Ready to rocket your site into the era of conversational search? Below you’ll find a feather‑light WordPress “classic” theme — ChatGPT‑Ready‑Lite — that marries clean, semantic code with Answer‑Engine‑Optimization (AEO) fundamentals such as JSON‑LD schema, conversational headings, bullet‑friendly layouts and lightning performance tweaks. Follow the step‑by‑step scaffold, drop in the code blocks, and you’ll have a site that both humans ❤️ and AI assistants love to quote!
1 Why build for AI & ChatGPT search?
| Key Principle | Why it matters |
| Conversational content & headings | AI answer engines pick up natural‑language questions more than raw keywords |
| Structured data (Schema / JSON‑LD) | Clear entity markup improves the odds of being cited in ChatGPT, Perplexity & Copilot answers |
| Clean, crawlable code | LLMs reward lightweight HTML & accessible ARIA semantics |
| Bullet lists & rich media | Perplexity and ChatGPT frequently surface sources that use scannable lists, images and charts |
Mindset shift: Think AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) alongside traditional SEO. Your goal is to become an authoritative citation inside an AI response rather than just Position #1 in Google.
2 Theme skeleton
Create a new folder /wp-content/themes/chatgpt-ready-lite containing these files:
chatgpt-ready-lite/
├─ style.css
├─ functions.php
├─ header.php
├─ footer.php
├─ index.php
├─ single.php
├─ page.php
└─ screenshot.png (300×225 preview)
(Only index.php and style.css are mandatory per WP core, the rest add clarity and flexibility.)
3 style.css (meta header + base styles)
/*
Theme Name: ChatGPT‑Ready‑Lite
Theme URI: https://example.com/chatgpt-ready-lite
Author: You ✨
Description: Ultra‑lean, AI‑optimized classic theme.
Version: 1.0
License: GPL‑3.0
Text Domain: chatgpt-ready-lite
*/
*{box-sizing:border-box}
body{margin:0;font-family:system-ui,Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif;line-height:1.6;background:#fafafa;color:#111}
main{max-width:70ch;margin:auto;padding:2rem}
img{max-width:100%;height:auto}
The micro‑reset keeps HTML consistent across browsers without heavy frameworks.
4 functions.php (power‑ups)
<?php
/**
* ChatGPT‑Ready‑Lite functions
*/
/* 1. Core supports */
add_action( ‘after_setup_theme’, function () {
add_theme_support( ‘title-tag’ ); // Let WP handle <title> [oai_citation:9‡WordPress Developer Resources](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/functions/add_theme_support/?utm_source=chatgpt.com)
add_theme_support( ‘post-thumbnails’ ); // Featured images [oai_citation:10‡WordPress Developer Resources](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/functions/get_the_post_thumbnail/?utm_source=chatgpt.com)
add_theme_support( ‘html5’, [
‘search-form’, ‘comment-form’, ‘comment-list’, ‘gallery’, ‘caption’
]);
register_nav_menu( ‘primary’, ‘Primary Menu’ );
} );
/* 2. Asset queue */
add_action( ‘wp_enqueue_scripts’, function () {
// Normalize.css for consistent base
wp_enqueue_style(
‘normalize’,
‘https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/normalize/8.0.1/normalize.min.css’,
[],
null
);
// Theme stylesheet
wp_enqueue_style( ‘chatgpt-style’, get_stylesheet_uri(), [‘normalize’], null );
} );
/* 3. Sidebar */
function chatgpt_widgets_init() {
register_sidebar( [
‘name’ => ‘Sidebar’,
‘id’ => ‘sidebar’,
‘before_widget’ => ‘<div class=”widget %2$s”>’,
‘after_widget’ => ‘</div>’,
‘before_title’ => ‘<h3 class=”widget-title”>’,
‘after_title’ => ‘</h3>’,
] );
}
add_action( ‘widgets_init’, ‘chatgpt_widgets_init’ ); // Widgets auto‑enable [oai_citation:11‡WordPress Developer Resources](https://developer.wordpress.org/reference/functions/register_sidebar/?utm_source=chatgpt.com)
/* 4. Automatic JSON‑LD injection */
add_action( ‘wp_head’, function () {
if ( is_single() ) {
$data = [
‘@context’ => ‘https://schema.org’,
‘@type’ => ‘Article’,
‘headline’ => get_the_title(),
‘author’ => get_the_author(),
‘datePublished’ => get_the_date( DATE_ATOM ),
‘image’ => wp_get_attachment_url( get_post_thumbnail_id() ),
‘mainEntityOfPage’ => get_permalink(),
];
echo ‘<script type=”application/ld+json”>’.wp_json_encode( $data ).'</script>’;
}
} );
JSON‑LD is Google’s recommended schema format and is easy for LLMs to parse.
5 header.php
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html <?php language_attributes(); ?> >
<head>
<meta charset=”<?php bloginfo( ‘charset’ ); ?>”>
<meta name=”viewport” content=”width=device-width, initial-scale=1″>
<?php wp_head(); ?>
</head>
<body <?php body_class(); ?>>
<header class=”site-header”>
<h1 class=”site-title”>
<a href=”<?php echo esc_url( home_url( ‘/’ ) ); ?>”><?php bloginfo( ‘name’ ); ?></a>
</h1>
<?php wp_nav_menu( [ ‘theme_location’ => ‘primary’ ] ); ?>
</header>
<main>
Semantic <header> and <main> help crawlers understand page hierarchy.
6 footer.php
</main>
<footer class=”site-footer”>
<p>© <?php echo date(‘Y’); ?> <?php bloginfo(‘name’); ?></p>
</footer>
<?php wp_footer(); ?>
</body>
</html>
7 index.php (the loop)
<?php get_header(); ?>
<?php if ( have_posts() ) : while ( have_posts() ) : the_post(); ?>
<article <?php post_class(); ?>>
<h2><a href=”<?php the_permalink(); ?>”><?php the_title(); ?></a></h2>
<?php the_post_thumbnail( ‘large’ ); ?>
<?php the_excerpt(); ?>
</article>
<hr>
<?php endwhile; endif; ?>
<?php get_sidebar(); ?>
<?php get_footer(); ?>
8 A quick nod to
theme.json
& hybrid themes
If you’d like block‑editor color palettes or spacing presets, add a minimalist theme.json; WordPress hybrid themes let you mix classic PHP templates with block‑controlled styles for future‑proof flexibility.
9 Content & publishing checklist for AEO
- Write conversational H2s (“How do I…”, “Best ways to…”) to map directly to user prompts.
- Answer with bullets first, detail later — AI models often quote the first list they see.
- Embed original images / charts to win Perplexity and Bing citations.
- Keep paragraphs short (≤ 80 words); large language models favor concise chunks.
- Link to authoritative sources; ChatGPT prefers content with outbound credibility signals.
- Refresh timestamps—AI systems use freshness as a tie‑breaker.
10 Next steps & deployment
- Zip the folder or push via Git/CLI, then activate the theme.
- Run your pages through Google Rich Results Test and the Schema.org validator to confirm JSON‑LD.
- Monitor citations in ChatGPT, Copilot or Perplexity manually or with tools such as OmniSEO.
- Iterate: add FAQPage schema, custom post types, or block patterns as your content grows.
You’re all set!
Slap on that dopamine‑decorated smile 😄, hit “Activate,” and watch your content leap from ordinary search listings into the featured snippets, AI sidebars and chatbot answers of tomorrow. Go forth and own the convo!