An analysis is judged by what it answers. The pages, the traffic lights and the scores out of a hundred are the wrapping. What follows is a list of nine questions an executive can apply in ten minutes to any digital presence analysis, before paying for it or before approving the plan it brings. Eight can be answered with work. The ninth only with your own data, which is why it comes last.
Why a checklist and not a score
The score out of a hundred is the best-selling format because it generates itself. When I measured with DataForSEO what people search for on this topic in the United States, on October 25, 2026, website audit checklist had 170 searches a month and a keyword difficulty of 2 out of 100: almost nobody has written a serious one. In Mexico, SEO audit example and website audit example are among the related terms with the most searches. The buyer wants to see what a good one looks like. This list is that, in the form of questions.
The first four: what the analysis saw
- Whom does the AI cite when a buyer asks for what we sell, in each market and language? With the question written out, the assistant, the date and the name cited.
- Can search and AI crawlers read the site? What is closed off in robots.txt, what lives in PDF, what structured data exists, whether there is an llms.txt.
- Which version of the site does the buyer in each country receive? With hreflang verified, not assumed.
- Who holds the positions we should hold today, with what content and how much advertising? Names, not categories.
If any of the four comes back blank or generic, the analysis did not look at your market. Keep going anyway: the next ones tell you whether it at least knows how to measure.
The next four: how it will be measured
- What is the baseline of each indicator and how was it measured? Source, date and method, beside every number.
- What is the six-month target and with what instrument will it be checked? A target without an instrument is an intention.
- Who owns each move of the plan: our team, a provider or the analyst? As a sequence, not a list.
- What is included in the price and what is quoted apart? If the answer mixes the analysis with building the site, the analysis was the bait.
Eight questions. You now have enough to separate a template from real work. But there is a ninth, and it is the one that decides whether the plan is worth what it costs.
The ninth question
How many quote requests does each market and each channel produce today, and how many will it produce when the plan is done? It is the only question that cannot be answered with external tools, because the data lives in your form, your CRM and your phone line. A real analysis answers it or explains how it will obtain the data in the first thirty days. A template does not even mention it, because in its place it puts traffic, impressions and reach, which are what the platforms give away.
Once that question has an answer, everything else falls into order on its own: AI visibility, structure and presence per market stop being goals and become means to a single column, the quote-request column.
| Question | What a template brings | What a real analysis brings |
|---|---|---|
| Whom does the AI cite? | A paragraph about the importance of AI | A table by question and market with names and date |
| Which version does each country receive? | Nothing, or a list of languages | The version served per market and the state of hreflang |
| What is the target? | Improve rankings | A number per indicator, with the measuring instrument |
| How many requests does it produce today? | Traffic and impressions | Requests by channel and market, or the plan to measure them within 30 days |
In my sample deliverable all nine are answered with an illustrative case and sample figures, labeled as such. It is the shape of the work; the figures of your case come from your data.
Can I ask for these answers before hiring?
You can ask the provider to show a previous deliverable with the client's data hidden, and apply the list. If there is none to show, you have your answer.
What if the analysis answers five out of nine?
Five out of nine is more than a template brings. Ask about the four missing ones: if the answer is that those come in the next phase, the price of the next phase is the real price.
Does this checklist apply to a one-page site?
It applies to any site that sells to other companies in more than one market. A local business needs a different list, and that is what UnEjemplo.com and OneExample.com are for.
