Manual AI citation and Google search optimisation for businesses that need clearer answers, stronger evidence and crawlable source pages. We identify the questions worth owning, improve the pages that can answer them, and show exactly what was completed.
No dashboard. No bulk AI blogs. No paid citations. No placement promise.
The method is repeatable and evidence-led. It controls the work The Dot Dev can control, while platform selection remains outside the guarantee. It does not guarantee citations or rankings.
Select the buyer questions that are worth owning because you can answer them truthfully.
Write one precise, truthful claim for each question. Do not stretch the claim to chase a query.
Gather client-approved first-party proof or a reputable primary source before the page is changed.
Build or improve the single public page that can answer that question.
Make crawl and index eligibility, the canonical URL, and internal links consistent with that page.
Add structured data only for facts a person can already read on the page.
Issue a manual Citation Evidence Report that records agreed work, current evidence, gaps, and next scenarios.
This method follows people-first content, crawlable links and canonical pages, and structured data that matches visible facts. It makes a page eligible and clear. It does not guarantee that Google, ChatGPT or any other system will select, cite or rank that page. The working brief for one question is a citation scenario map.
The same eligibility conditions apply to ordinary Google search and to answer engines. See Answer Engine Optimisation, WordPress AEO eligibility and Show up in ChatGPT.
Each priority question is assigned to one page that can answer it in visible HTML, not a cluster of thin variants.
Claims stay inside client-approved first-party proof or a reputable primary source. Untrue claims are refused.
We check a public 200 response, a correct canonical, sitemap listing, and internal links. Eligibility is not an indexing guarantee.
Structured data repeats facts already on the page. We do not invent special AI markup.
Examples are generic. They do not name competitors or claim client results.
What the business does and which problem it solves. Example: how a consultancy scopes a website rebuild.
How an approach differs from common alternatives. Example: when a public source page is more useful than a private PDF.
What evidence exists and what remains uncertain. Example: which delivery checks were completed and which outcomes are still unknown.
What a buyer needs before they commission work. Example: what is included, what is excluded, and how scope is agreed.
A written plan of the agreed questions, claims, pages, and order of work before implementation starts.
Edits or new source pages limited to the agreed scope. Scope agreed before work starts.
A map of each claim to the approved first-party proof or primary source that supports it.
Public 200, canonical, sitemap and internal-link conditions for the approved pages.
A manual report of agreed scenarios, work completed, dated observations where available, gaps, and next priorities. It is not a dashboard or a citation count.
Prices are in USD. Scope agreed before work starts.
A written plan for the questions and pages worth owning first.
Recommended. Strategy plus implementation on five agreed priority pages.
Ongoing source-page and evidence work. 3-month minimum.
Before work begins, we agree a written Citation Action Plan. If The Dot Dev does not complete every agreed, controllable optimisation for the approved pages—including content, evidence paths, internal links, crawl eligibility, visible-matching structured data, and the final Citation Evidence Report—we refund 100% of the implementation fee.
Exclusions: third-party platform selection; rankings; citations; traffic; leads; revenue; client delays or missing access; requested untrue claims; and third-party publication or link placement unless named in writing. This is a service-scope statement, not legal advice. The public policy path is the Service Delivery & Refund Policy.
AI citation optimisation is a manual process that chooses buyer questions worth owning, maps each one to a truthful claim, collects approved evidence, and improves the one public page that can answer it. It also checks crawl and index eligibility, adds structured data only for visible facts, and records the work in a Citation Evidence Report. It is an implementation process, not a platform-outcome guarantee.
No. The Dot Dev does not guarantee citations, AI answers, rankings, traffic, leads, revenue, Google AI Overview inclusion, or ChatGPT placement. Those outcomes are selected by third-party platforms. The written guarantee covers agreed, controllable implementation only.
We start with the buyer questions that can be answered truthfully from first-party proof or a reputable primary source. Priority goes to service and problem queries, comparison and alternatives, proof and risk, and buying-decision questions that one canonical page can own. We do not invent claims to chase a query.
Google work covers question-to-page fit, proof and source discipline, crawl and index eligibility such as a public 200 response, a correct canonical, sitemap listing and internal links, plus visible HTML with matching structured data. This makes a page eligible and clear. It does not guarantee indexing, ranking, or selection in Google AI features.
No. Most work improves agreed existing public pages. A new page is recommended only when no current URL can truthfully answer the chosen question. Related WordPress and headless release checks are documented on our WordPress AEO and headless WordPress pages.
Before work begins, we agree a written Citation Action Plan. If The Dot Dev does not complete every agreed, controllable optimisation for the approved pages—including content, evidence paths, internal links, crawl eligibility, visible-matching structured data, and the final Citation Evidence Report—we refund 100% of the implementation fee. The guarantee does not cover third-party platform selection, rankings, citations, traffic, leads, revenue, client delays or missing access, requested untrue claims, or third-party publication and link placement unless named in writing.
Related reading: AI Search Optimization 2026, headless WordPress release evidence, Trust and portfolio.
Author and reviewer: The Dot Dev. First published 23 August 2026. Review when the cited publisher guidance or agreed service scope changes.
