seo-readiness

File existence is the easy 10%. The failures that cost launches are contradictions: canonical says localhost, sitemap advertises

/admin

, a

noindex

left over from staging, robots blocking the pages the sitemap lists. This skill reads the relationships.

Activate when

The product has public pages meant to be found, or launch/domain/redesign is near.
Titles look like "Vite + React", canonicals or sitemap hosts look wrong, or the site has never been indexed.
Not for a private/internal product (confirm it is consistently
```
noindex
```
), not for ranking strategy or keyword research.

Inspect

Intent. Should this site be indexed? Production origin (scheme, host,
```
www
```
)? Public vs private routes? Ask only if
```
.readyvibe/context.md
```
and config do not say (
```
site-reconnaissance
```
).
Run the sweep (paths relative to this skill's folder; add
```
--render
```
for client-rendered apps; serve a build locally if needed):
bash
```
node scripts/inspect-metadata.mjs --url <site> --render --private-path /dashboard
node scripts/check-links.mjs      --url <site> --render     # sitemap/canonical target status
```
Read rendered HTML: frameworks can override tags after hydration. Compare with source (
```
<Head>
```
,
```
metadata
```
exports,
```
next-seo
```
,
```
react-helmet
```
,
```
index.html
```
) to find where each value comes from, so fixes land in the right place.

Relationships to reason about:

Signal A	vs. Signal B	Problem
canonical host	production origin	localhost/staging/preview host in a canonical (HIGH)
sitemap `<loc>` host	canonical host	search engines get two truths
sitemap lists path	page is `noindex` or private route	contradictory signals; private exposure (HIGH for admin/dashboard/api)
sitemap lists path	robots blocks it	unfetchable listing
sitemap lists path	canonical points elsewhere	non-canonical URL listed
sitemap lists path	returns 404/redirect/soft-404	dead listing ( `check-links` )
robots `Sitemap:`	actual sitemap URL/host	wrong or dev sitemap advertised
robots `Disallow: /`	production intent	whole site blocked (HIGH)
robots `Disallow: /_next/` `/assets/`	rendering	crawlers cannot render
robots lists `/admin`	route reachable?	robots is not access control; hands attackers a map
`noindex` on home/most pages	launch intent	staging leftover (HIGH)
`x-robots-tag` header	meta robots	header may override; check both
several pages	the same canonical URL ( `CANONICAL_DUPLICATE_TARGET` )	template copied from the home page; tells engines to ignore the rest
robots blocks a linked public page ( `ROBOTS_BLOCKS_PAGE` )	page's title, description, and `noindex` are never read	crawler cannot see it
trailing slash / `www` / `http` variants	canonical + redirects	duplicate URL forms

Titles and descriptions: unique per page, specific to the page's content, front-load the topic, roughly 50-60 / 120-160 characters as a guideline (truncation, not a rule); no framework defaults; no keyword stuffing. Derive copy from the page's visible content and product facts; do not invent claims.
Multi-language:
```
hreflang
```
pairs, per-language canonicals (with
```
multilingual-readiness
```
).
JS-only pages: if content appears only after JavaScript and no server rendering or prerender exists, say indexing depends on the crawler executing JS: SOURCE-INDICATED risk, not proven.

Evidence that counts

Label each claim OBSERVED, SOURCE-INDICATED, DECLARED, INFERRED, UNKNOWN, or REVIEW REQUIRED. UNKNOWN is never a pass and never a failure.

Rendered tag from the running site: OBSERVED. Tag in source only: SOURCE-INDICATED.
Local checks cannot show what the production CDN redirects, rewrites, or serves. Verify the live URL when one exists; otherwise mark host/redirect behavior UNKNOWN.
Never state a page "is indexed", "will rank", or "Google will show X"; that needs Search Console (
```
search-console-readiness
```
).

May change

Set/repair titles, descriptions, canonicals (only once the production origin is known: DECLARED or asked), robots.txt, sitemap.xml or its generator (

next-sitemap

app/sitemap.ts

@astrojs/sitemap

noindex

on genuinely private routes, removal of private routes from the sitemap, redirects for duplicate URL forms. Preserve intentional owner copy; improve only starter, missing, duplicate, or placeholder values.

Must not claim

"SEO-optimized", "will be indexed", "will rank", "Google-friendly" or a numeric score. Do not claim a sitemap is correct because it exists; correctness is the agreement list above.

Verify

Re-run

inspect-metadata

and

check-links

. Pass = no HIGH; every sitemap URL is public, canonical, 200, not noindex, not blocked; every canonical target resolves and is on the production host; no localhost/staging strings remain; robots and sitemap agree. Then spot-check one page in the rendered DOM.

Escalate

Unknown production origin (ask before writing absolute URLs); a private route that is reachable (hand to

web-security

); site migrations with redirects; sites with several domains or heavy JS rendering where search visibility matters (deep technical SEO is beyond this pass).

No change is valid when

The site is intentionally private and consistently noindex; a one-page site has no sitemap by design; an apparent finding is explained by context (

noindex

/dashboard

). Do not generate a sitemap or rewrite good copy to hit a length target.

seo-readiness

NPX Install

Tags

SKILL.md Content

seo-readiness

Activate when

Inspect

Evidence that counts

May change

Must not claim

Verify

Escalate

No change is valid when