Use this when
SXO, search experience, page type mismatch, why isn't my page ranking, persona scoring.
Process
The core insight this playbook exists for: a page can score 95/100 on technical SEO and still never rank, because it's the wrong page type for the keyword — if Google shows 8 product pages and 2 comparisons for a query, a blog post will not break through no matter how well-optimized it is. This methodology needs live web search of the actual current SERP; when that isn't available, say so and skip straight to a lighter page-type self-assessment instead of guessing at SERP composition.
Fetch and classify the target page's own type, then search the target keyword and classify each of the top 10 organic results the same way, recording content format, estimated depth, schema types present, and media signals. Calculate SERP consensus: over 60% sharing one page type is strong consensus, 40-60% is mixed, under 40% is fragmented (an opportunity for differentiation rather than a mismatch signal).
Flag page-type mismatch by severity: a blog post where the SERP expects product pages is Critical; a blog post where it expects comparisons is High; a product page where it expects informational content is High; a landing page where it expects an interactive tool is High; a service page where the SERP is dominated by local-pack results is Medium.
Derive 3-5 user stories from real SERP signals: People Also Ask questions reveal knowledge gaps, ad copy themes reveal commercial triggers, related searches reveal the surrounding search journey, and the featured-snippet format reveals the expected answer shape. Each story follows the pattern: as a [persona], I want to [goal], because [driver], but I'm blocked by [barrier] — every element sourced from an actual SERP signal, not invented.
Score a 7-dimension gap analysis against the SERP consensus (page type, content depth, UX signals, schema markup, media richness, authority signals, freshness) for a 0-100 SXO Gap Score, then derive 4-7 personas from the SERP's own intent signals and score the page against each on Relevance/Clarity/Trust/Action (25 points each).
Report the SXO score as explicitly separate from the general SEO Health Score — a page can be technically perfect and strategically misaligned at the same time, and conflating the two numbers hides that. Include the SERP landscape summary, page-type verdict, user stories with their source signals cited, the gap breakdown, persona cards, and priority actions (fix the mismatch first, then the weakest persona gaps).