- Owner
- Analyst with the writer
- Cadence
- Once per panel, then quarterly
- Time box
- One hour per five questions
- Output
- Fan-out map with every gap assigned
How query fan-out works
AI assistants don't run one search. They break a question into many smaller searches, check different sources for each, then combine the results. Bay Area AEO explains it in four steps: understand, fan out, retrieve, answer. The assistant works out what the customer needs, splits the question into narrower searches, retrieves sources for each and then writes one answer from what came back. Google has described its AI Mode working this way, and the same pattern shows up in the sources Perplexity lists beside its answers.
The consequence for a business is that one customer question is really several. A business that answers the main question but not the sub-questions may lose to a business that answers all of them, even if the first is better known.
A worked example
Bay Area AEO's restaurant page starts with a question of exactly this kind: "Where's a good Thai place in Mountain View that's open late and has vegetarian options?" The map below shows how that question splits and where each part should be answered.
| Sub-question the assistant checks | Where the answer should live | Covered? |
|---|---|---|
| Thai restaurants in Mountain View | Google profile category and address; Yelp category; site home page | ☐ |
| Which of them are good | Reviews that describe dishes; local guides and food lists | ☐ |
| Open late | Hours on every listing; hours on the site; markup | ☐ |
| Vegetarian options | Text menu with dietary labels; a vegetarian line in the FAQ | ☐ |
| Near the customer | Neighborhood text such as Castro Street; map pin | ☐ |
Procedure
- Pick five panel questions
Start with the conditional questions, which split into the most parts.
- Split each one
Write the sub-questions an assistant would need answered: the category, the place, each condition, and the quality judgment.
- Find the answer source
For each sub-question, name the page, listing or outside source that answers it today.
- Mark the gaps
Any sub-question with no source, or with a source that disagrees with the fact sheet, is a gap.
- Assign each gap
Send listing gaps to the listings SOPs, page gaps to the service page or FAQ SOP and proof gaps to the review or press SOP.
- Check against the audit
Compare the map with the sources assistants actually cited in the audit, and add any cited source you missed.
Reading a finished map
Patterns repeat across questions. If "open late" or "open Sunday" is a gap for every question, the problem is the hours on the listings, and one fix closes many gaps. If the quality judgment is always answered only by the business's own site, the business needs outside proof: reviews that describe the work and mentions in the guides assistants trust. If a condition such as an insurance plan or a dietary option is never stated anywhere, it is the cheapest gap to close, because it needs one sentence on the right page and one field on the right listing.
The same method in other trades
For "My water heater is leaking. Is there a plumber in Hayward who can come today?" the sub-questions are plumbers in Hayward, same-day availability, water heater service, and who is reliable. For "Divorce attorney in Walnut Creek who handles high-asset cases" they are family law firms in Walnut Creek, high-asset experience, credentials and reputation. Each sub-question points at a specific page, listing or source, and the map makes the missing ones visible.
| Check | Tool or method | Pass condition | Result and date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Map complete | Fan-out map for five questions | Every sub-question has a source or an assigned gap | |
| Facts agree | Compare sources with the fact sheet | No source contradicts another | |
| Cited sources included | Cross-check with the audit capture sheet | Every cited source appears on the map |
Done when
Service-area businesses
For a business that travels to customers, the place sub-question splits again: which cities it serves, how quickly it gets there and whether it covers the customer's neighborhood. A plumber's niche signals from Bay Area AEO include city-level service areas with response time expectations for exactly this reason. Add a row to the map for each city in the question and check that the website, the Google service area and the structured data list it.
Keeping the map alive
Store the map beside the prompt panel and refresh it when the panel changes. Each quarter, take the questions where the business was still missing in the latest re-test and map them again. A sub-question that keeps showing up uncovered is the next piece of work, and the map says which procedure owns it. Over a year the maps become a record of how the business's coverage grew, question by question.
Filing the maps
File each finished map with the prompt panel version it was built from, so a later map can be compared with the earlier one question by question. Name the file with the panel date and the question numbers it covers, and link it from the quarter's report so the owner can see which gaps closed.