aeo.server-blocks-answer-bot

What to change

A finding of this rule on a page carries the exact edits for that page: the markup it quotes, and what to write instead.

When it runs

Runs with --ai-bots, on the command or the local server. A warning is a problem that costs a page ranking, clicks or citations. Each finding takes 5 points off the page's score.

The severity here is the rule's usual one: a finding can be raised or lowered when the page gives a reason.

Run it, or skip it

Check a page for this rule alone, after a fix for instance:

npx @rivi-software/agentic-seo-check aeo https://example.com --ai-bots --rule aeo.server-blocks-answer-bot

Or from an assistant, with the MCP tool seo_aeo_audit:

{
  "url": "https://example.com",
  "aiBots": true,
  "rules": [
    "aeo.server-blocks-answer-bot"
  ]
}

To leave it out of an audit, pass --disable aeo.server-blocks-answer-bot on the command, or disableRules: ["aeo.server-blocks-answer-bot"] to a tool.

• Warningaeo.content-signal-blocks-answersA robots.txt Content-Signal line sets ai-input=no or search=no, asking answer engines not to use the pages in AI answers or search.
• Infoaeo.content-signal-invalidA robots.txt Content-Signal line has a signal other than search, ai-input or ai-train, or a value other than yes or no.
• Infoaeo.llms-txt-missingThe site has no /llms.txt.
• Warningaeo.llms-txt-invalid/llms.txt exists but does not follow the llms.txt format, which requires an H1 title first.
• Infoaeo.llms-txt-no-links/llms.txt has no Markdown links, so it points AI tools to no pages.
• Infoaeo.server-blocks-training-botThe server refuses or challenges an AI training bot's User-Agent while it serves the audit's own request.
• Infoaeo.crawl-stoppedThe hosted server stopped requesting the site before the crawl was done: the site refused its requests (a challenge, HTTP 429), robots.txt asked for a Crawl-delay longer than a hosted crawl waits, or the server reached its request limit for the site. The audit covers the pages it read.
• Infoaeo.bot-probe-inconclusiveThe AI bot probe could not run: the target is not a URL, or the audit's own request did not get the page.