SEO/GEO/AEO Scanner Tutorial: Understand Your Site Visibility in 30 Seconds
Have you ever wondered: your site ranks fine on Google, but when someone asks ChatGPT or Perplexity a related question, your site is never mentioned?
In 2026, “website visibility” goes beyond Google rankings. Search engines, AI generative engines, and answer engines are splitting traffic three ways. How does your site score on each path? The TWTools three-axis scanner tells you in 30 seconds.
This is a complete walkthrough — from “paste your URL” to “read the report” to “fix the issues.”
What Are the Three Axes? A 1-Minute Primer
Before scanning, understand what each axis measures:
| Axis | Full Name | One-Line Explanation | Traffic Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| SEO | Search Engine Optimization | Google organic ranking fundamentals | google.com organic results |
| GEO | Generative Engine Optimization | Will AI engines cite your site? | ChatGPT / Claude / Perplexity / Gemini |
| AEO | Answer Engine Optimization | Can you claim “position zero”? | Google Featured Snippets + AI Overview |
You probably know SEO well. GEO and AEO became critical in 2025-2026. The three-axis scanner checks all three at once — no need to run separate tools.
Step 1: Open the Scanner and Paste Your URL
- Go to the TWTools Three-Axis Scanner
- Paste the URL you want to scan (homepage or any page)
- Click “Start Scan”
The scan runs through 6 stages in real time: fetch HTML → check robots.txt → inspect sitemap → parse JSON-LD → run 18 rules → generate suggestions. About 30 seconds total, no login or email required.
⚠️ Common issue: If the URL returns 403 or times out, the target server is likely blocking fetch requests. Try a different page, or check if the site has a WAF (Web Application Firewall).
Step 2: Read the Three-Axis Scores
After scanning, you see three scores from 0 to 100:
| Score Range | Meaning | Action |
|---|---|---|
| 80-100 | Excellent — solid fundamentals | Maintain; fine-tune details |
| 60-79 | Passing — clear room for improvement | Fix red indicators first |
| 40-59 | Below average — multiple gaps | Follow the suggestion list |
| 0-39 | Critical | Review your site architecture |
On average, Taiwan SME websites score 50-65 on SEO, much lower on GEO (many sites have never optimized for AI engines). If your first scan lands 70+ across all three axes, you are ahead of most competitors.
Step 3: Drill Into the 18 Sub-Metrics
The total score comes from 18 weighted sub-metrics, 6 per axis:
SEO Axis (Traditional Search)
- Performance: Page response time, critical issues
- On-Page Structure: H1/H2 hierarchy, internal links, image alt coverage
- Technical SEO: robots.txt / sitemap / canonical correctness
- Meta Tags: title / description length and quality
- Mobile-Friendly: viewport settings, touch target sizes
- Page Speed: HTML size, blocking resources
GEO Axis (Generative Engine)
- Citability: Does content contain clear factual statements AI can cite?
- AI Crawler Access: Does robots.txt allow GPTBot / ClaudeBot / PerplexityBot (10 AI bots)?
- Structured Data: JSON-LD schema types and completeness
- E-E-A-T Signals: Author info, organization info, expertise evidence
- Brand Authority: Organization schema, sameAs external links
- Multi-Platform Signals: Consistent brand presence across authoritative platforms
AEO Axis (Answer Engine)
- Answer Paragraph: Do the first 150 words contain a concise direct answer?
- FAQ Structure: FAQ schema or Q&A format present?
- Snippet Ready: Is the content format easy for Google to extract as a Featured Snippet?
- HowTo Structure: Does step-by-step content have HowTo schema?
- Question Headings: Are H2/H3 phrased as questions (“How to…” / “Why…”)?
- PAA Friendly: Does content align with “People Also Ask” patterns?
Each sub-metric is color-coded: green = pass, yellow = improvable, red = needs fix. Click through to the detail page for specific how-to-fix instructions.
Step 4: Fix by Priority
At the bottom of results, a suggestion list is sorted by severity. The approach:
Fix reds first, then yellows. Greens need no action.
The most common red flags and their fixes:
“All AI Crawlers Blocked” (Most Common GEO Red)
Many sites’ robots.txt looks like this:
User-agent: GPTBot
Disallow: /
User-agent: ClaudeBot
Disallow: /This means you are actively blocking ChatGPT and Claude. If you want AI engines to cite you, remove those Disallow lines or change them to Allow: /.
”Missing Organization JSON-LD” (GEO + SEO Cross-Axis Impact)
This structured data tells search engines and AI “who runs this site.” Without it, your brand has no identity in AI engines. Adding it is straightforward — a JSON-LD block in your <head>:
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "Organization",
"name": "Your Brand",
"url": "https://yoursite.com",
"logo": "https://yoursite.com/logo.png"
}“No Answer Paragraph” (Common AEO Yellow)
Google Featured Snippets prefer a direct answer in the first 150 words. If your page opens with “Welcome to our website. We are a company founded in…”, AI does not know what to extract. Put the core answer in paragraph one, then elaborate.
Step 5: Rescan After Changes
After fixing issues, scan the same URL again. Score changes are instant because the scanner uses pure rule-based scoring (no LLM inference). Same page, same HTML, same score — every time.
The scanner stores your score history in localStorage (browser-only, nothing uploaded), so you can track improvement trends.
⚠️ If you changed robots.txt or JSON-LD but the score did not change, verify: (1) Is the change deployed to production? (2) Is the CDN cache cleared? The scanner fetches the live version, not your localhost.
FAQ
Q1: Does it scan just one page or the whole site?
One page per scan. Whichever URL you paste, that is what gets scanned. For a site-wide picture, scan at least three pages: homepage, an important article, and a product/service page.
Q2: Is the score relative to competitors?
No — scores are absolute (rule-based 0-100), not a relative ranking. Based on our data, Taiwan business sites average ~55 on SEO, ~35 on GEO, ~28 on AEO. GEO and AEO are universally low because most sites have not started AI-related optimization.
Q3: Is there a usage limit?
No. Unlimited scans, no login, no email. Hosted on Cloudflare free tier — scan as many times as you want.
Q4: What does “rule-based scoring” mean?
Every point comes from an explicit condition (e.g., “Organization JSON-LD present = +X points”), with zero AI model inference. Results are reproducible and explainable — same page scanned ten times, same score every time. Each deduction links to a detail page with fix instructions.
Next Steps
If GEO and AEO are new to you, read this companion article: 2026 GEO Complete Guide: A Taiwan Webmaster’s Perspective for deeper context on why AI engines require separate optimization.