Never Ranked
AI-native SEO & AEO agency. Search changed. Your visibility didn't. We fix that.
This repository contains the Never Ranked marketing site, the audit methodology used to deliver client work, and the first proof-of-practice case study (an audit of our own in-house SaaS, Montaic).
What's in this repo
neverranked/
├── index.html # the marketing site (single-file, no framework)
├── _headers # Cloudflare Pages security + caching headers
├── robots.txt # robots directives
├── sitemap.xml # sitemap for crawlers
│
├── audit-template/ # reusable blank template for client audits
│ ├── README.md # how to run a new audit
│ ├── intake-questionnaire.md # 12-question client intake
│ ├── 00-executive-summary.md
│ ├── 01-intake.md
│ ├── 02-technical-audit.md
│ ├── 03-schema-review.md
│ ├── 04-keyword-gap.md
│ ├── 05-ai-citations.md
│ ├── 06-competitor-teardown.md
│ └── 07-roadmap.md
│
├── audits/ # completed client audits
│ └── montaic/ # the first case study
│ ├── 00-executive-summary.md
│ ├── 02-technical-audit.md
│ ├── 03-schema-review.md
│ ├── 04-keyword-gap.md
│ ├── 05-ai-citations.md
│ ├── 06-competitor-teardown.md
│ ├── 07-roadmap.md
│ ├── implementation/ # Month 1 pasteable implementation kit
│ │ ├── README.md
│ │ ├── A1-root-schema.md
│ │ ├── A2-breadcrumbs.md
│ │ ├── A3-howto-schema.md
│ │ ├── A4-blogposting-schema.md
│ │ ├── A5-software-application.md
│ │ ├── A6-free-grader-full-stack.md
│ │ ├── A7-canonicals-robots.md
│ │ ├── A8-og-images.md
│ │ ├── A9-title-meta-rewrites.md
│ │ ├── A10-entity-registration.md
│ │ └── A11-fair-housing-pillar-article.md
│ └── raw/ # fetched HTML + evidence trail
│
└── scripts/
└── run-audit.py # automated audit runner (no dependencies)
The site
index.html is the entire Never Ranked marketing site. Single file. No framework. No build step. Editorial dark-luxury design inspired by MouthWash Studio.
Fonts: Playfair Display (headlines), DM Mono (body), Barlow Condensed (labels).
Palette: #080808 background, #c9a84c gold accents, #f0ece3 off-white text.
Features: Film grain overlay, scroll reveal animations, mobile-first responsive, async-first positioning.
Deploy: drop this folder into Cloudflare Pages, or point a GitHub connection at it. No build command. Output directory: /.
The methodology
Never Ranked delivers audits in six parts:
- Technical Audit — meta tags, canonicals, OG tags, schema inventory, crawlability
- Schema Review — JSON-LD coverage, entity signals, ready-to-paste fixes
- Keyword Gap Analysis — SERP reality check, intent clusters, positioning opportunities
- AI Citation Audit — citation share across target queries in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Google AI Overviews
- Competitor Teardown — side-by-side technical comparison with direct competitors
- 90-Day Roadmap — prioritized, dated, effort-estimated action plan
The audit runs in ~90 minutes of automated work plus ~3 hours of human synthesis. Delivered within 48 hours of booking.
Running a new audit
# 1. Clone this repo, cd into it
git clone https://github.com/yourorg/neverranked.git
cd neverranked
# 2. Run the audit runner against the target domain
python3 scripts/run-audit.py https://client-domain.com --out audits/client-name/raw/
# 3. Copy the template
cp -r audit-template audits/client-name
# 4. Fill in each deliverable using the raw data + live SERP testing
# (see audit-template/README.md for the full workflow)
The Montaic audit
The audits/montaic/ directory contains the first Never Ranked audit, run against our own in-house SaaS. It's the proof of practice — we don't pitch what we haven't tried.
Headline finding: Montaic has 0% AI citation share across 8 primary category queries, vs 100% for ListingAI (the category leader).
Root cause: Missing entity signals. No Organization schema anywhere on the site, despite 222 indexed pages. Google fuzzy-matches "Montaic" as "Monti" / "Monte" / "Montana."
Fix path: The implementation/ subdirectory contains pasteable code and copy for all 11 Month 1 tasks. Total implementation time: ~10 focused hours spread across 3-5 days.
Expected outcome: 15%+ AI citation share within 90 days, paired with Wikidata / Crunchbase / G2 / LinkedIn entity registration.
The operating model
Never Ranked is deliberately small. One founder, async-first, no standing meetings.
- Audit: $500 one-time, delivered within 48 hours. The starting diagnostic.
- Signal retainer: $2,000/mo, three-month minimum. Web-grounded citation tracking across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude. Reddit thread monitoring. Schema fixes auto-pushed to your live site (graded for completeness first). Authority audits. Industry-percentile benchmarks. Quarterly drift detection. Forward-ready Monday digest.
- Amplify retainer: $4,500/mo, three-month minimum. Capped at 6 active clients globally. Everything in Signal plus brand-voice fingerprint, citation-shaped content drafted in your voice, auto-publish to WordPress / Webflow / Shopify, and Reddit reply briefs (per-thread strategic briefs your team uses to post real human replies — we never draft the comment itself).
The dashboard is the meeting. Loom recaps replace calls. Email SLAs replace Slack channels.
Contact
Email: hello@neverranked.com Web: https://neverranked.com Proof of practice: Montaic — our in-house AI-native SaaS, audited by the same team that runs Never Ranked.
License
This repository is source-available, not open-source. See LICENSE for the full text. In plain language:
- You can: read every line, audit it, run it locally, fork it, learn from it, cite it, file issues, send PRs, copy ideas into your own work.
- You cannot: use this code to operate a commercial AEO service (citation tracking, schema grading, drift detection, authority audits, etc.) that competes with NeverRanked.
- In four years (April 2030): the code automatically converts to MIT and the restriction lifts.
The license is modeled on the Business Source License pattern used by MariaDB, Sentry, and CockroachDB. The intent: keep the code open enough that customers can audit our work and security claims, while preventing a clone-and-launch competitor in the early years.
If you want to operate a commercial service using this code before the change date, email licensing@neverranked.com.
The "NeverRanked" name and wordmark are trademarks. Forks must be renamed.