- Visibility32
- Citations7
- Sentiment83
- Site quality67
- AI readiness21
AI assistants name West Marine in 30% of answers, much more often than the typical company in its sector. Its overall score is 41 out of 100, ranking 295th of 2,047 companies. The company's website passes 3 of 14 technical checks for AI tool readiness.
We asked 15 unbranded questions about the retail market: none named West Marine. AI assistants named it in 18 of 60 answers (30.0%). The typical retail company is named in 6.7% of answers. By how often it is named, West Marine ranks 88 of 640 in its sector.
Every dot is a company in the study. Hover one to see it; click to open its report.
This companySame sectorEvery other companyNever named
Five parts, each scored out of 100.
How often AI assistants name the company
How often AI uses the company's own website as a source
How positively AI describes the company
How well built the website's own pages are
How easily AI tools can read and use the website
Visibility is calculated from the answers on this page. How the score is built.
640 companies in this sector. The line on each bar is the typical company.
An answer that names the company
“What are the best places to buy boating supplies in the US?”
I'll search for information about the best places to buy boating supplies in the US.Based on the search results, here are the best places to buy boating supplies in the US:
Online Retailers
West Marine - Over 100,000 products in stock, with over 250 local stores and knowledgeable associates, operating since 1968.
Wholesale Marine - Stocks an enormous selection of engine components, propellers, electrical systems, deck hardware, and other products, offering free economy shipping on orders over $99.
Defender Marine - Offers boat supplies, inflatable boats, outboard motors, mar …
The AI’s answer as we received it, shortened and not checked for accuracy.
How the mentions in these answers were split between this company and its rivals
Answers naming it, out of answers received
What this website publishes for an AI agent to read, use and buy from, on a scale of six levels.
- 0
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
Level 1: Basic web presence. Two of robots.txt, a sitemap and Link headers are in place.
- Content Signals
Not by itself. West Marine publishes none of the purchase protocols we look for. An agent would have to click through the checkout like a person.
- UCPNot present
- ACPNot present
- AP2Not present
- x402Not present
- MPPNot present
The shop runs on Salesforce Commerce Cloud.
Show every check, for your technical teamHide the checks
- study: 92.0%robots.txtPassed
A valid robots.txt with crawl rules at the site root.
- study: 86.8%SitemapPassed
An XML sitemap listing the pages, ideally referenced from robots.txt.
- study: 0.3%Link headersNot met
Send Link headers such as rel="api-catalog" or rel="describedby" on the homepage.
- study: 5.5%DNS for AI DiscoveryNot present
Advertise agent endpoints with SVCB records under _agents.
- study: 1.9%Markdown negotiationNot met
Return a markdown version when asked with Accept: text/markdown, for example at the CDN.
- study: 25.1%llms.txtPassed
An llms.txt that tells language models what the site offers.
- study: 93.4%AI bot rulesPartly met
Add explicit robots.txt groups for the main AI crawlers.
- study: 1.4%Content SignalsNot met
Add a Content-Signal line for search, ai-input and ai-train to robots.txt.
- study: 0.2%Web Bot AuthNot present
Only relevant if you run your own agents or crawlers: publish a signing key directory.
- study: 0.3%API CatalogNot met
List public APIs in a linkset at /.well-known/api-catalog.
- study: 11.8%OAuth discoveryNot met
Publish OpenID Connect or OAuth server metadata under /.well-known.
- study: 10.3%OAuth Protected ResourceNot met
Serve protected resource metadata at /.well-known/oauth-protected-resource.
- study: 0.0%auth.mdNot met
Publish an auth.md describing how agents sign in.
- study: 0.2%MCP Server CardNot met
Offer an MCP server and publish its server card under /.well-known.
- study: 0.1%A2A Agent CardNot met
Publish an agent card at /.well-known/agent-card.json.
- study: 0.2%Agent SkillsNot met
Publish a skills index with the main tasks agents can do.
- study: 33.7%WebMCPCould not check
Register key actions such as search or cart as WebMCP tools.
- study: 0.1%ARD manifestNot met
Publish an ai-catalog.json listing every agent interface.
Score 36 of 100 · 97% of checks could run · checked on October 5, 2026 · www.westmarine.com · 2,047 companies scanned
3 of 14 passed. This list is for your technical team. The percentage is how many companies in the study pass each check.
These 14 checks ran during the audit and are what the AI readiness part of the overall score counts. The scan above ran later and is stricter on Link headers and Markdown, so a check can pass here and not there.
Show the 14 checksHide them
- Passedrobots.txt publishedstudy: 85.0%
- Not metXML sitemapstudy: 73.2%
- Not metHTTP Link headers (RFC 8288)study: 29.0%
- Not metMarkdown content negotiationstudy: 8.3%
- Passedllms.txt publishedstudy: 21.7%
- PassedToken budget (page weight)study: 95.2%
- Not metExplicit AI bot rulesstudy: 13.0%
- Not metAPI Catalog (.well-known/api-catalog)study: 0.2%
- Not metOAuth Authorization Server discoverystudy: 10.1%
- Not metOAuth Protected Resource discoverystudy: 9.3%
- Not metMCP Server Cardstudy: 0.0%
- Not metA2A Agent Cardstudy: 0.0%
- Not metWebMCP toolsstudy: 4.2%
- Not metAgent Skills declaredstudy: 0.0%
This website sets no rules for any AI crawler by name, like 84% of the websites whose rules we could read. Every AI crawler follows its general rules.
- GPTBotpartly
- ClaudeBotpartly
- Anthropic-AIpartly
- Google-Extendedpartly
- Applebot-Extendedpartly
- Meta-ExternalAgentpartly
- FacebookBotpartly
- Bytespiderpartly
- CCBotpartly
- Diffbotpartly
- Omgilibotpartly
- OAI-SearchBotpartly
- Claude-SearchBotpartly
- PerplexityBotpartly
- Applebotpartly
- Amazonbotpartly
- YouBotpartly
- ChatGPT-Userpartly
- Claude-Userpartly
- Perplexity-Userpartly
- DuckAssistBotpartly
- MistralAI-Userpartly
Read from the website’s own rules file (robots.txt). An asterisk marks a crawler the file names. The rest follow its general rules. “Partly” means only some pages are blocked.
How many times each website was listed as a source in these answers
In the study as US retailers: listed as a retailer in Wikidata, a public database, and among the websites Cloudflare Radar ranks as visited.
- Alternatives to big-box marine retailers for buying nautical charts
- What are the best places to buy boating supplies in the US?
- Are high-end marine electronics worth the price for weekend boaters?
- Best places to get paddling gear for kayak fishing
- Is it better to shop at a local marine supply store or online for boat accessories?
- Where can I find reliable gear for extended offshore trips?
- Where else can you buy discounted boating accessories online?
- How do I get support with installing new navigation lights on my sailboat?
- Is it worth paying extra for premium marine safety equipment?
- Where can I find help with replacing a broken bilge pump?
- What are other options for sourcing used boat parts besides marine supply shops?
- Marine supply retailer vs general outdoor outfitter for fishing gear
- Price ranges for basic vs advanced fish finders at marine supply stores
- Best marine gear stores for sailing enthusiasts
- How much should I expect to spend on outfitting a small powerboat with safety equipment?
Columns, left to right: OpenAI, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini. The AI assistants often disagree. Across the study, on 40% of the questions where a company is named, only one of the four names it.
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<a href="https://aeo-audit.rezolve.com/us/westmarine.com"><img src="https://aeo-audit.rezolve.com/us/badges/westmarine.com.svg" alt="Overall score 41 of 100, US AI Visibility Study 2026" width="280" height="64"></a>