AI Visibility

How AI
reads websites

AI does not see your website the way you do. It does not see your beautiful design, your hero images or your carefully chosen colour palette. AI sees text, structure and code. Understanding what AI actually reads on your website, and what it ignores, is the key to making your content work for AI visibility.

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What AI sees versus what you see

When you visit a website, you see colours, images, layout and design. You form an impression of the business within seconds based on how professional it looks. AI does none of this. AI crawlers read the raw HTML of your page. They extract text, headings, links, meta tags and structured data. Everything else is invisible to them.

This means a beautifully designed website with very little text gives AI almost nothing to work with. A plain-looking website with detailed FAQ pages, service descriptions and helpful articles gives AI everything it needs. Design matters for human visitors. Content matters for AI.

Several things on your website are effectively invisible to AI crawlers:

  • • Images without alt text: AI cannot "see" images. Without alt text, they do not exist.
  • • Content loaded by JavaScript: Many AI crawlers do not execute JavaScript. If your content only appears after JavaScript loads, it may be invisible.
  • • Content behind login walls: Gated content is inaccessible to crawlers.
  • • PDFs and documents: Most AI crawlers focus on HTML pages. PDF content is often missed.
  • • Video and audio content: Unless transcribed as text on the page.

What AI reads and values on your website:

  • • Page titles and meta descriptions: These tell AI what each page is about.
  • • Heading structure (H1, H2, H3): Headings tell AI how your content is organised and what the key topics are.
  • • Body text: The actual content of your pages. More detailed, helpful text gives AI more to work with.
  • • Internal links: Links between your pages help AI understand how topics relate to each other.
  • • Structured data (schema markup): Machine-readable information about your business, services, FAQs and reviews.
  • • Canonical URLs: Tell AI which version of a page is the primary one.

If your website relies heavily on images, videos or JavaScript for content delivery, much of it may be invisible to AI. Make sure all key information also exists as plain HTML text.

The AI crawlers: who visits your website

GPTBot

OpenAI's crawler. Indexes content for ChatGPT's training data and knowledge. User agent: GPTBot/1.0. Respects robots.txt directives.

ClaudeBot

Anthropic's crawler for Claude. Indexes web content for training and knowledge retrieval. User agent: ClaudeBot/1.0. Respects robots.txt.

Googlebot

Google's crawler powers both regular search and Gemini/AI Overviews. Your Google SEO directly feeds Gemini's knowledge. The most established of all crawlers.

PerplexityBot

Perplexity's web crawler. Indexes content for Perplexity's answer engine. User agent: PerplexityBot. Focuses on content that can be cited with sources.

Check your robots.txt file to make sure none of these crawlers are blocked. If you want AI visibility, these bots need access to your content.

What AI does with what it reads on your website

Once an AI crawler has read your website, it does not simply store the text. It processes it. The AI extracts entities (your business name, location, services), relationships (which services you offer in which areas), facts (your prices, opening hours, specialisms) and sentiment (whether the content is confident and expert or vague and generic).

This processing determines how AI represents your business when answering questions. If your website clearly states "We are a family-run plumbing company in Bristol, specialising in boiler installations and central heating repairs, serving BS1 through BS16", the AI has a precise understanding. If your website says "We provide comprehensive plumbing solutions across the South West", the AI has a vague one. Precision wins.

AI also evaluates the structure and quality of your content. A page with a clear H1 heading, logical H2 subheadings and well-organised paragraphs is easier for AI to process than a wall of unstructured text. Similarly, content that answers questions directly ("A new boiler costs between £2,500 and £4,500 in Bristol") is more useful to AI than content that avoids specifics ("Contact us for a competitive quote").

The practical takeaway: write your website as if you are explaining your business to a knowledgeable assistant who will then recommend you to potential customers. Be specific, be clear, be structured. That is exactly what AI does with the information it reads.

How to make your website AI-readable

Making your website readable for AI is not complicated. It mostly overlaps with good SEO practices. Here are the key steps:

  1. 1.
    Use clear heading structure

    One H1 per page with your main topic. H2s for sections. H3s for subsections. Headings should describe what follows, not be clever or vague.

  2. 2.
    Write content as plain HTML text

    Do not put important information only in images, PDFs or JavaScript-loaded elements. Make sure all key content is in the HTML source code.

  3. 3.
    Add structured data

    LocalBusiness, FAQPage and Service schema tell AI exactly what your business does. This is the most direct way to communicate with AI systems. Read more in our guide on why structured data matters for AI.

  4. 4.
    Answer questions directly

    Use the question as a heading, then answer it in the first two sentences. AI extracts answers from content that follows this pattern.

  5. 5.
    Allow AI crawlers access

    Check your robots.txt for rules blocking GPTBot, ClaudeBot or PerplexityBot. Remove any blocks unless you have specific reasons to keep them.

A practical example. Suppose you are an estate agent in Bristol. Your current website has a hero image, a tagline ("Finding your dream home"), three small icons with captions, and a contact form. An AI crawler sees almost nothing useful.

The improved version has the same design, but adds: a detailed "About Us" section explaining your specialisms and areas covered. An FAQ page answering "How much does an estate agent charge in Bristol?", "How long does it take to sell a house?", "What is the stamp duty threshold?". Service pages for each area you cover. Guides on buying and selling property in Bristol. LocalBusiness schema markup with your address, phone and service area.

Now AI has substantial content to work with. When someone asks ChatGPT "Who is a good estate agent in Bristol?", there is enough evidence on your website for AI to consider recommending you.

The best part: everything that makes your website better for AI also makes it better for Google and for human visitors. It is not a trade-off. It is an upgrade across the board. For the full visibility strategy, read our guide on how to get visible in ChatGPT.

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Common problems with UK business websites

Many UK business websites are built for humans but accidentally hostile to AI. Here are the most common issues we see:

  • 1.
    Wix and Squarespace sites with minimal text. Beautiful templates with hero images and short taglines. AI sees an almost empty page. Add detailed text content to every page.
  • 2.
    WordPress sites blocking AI crawlers via security plugins. Plugins like Wordfence or Sucuri sometimes block AI crawlers by default. Check your security plugin settings and whitelist GPTBot and ClaudeBot.
  • 3.
    Single-page websites. Everything on one long page. AI prefers dedicated pages for each topic. A separate FAQ page, a separate services page, individual pages for each service area.
  • 4.
    Pricing hidden behind "Contact us". AI values transparency. If you can share price ranges, do so on your website. "Boiler installation from £2,500" is more AI-friendly than "Contact us for a quote."

The fix for most of these problems is straightforward: add more text content to your website. Not filler or marketing jargon, but genuinely useful information that answers the questions your customers ask.

Think of your website as a resource, not a brochure. A brochure says "We do plumbing." A resource says "Boiler installation in Leeds typically costs between £2,500 and £4,500 depending on the type of boiler and complexity of the installation. Here are the factors that affect the price..."

The resource version gives AI something to cite. The brochure version does not. Every page of your website should answer at least one question that a potential customer might ask. For more on what AI values in your content, read our article on how AI collects business information.

Frequently asked questions

Does my website design affect AI visibility?

Design itself does not affect AI visibility directly. AI does not see colours, layouts or images. But design affects whether you have enough text content. A minimal design with very little text gives AI nothing to work with, even if it looks professional to human visitors.

How do I check if AI crawlers can access my site?

Check your robots.txt file (yourwebsite.co.uk/robots.txt). Look for rules mentioning GPTBot, ClaudeBot or PerplexityBot. If they are disallowed, AI crawlers cannot access your content. Also check your hosting provider and security plugin settings.

Do I need to rebuild my website for AI?

Usually not. Most improvements are additions, not rebuilds. Add text content, FAQ pages, structured data and detailed service descriptions to your existing site. The structure matters more than the platform (WordPress, Wix, Squarespace all work fine).

Is good SEO enough for AI visibility?

Good SEO helps but is not sufficient. SEO focuses on keywords and backlinks. AI visibility also requires content that directly answers questions, structured data, and a strong presence on multiple platforms beyond your website. Think of SEO as the foundation and AI optimisation as the next layer.

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