Pillar 02112 checks

Topical Content

The second pillar is about whether each page answers a real query well enough to be cited. Titles and meta, heading structure, body depth and originality, internal linking, images and rich media. This is where a page earns the right to be the answer rather than just another result.

By Piers Butler, founder and AEO consultantPublished 13 June 2026, updated 25 August 2026

PILLAR 2, TOPICAL CONTENT · 2.1 Title & meta

19 checks

131Missing <title>Critical 132Empty <title>Critical 133Duplicate titles across pagesHigh 134Title too long (truncated)Medium 135Title too short / non-descriptiveMedium 136Multiple <title> tagsHigh 137Title doesn’t match content/intentHigh 138Keyword-stuffed titleHigh 139Title is just brand on a content pageMedium 140Missing meta descriptionMedium 141Duplicate meta descriptionsLow 142Meta description too longLow 143Meta description too shortLow 144Meta description doesn’t summarise pageLow 145Multiple meta description tagsLow 146Meta keywords tag presentLow 147Missing <meta charset>Medium 148Missing viewport metaHigh 149Invalid elements closing <head> earlyHigh

2.2 Heading structure

9 checks

150Missing <h1>High 151Multiple <h1> tagsMedium 152Empty heading tagsMedium 153Skipped heading levelsMedium 154Vague headingsMedium 155Headings used for stylingMedium 156Heading text duplicated across pagesLow 157Question heading with no direct answerHigh 158Incoherent heading outlineMedium

2.3 Body content, quality & non-commodity ✦

24 checks

159Thin contentHigh 160Commodity contentHigh 161Low information gain vs competitorsHigh 162No first-hand experience / unique POVHigh 163AI-generated boilerplate with no insightHigh 164Internal duplicate contentHigh 165Near-duplicate / spun variantsHigh 166External duplicate contentHigh 167Keyword stuffing / over-optimisationHigh 168Content not matching search intentHigh 169Outdated contentMedium 170No clear answer to the page’s questionHigh 171Passages not self-containedMedium 172Answer buried (lead doesn’t answer)Medium 173Padded contentMedium 174Low readability for audienceMedium 175Grammar/spelling errorsMedium 176Poor auto-translated contentHigh 177Doorway pagesHigh 178Very low content-to-boilerplate ratioMedium 179Important facts only in imagesHigh 180No publish/update date shownMedium 181Tables/lists vs prose mismatchLow 182Excessive ads/interstitials in main contentHigh

2.4 Internal linking

12 checks

183Generic anchor textMedium 184Broken internal links (404)High 185Internal links to redirectsMedium 186Key pages with few internal linksHigh 187No contextual links between related pagesMedium 188Weak topic-cluster structureMedium 189Excessive links on a pageLow 190Internal nofollow on equity linksMedium 191Links only in JS-rendered navHigh 192Deep pages not linked from authority pagesMedium 193No breadcrumb navigationMedium 194Identical anchor text to a page everywhereLow

2.5 Images (Lever 5)

13 checks

195Missing alt attributeHigh 196Empty alt on meaningful imageMedium 197Keyword-stuffed/filename altMedium 198Non-descriptive altLow 199Decorative images without empty altLow 200Oversized image filesMedium 201Missing image dimensionsMedium 202Images not in image sitemapLow 203Broken image srcMedium 204Images blocked by robots.txtMedium 205Non-descriptive filenameLow 206Missing responsive srcsetLow 207Text embedded in imagesHigh

2.6 Video & rich media (Lever 5)

6 checks

208Video without VideoObject schemaMedium 209Video without transcript/captionsHigh 210Video not in video sitemapLow 211Embedded video, no surrounding textMedium 212Audio/podcast without transcriptHigh 213Key info only in videoHigh

Google search systems diagnostics

29 checks

331Search Console queries show concepts the page never covers (RankBrain)Medium 332Page answers the reverse of the query's direction or negation (BERT)Medium 333Key answer value not stated in text beside the answer (MUM)Low 334Core concept described only in jargon or brand terms (neural matching)Low 335Specific answers buried in unheaded blocks of long pages (passage ranking)Medium 336Question queries land on generic hub pages instead of an answering page (Hummingbird)Low 338Fan-out subtopics of a core question have no matching page or sectionMedium 342Priority pages linked only from boilerplate positions (Reasonable surfer)Medium 346Three or more URLs compete for the same query (Site diversity)Medium 347Thin or duplicated URLs form a large share of the indexable site (Panda legacy)High 348Content sections sit outside the site's purpose and were written for search traffic (helpful content)High 349Review or best-of pages show no first-hand evidence of testing (reviews system)High 350Syndicated copies of original articles carry no canonical or link back to the source (original content systems)Medium 362Visible date and structured data date disagree on time-sensitive pagesMedium 363CTR far below the site's own benchmark for its position (Navboost proxy)Medium 364No image or video impressions for queries that trigger those features (Glue proxy)Medium 365Low semantic similarity between target queries and page passages (RankEmbed proxy)Medium 366Answer ignores the query's qualifying words (DeepRank proxy)Medium 367Page omits salient terms shared by top-ranking pages (QBST proxy)Medium 368Page type does not match the feature layout of its target query (Tangram proxy)Medium 369Anchors, body and queries describe different topics (ABC alignment)Medium 370Internal anchor text and body copy describe different topics (T*)Medium 374Pages in a reading sequence repeat what the previous page said (information gain)Medium 375Visible updated dates change without substantive content change (historical data patent)Medium 376Topic page omits the related phrases that recur across top-ranking pages (phrase-based indexing)Medium 377Target queries show an AI Overview but the site is not cited (AI Overviews)High 378Page copy padded with terms to hit a TF-IDF tool scoreMedium 379Core query terms missing from title, H1 and opening copyMedium 380Related term lists inserted as "LSI keywords"Medium