Technical SEO checklist for website launches (with AI)

A website launch is the moment when everything can go wrong at once. And some SEO mistakes are silent: the site loads fine, the client signs off, and weeks later Google traffic collapses because the new site was blocked from search engines, or because the old URLs started returning errors.

This is the list we use to check launches, updated with the steps for AI-powered search. Print it, copy it into your task tool, adapt it.

1. Before going live: indexing

• The staging block has been removed: no noindex on pages and no Disallow: / in robots.txt.
• robots.txt blocks only what it should (login area, cart, internal search) and points to the sitemap.
• sitemap.xml exists, lists only pages that should appear in Google and responds successfully.
• Every page has a canonical URL (rel="canonical") pointing to the official version.
• There is only one version of the site: with or without www, always on https. The others redirect to it.
• Thank-you pages, test pages and duplicates are set to noindex.

2. Redirects (if the site replaces an old one)

• There is a list of old URLs that received traffic: pull it from Search Console, Analytics or the Web Archive.
• Every old URL has a 301 redirect to the equivalent new page (not everything to the homepage).
• No redirect chains (A → B → C) or loops.
• Old images and PDFs that had external links are redirected too.

This is the most expensive mistake. A new site without redirects throws away years of Google rankings. Budget time for it in the schedule.

3. Content and markup on every page

• A unique title on each page, up to about 60 characters, with the main keyword near the start.
• A unique, inviting meta description of up to about 155 characters.
• A single H1 per page, with subheadings (H2, H3) in logical order.
• Images with descriptive alt text.
• Short, readable URLs (/services/consulting, not /?p=123).
• Internal links connecting related pages; no broken links.
• Sharing tags (Open Graph) with title, description and a 1200×630 image.

4. Performance (Core Web Vitals)

• Key pages tested on mobile, with LCP, INP and CLS in or near the "good" range.
• Images in WebP or AVIF, correctly sized, with width and height set.
• The main image not lazy-loaded; the rest with loading="lazy".
• Caching turned on and, if possible, a CDN.
• Third-party scripts reviewed: only what the client actually uses.
• Fast server response (time to first byte under 0.8 s).

Our Core Web Vitals guide covers each item in detail.

5. Structured data

• Organization (or LocalBusiness, for businesses with an address) on the homepage, with name, logo and contact details.
• WebSite on the homepage, with the name that should appear above the link in Google.
• BreadcrumbList on inner pages.
• The business's main type: Product (store), Article (blog), Service or Event.
• Everything validated in Google's Rich Results Test, with no errors, matching the visible content.

Ready-to-use examples in our JSON-LD and Schema.org guide.

6. AI and GEO: what is new on the checklist

• AI search crawlers allowed in robots.txt (OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, PerplexityBot) if the client wants to appear in those answers. Blocking training crawlers is the client's call.
• Firewall and CDN not blocking these crawlers by default.
• Main content readable without JavaScript: the text appears in the page source, not only after scripts run.
• An About page and service pages with concrete information: what the business does, where it operates, prices or ranges, differentiators.
• Real FAQs answered directly on the site.
• Name, address and phone consistent across the site, Google Business Profile and social profiles.
• Optional: an llms.txt file summarizing the site. It is a proposal, not an official standard, and does not replace the items above.

More details in How to get your site cited by ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude.

7. Measurement and monitoring

• Google Search Console verified, with the sitemap submitted.
• Bing Webmaster Tools verified (Bing also feeds AI search).
• Google Analytics installed, with conversions set up (form, purchase, chat or call clicks).
• Cookie banner working and tied to consent for analytics tools (GDPR and similar privacy laws).
• Monitoring of uptime and performance on key pages, with alerts to the person responsible.

8. On launch day

• Open the site on mobile and desktop, in a private window.
• Test the forms for real and check that the email arrives.
• Confirm https with no warnings and a certificate set to auto-renew.
• Test a sample of the old redirects.
• Request indexing of the homepage and key pages in Search Console.

9. After 7 and 30 days

• Search Console: indexed pages, crawl errors and URLs returning 404.
• Organic traffic compared with the old site (a small, temporary dip is normal; a big drop signals a problem).
• Core Web Vitals with real-user data.
• Test questions in AI assistants, to set a GEO baseline.

For agencies: make this list a fixed step in every project schedule and a handover report for the client. "We launched with 40 technical SEO items checked" is both a sales argument and a trust builder.

Want to check many of these items at once? A test on Teste de Performance shows a page's speed, technical SEO and AI visibility in about a minute.