{"slug":"appcues-66kcdy","companyName":"Appcues","domain":"appcues.com","url":"https://appcues.com","headline":"Appcues publishes pricing only through JavaScript, blocking agents from computing cost before signup.","compositeScore":28,"humanScore":0,"agentScore":28,"doorGap":0,"humanMeasured":0,"agentMeasured":5,"percentile":null,"humanPercentile":null,"agentPercentile":null,"isPartial":true,"depth":"free","siteClass":"b2b_saas","scannerVersion":15,"scannedAt":"2026-09-08T19:21:03.917Z","unlocked":false,"mission":{"steps":[{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"reach the site at all"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/robots.txt","outcome":"ok","purpose":"find out whether machines are welcome"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"ask whether the door opens for requests carrying the AI crawlers' names"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/llms.txt","outcome":"ok","purpose":"read the site's own guide for language models"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/sitemap.xml","outcome":"ok","purpose":"find out what pages exist"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/.well-known/security.txt","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find a contact route for machines"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find a published agent interface"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/.well-known/ai-plugin.json","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find an agent plugin manifest"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find out whether verified agents are recognised"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"read the homepage as data rather than as a page"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find a machine readable API spec"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"blocked","purpose":"read the developer documentation"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com/pricing","outcome":"ok","purpose":"read the prices without running JavaScript"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"missing","purpose":"find a comparison page worth citing"},{"url":"https://www.appcues.com","outcome":"ok","purpose":"walk the way a visitor would, to a signup form or a product"}],"verdict":"The site refused automated access at www.appcues.com, so the agent could not read the developer documentation."},"observations":null,"dimensions":[{"key":"machine_discoverability","audience":"agent","score":72,"summary":"The site serves a real browser normally, publishes a sitemap with 517 URLs, and declares llms.txt. No user agent rule blocks AI crawlers by name. However, the homepage carries no schema.org markup, so machines cannot extract product.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":4}},{"key":"programmatic_onboarding","audience":"agent","score":10,"summary":".","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":3}},{"key":"pricing_legibility","audience":"agent","score":null,"summary":"Could not verify: this scan did not reach the pages that would show it.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}},{"key":"agent_aware_instrumentation","audience":"agent","score":8,"summary":"No MCP manifest is published at any of the 3 standard paths checked. The site does not declare support for Model Context Protocol or any other agent-aware protocol.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":4}},{"key":"machine_fetchable_trust","audience":"agent","score":40,"summary":"No security.txt is published at /.well-known/security.txt. The homepage answers automated requests normally, but the site provides no machine-readable security contact or vulnerability disclosure policy.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":2}},{"key":"commercial_rails","audience":"agent","score":10,"summary":".","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":2}},{"key":"steps_to_first_value","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Could not verify: this scan did not reach the pages that would show it.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}},{"key":"required_fields","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Could not verify: this scan did not reach the pages that would show it.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}},{"key":"verification_walls","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Could not verify: this scan did not reach the pages that would show it.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}},{"key":"error_recovery","audience":"human","score":null,"summary":"Could not verify: this scan did not reach the pages that would show it.","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1}}],"issues":[{"rank":1,"title":"docs.appcues.com turn the honest automated client away while serving a real browser, so the search crawlers that would cite the page are turned away by a rule about the client.","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1},"fix":null},{"rank":2,"title":"No comparison or alternatives page exists, which is the page an assistant cites when a buyer asks it to shortlist vendors.","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":1},"fix":null},{"rank":3,"title":"Documentation refuses HTTP requests from automated clients, blocking agents from reading the API specification.","dimensionKey":"programmatic_onboarding","evidence":{"locked":true,"count":3},"fix":null}],"fixArtifacts":{"locked":true,"count":6,"summaries":[{"id":"bot_wall_guidance:notes","kind":"bot_wall_guidance","title":"Let verified assistants through","path":"notes","effort":{"minutes":60,"role":"developer"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["Assistant shopping and search crawlers reach the product, pricing and policy pages a buyer asks about."]}},{"id":"comparison_page_brief:compare-appcues-vs-competitor","kind":"comparison_page_brief","title":"A comparison page brief","path":"/compare/appcues-vs-competitor","effort":{"minutes":180,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["A server-rendered comparison page exists for an assistant to cite."]}},{"id":"robots_search_bots:robots-txt","kind":"robots_search_bots","title":"robots.txt rules for AI crawlers","path":"/robots.txt","effort":{"minutes":10,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["The assistants' search crawlers read and cite the site to buyers; training stays the owner's decision."]}},{"id":"interfaces_note:notes","kind":"interfaces_note","title":"Machine interfaces: where you stand","path":"notes","effort":{"minutes":10,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"agent_aware_instrumentation","external":["The developer surface is built in an order where every published pointer answers."]}},{"id":"organization_jsonld:homepage","kind":"organization_jsonld","title":"Organization structured data","path":"homepage","effort":{"minutes":15,"role":"developer"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_discoverability","external":["Search and assistant crawlers read the company entity from the homepage rather than inferring it."]}},{"id":"security_txt:well-known-security-txt","kind":"security_txt","title":"security.txt","path":"/.well-known/security.txt","effort":{"minutes":10,"role":"owner"},"outcome":{"dimension":"machine_fetchable_trust","external":["Researchers and automated scanners find a disclosure address instead of guessing one."]}}]},"feedback":{"endpoint":"/api/feedback","mcpTool":"rate_fix","targets":[{"type":"report","key":"report"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","key":"dimension:machine_discoverability"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"programmatic_onboarding","key":"dimension:programmatic_onboarding"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"pricing_legibility","key":"dimension:pricing_legibility"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"agent_aware_instrumentation","key":"dimension:agent_aware_instrumentation"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"machine_fetchable_trust","key":"dimension:machine_fetchable_trust"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"commercial_rails","key":"dimension:commercial_rails"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"steps_to_first_value","key":"dimension:steps_to_first_value"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"required_fields","key":"dimension:required_fields"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"verification_walls","key":"dimension:verification_walls"},{"type":"dimension","dimensionKey":"error_recovery","key":"dimension:error_recovery"},{"type":"issue","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","checkId":"bot_walls","key":"issue:machine_discoverability:bot_walls"},{"type":"issue","dimensionKey":"machine_discoverability","checkId":"comparison_pages","key":"issue:machine_discoverability:comparison_pages"},{"type":"issue","dimensionKey":"programmatic_onboarding","checkId":null,"key":"issue:programmatic_onboarding:-"}]}}