Agent Experiences

AXO Quick Start Guide

Implement Agent Experience Optimization in 10 practical steps with ready-to-use code templates and checklists.

What You'll Accomplish

1

Foundation

Set up basic structure and markup

2

Enhancement

Add trust signals and structured data

3

Optimization

Monitor and iterate improvements

Prefer to limit or block AI crawlers?

If your goal is to prevent AI training or referencing, see our AI Opt-Out Controls guide for robots.txt and ai.txt templates, plus server-side controls and monitoring tips.

1

Add Basic JSON-LD Schema

Start with Article or WebPage schema to help agents understand your content structure.

Article Schema Template
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "Article",
  "headline": "Your Article Title",
  "author": {
    "@type": "Person",
    "name": "Author Name"
  },
  "datePublished": "2024-01-15",
  "dateModified": "2024-01-15",
  "description": "Article description"
}
</script>
2

Create robots.txt with AI User-Agents

Configure crawler access with common AI agent user-agents.

robots.txt Template
User-agent: *
Allow: /

# AI Agent User-Agents
User-agent: GPTBot
Allow: /

User-agent: PerplexityBot
Allow: /

User-agent: ClaudeBot
Allow: /

User-agent: Bard
Allow: /

Sitemap: https://yoursite.com/sitemap.xml
3

Implement llms.txt (Emerging Standard)

Add llms.txt to provide structured information about your site for AI agents.

📋 llms.txt vs Other Standards

  • • llms.txt: Emerging proposal for AI agent communication
  • • robots.txt: Established crawler control standard
  • • sitemap.xml: Content discovery for search engines
  • • ai.txt: Alternative proposal with similar goals
llms.txt Template
# llms.txt - Information for AI Agents

## Site Information
- Name: Your Site Name
- Description: Brief description of your site
- Contact: contact@yoursite.com

## Content Guidelines
- Primary topics: [list main topics]
- Content types: articles, documentation, guides
- Update frequency: weekly

## Attribution
- Preferred citation: "Your Site Name (yoursite.com)"
- License: CC BY 4.0
4

Optimize Heading Structure

Ensure proper H1-H6 hierarchy for predictable content chunking.

Single H1 per page
Logical H2-H6 nesting
Descriptive heading text
5

Add Author and Date Information

Include clear authorship and publication dates for trust signals.

<article>
  <header>
    <h1>Article Title</h1>
    <div class="article-meta">
      <span class="author">By John Smith</span>
      <time datetime="2024-01-15">January 15, 2024</time>
      <time datetime="2024-01-20" class="updated">
        Updated: January 20, 2024
      </time>
    </div>
  </header>
  <!-- Article content -->
</article>
6

Create FAQ Schema

Add FAQ structured data for common questions agents might ask.

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "FAQPage",
  "mainEntity": [{
    "@type": "Question",
    "name": "What is Agent Experience Optimization?",
    "acceptedAnswer": {
      "@type": "Answer",
      "text": "AXO is the practice of optimizing content..."
    }
  }]
}
7

Update Sitemap with lastmod

Ensure your sitemap includes accurate last modification dates.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<urlset xmlns="http://www.sitemaps.org/schemas/sitemap/0.9">
  <url>
    <loc>https://yoursite.com/article</loc>
    <lastmod>2024-01-15T10:30:00Z</lastmod>
    <changefreq>weekly</changefreq>
    <priority>0.8</priority>
  </url>
</urlset>
8

Set Up Agent Traffic Monitoring

Track AI agent crawls in your analytics to measure engagement.

🤖 Common AI Agent User-Agents to Track

  • • GPTBot - OpenAI's web crawler
  • • PerplexityBot - Perplexity AI crawler
  • • ClaudeBot - Anthropic's crawler
  • • Bard - Google's AI crawler
  • • ChatGPT-User - ChatGPT browsing
9

Validate Implementation

Use validation tools to check your schema markup and structure.

Schema Validation

Schema.org Validator

HTML Validation

W3C Validator
10

Monitor and Iterate

Set up ongoing monitoring and improvement processes.

Weekly crawl rate monitoring
Monthly citation tracking
Quarterly content audits

Next Steps

Deep Dive: CLEAR Framework

Learn the systematic methodology

Measurement & Analytics

Track your AXO performance

AI Opt-Out Controls

robots.txt & ai.txt templates

Case Studies

See real implementation examples