Article generation

Once a topic comes off the queue, CiteFlow generates a full article: title, slug, meta description, body, FAQ, schema markup, suggested keywords, and a hero image. This page covers how it works, what you can edit, and how to ship it.

How does the generation pipeline work?

1. A topic is picked from the queue.
2. Claude Sonnet generates a 1,500–2,000 word article using your approved knowledge base as context.
3. The article is structured AEO-first: an answer-first opening paragraph, scannable subheadings (often phrased as questions), and a dedicated FAQ section at the end.
4. JSON-LD schema is generated: Article always, FAQPage when FAQ items are present.
5. UK English is enforced at the prompt and re-checked post-generation.
6. A hero image is generated in parallel (see below).
7. The finished article lands in your dashboard as a draft.

Typical generation time is 60–120 seconds end-to-end.

What is the structure of a generated article?

Every generated article has:

• Title, H1, optimised for the target search intent.
• Slug, URL-friendly, derived from the title. Editable before publish.
• Meta description, 150–160 characters, distinct from the opening paragraph.
• Body, markdown and pre-rendered HTML. Either is exported to your CMS depending on the adapter.
• FAQ items, extracted into a structured list for the FAQPage schema and for CMS adapters that surface them separately.
• Schema JSON-LD, Article and (when applicable) FAQPage.
• Target keywords, five suggestions surfaced for review. Not injected into the article; they're for your tracking decisions.
• Hero image URL and alt text.

How are hero images created?

Hero images are generated by Nano Banana Pro (gemini-3-pro-image-preview), prompted to produce a 16:9 editorial-style image appropriate to your industry and the article's topic.

• Soft-fail behaviour, if image generation fails (rate limits, policy filter, transient API issue), the article still completes without a hero. You'll see a "no image" placeholder and a Regenerate image button.
• Regenerate, click to try again with a fresh prompt seed. Each attempt counts towards your image cost.
• Upload replacement, accepts PNG, JPEG, or WebP, max 8 MB. The uploaded image becomes the hero, replacing any generated one.
• Alt text, editable in the article editor. Keep it descriptive (it ships with the article to your CMS).

What do the article statuses mean?

An article moves through:

• draft, just generated. Not visible to your audience until you approve and publish.
• approved, you've reviewed and signed off. If auto-publish is enabled (see scheduling), publishing triggers immediately.
• published, sent to one or more configured publishing endpoints.
• archived, removed from active lists. Reversible.

How do you edit an article?

The article editor lets you adjust:

• Title, slug, meta description.
• Body markdown.
• Each FAQ item.
• Hero image and alt text.
• Suggested keywords (add or remove from tracking).

Schema JSON-LD is regenerated automatically from the edited content at approval time.

How do you approve and publish an article?

1. Open the article from /dashboard/content.
2. Review and edit.
3. Click Approve.
4. If auto-publish is on and at least one endpoint is configured, the article ships immediately. Otherwise, click Publish and pick the endpoint(s).

See publishing overview for endpoint setup, and auto-scheduling for the auto-publish toggle.

What are the tier limits?

The dashboard shows your remaining allowance. Once exhausted, generation pauses until the next billing period or until you upgrade.

How is article cost calculated?

Article generation cost (Claude Sonnet + Nano Banana Pro) is included in your subscription. There are no per-article add-on charges. We monitor cost-per-tenant and the Marketplace soft cap exists so a single tenant generating tens of thousands of articles a month can be individually rate-limited if needed.

Related

• Topic queue, what feeds the generator
• Knowledge base, the brand context every article uses
• Auto-scheduling, cadence and auto-publish
• Publishing overview, where articles go after approval