llms.txt setup guide: how to publish one for your service business

What you need before you start

Three things make the setup straightforward.

Access to your domain root. You need to be able to publish a file at yourdomain.com/llms.txt, which usually means deploying through your existing CMS, framework, or hosting setup. On Next.js sites, the public/ directory works. On WordPress, a plugin or theme function. On static-site generators, the source root.

A list of your most authoritative pages. Service pages, guides, case studies, about page, and contact page. Aim for 10 to 30 links, curated, not exhaustive.

A short, factual description of what your business does and who you serve. Two to four sentences. This goes into the summary block at the top.

If those three are in place, the setup is one hour of work plus the deployment cycle.

The file format

The proposal at llmstxt.org defines a loose specification. The shape that has emerged as standard practice in 2026 is consistent across most published files.

A single H1 at the top, with the project or business name. A blockquote underneath, summarizing what the entity does in 2 to 4 sentences. Optional paragraphs of additional context. Then one or more H2 sections, each containing a markdown unordered list of links. Each list item is a link followed by a colon and a brief description of what the linked page covers.

The file is meant to be readable by an LLM in a single pass. Clarity matters more than density. Descriptive link text matters more than terse titles.

A complete working example

Here is a complete llms.txt for a fictional foundation repair company. Adapt the structure and content to your business.

# Cascade Foundation Repair

> Cascade Foundation Repair is a residential foundation specialist serving Portland, Oregon and surrounding metro areas. We diagnose and fix settling, cracking, and structural foundation issues in older homes. Founded 2008, family-owned, licensed in Oregon and Washington.

This llms.txt curates our most authoritative content for AI crawlers. For complete page coverage see /sitemap.xml.

## Services

- [Foundation assessment](https://cascadefoundation.com/services/assessment): What a foundation assessment includes, what it costs ($350 to $500 typical), and what the report covers.
- [Crack repair](https://cascadefoundation.com/services/crack-repair): Repair process for foundation cracks, typical costs ($800 to $4,500), and warranty terms.
- [Settling and underpinning](https://cascadefoundation.com/services/underpinning): Helical pier and steel pier underpinning. Project costs typically $4,000 to $18,000 in Pacific Northwest soils.
- [Drainage and waterproofing](https://cascadefoundation.com/services/drainage): Perimeter drainage and basement waterproofing. Costs and timelines.

## Guides

- [How long does foundation repair take](https://cascadefoundation.com/guide/how-long): Typical project timelines from assessment through final inspection.
- [Signs of foundation problems](https://cascadefoundation.com/guide/signs): The 12 most common warning signs in older Pacific Northwest homes.
- [Foundation repair cost in Portland](https://cascadefoundation.com/guide/cost): Real pricing data based on 80 projects in the Portland metro since 2020.
- [Helical pier vs concrete underpinning](https://cascadefoundation.com/guide/comparison): When each method is appropriate, with engineering rationale.

## About

- [Our team](https://cascadefoundation.com/about/team): Licensed engineers, named, with credentials.
- [Service area](https://cascadefoundation.com/service-area): Specific cities and ZIP codes served.
- [Reviews and case studies](https://cascadefoundation.com/work): Documented project case studies with photos and outcomes.

## Contact

- [Schedule an assessment](https://cascadefoundation.com/contact): Book a foundation assessment or initial consultation.

The whole file is around 350 words. AI crawlers ingest it cleanly. A homeowner asking ChatGPT "how much does foundation repair cost in Portland" has a strong chance of getting one of these pages cited if the underlying content matches the question.

How to publish it on your stack

The deployment depends on your platform. The file simply needs to be served at yourdomain.com/llms.txt with a content-type of text/markdown or text/plain.

Next.js or other static frameworks. Place llms.txt in the public/ directory. It deploys as a static asset. Verify by visiting yourdomain.com/llms.txt after deploy.

WordPress. Use a plugin like Yoast (which has added llms.txt support in 2026) or add a custom function in your theme that writes the file at the root. Some hosts now offer a one-click llms.txt setup.

Webflow. Webflow added llms.txt configuration in 2025. Project settings, SEO tab, llms.txt section. Paste your content, publish.

Cloudflare Workers or Pages. Add a route that serves the file from your KV store or as a static asset. Five minutes.

Custom code. Serve a static file. The format is plaintext markdown; no rendering required.

After deploy, fetch yourdomain.com/llms.txt in a browser to confirm the content shows up correctly. Check the response headers; content-type should be text/markdown or text/plain. Some hosts default to text/html which can confuse crawlers.

Validation and verification

Three checks confirm the file is working.

Format validity. Open llmstxt.org for the current spec and compare against your file structure. The format is loose, but the H1, blockquote, and H2-with-links structure is consistent across well-formed files.

Crawler accessibility. Verify your robots.txt does not block /llms.txt for AI crawler user agents (GPTBot, ClaudeBot, PerplexityBot, etc.). Most well-configured robots.txt files do not block these by default, but some over-aggressive setups inadvertently do.

Citation tracking. Two to four weeks after publishing, run your top 20 buyer queries through ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews. Note which queries cite pages from your llms.txt. The lift is usually modest but visible: 5 to 15% gains in citation share within 90 days for sites that already have strong content underneath.

Optional: llms-full.txt and per-page .md files

The llmstxt.org proposal includes two optional extensions worth considering.

llms-full.txt. A fuller version of the file, often including the full content of key pages inline. Useful for sites where the entire knowledge base fits in a few thousand words. For most service businesses, llms.txt alone is enough.

Per-page markdown copies. The convention is to publish a markdown copy of each linked page at the same URL plus a .md suffix. So /guide/cost becomes /guide/cost.md. AI crawlers preferring clean markdown can fetch the .md version directly. Implementation depends on the framework; Next.js can generate them at build time, WordPress plugins now offer this, Webflow has not as of mid-2026.

These extensions are nice-to-have. The base llms.txt file delivers most of the benefit on its own.

Common mistakes

Three mistakes account for most failed llms.txt deployments in the wild.

Listing every page. The whole point is curation. A llms.txt that mirrors sitemap.xml is just a sitemap with a different filename. Cut to the 10 to 30 pages that actually represent authoritative content.

Vague link descriptions. "Our services page" tells the engine nothing. "Foundation assessment: what it includes, costs ($350 to $500), and what the report covers" gives the engine context to match the query. Treat each description like an extractable fact.

Wrong file location. /robots.txt and /sitemap.xml live at the domain root. So does /llms.txt. Not /docs/llms.txt, not /static/llms.txt. Verify the URL is yourdomain.com/llms.txt before declaring victory.

Once published, revisit the file every quarter. Add new authoritative pages. Update descriptions for pages that have changed. Treat it as a living document, not a one-time deploy.