hop adds latency and dilutes link equity. Phase 8 identifies the full chain and recommends the direct URL.
- Each redirect hop adds latency to page load
- Link equity dilutes with every hop in the chain
Do broken images really affect SEO?
Yes. Broken images generate 404 errors in server logs, waste crawl budget, hurt Core Web Vitals (CLS), and signal neglect to search engines. Phase 8 catches every one.
- 404 errors waste Google's crawl budget on your site
- Missing images cause CLS shifts that hurt rankings
How often should I run the technical audit?
After any site update, migration, or plugin change. Technical issues are the most likely to be introduced by routine changes and the least likely to be noticed without automated checking.
- Routine updates are the #1 source of new technical issues
- Automated checking catches what visual inspection misses
Run Free Audit
Run Free AuditFind the technical issues hiding in plain sight.
Run all 12 phases on your live site. AI Readiness and Links & Images are phases 7 and 8 — the checks that catch what visual inspection misses. Free audit, results in under 5 minutes.
- AI readiness scored for the new search landscape
- Every link and image on the page validated
- Free to run, free to download, yours to keep
AI Readiness + Links & Images