Use this when business facts disagree
- Name conflict: legal name, DBA, brand name, old franchise name, or location modifier appears inconsistently.
- Phone conflict: tracking numbers, call center numbers, old office numbers, or SMS-only numbers appear on different pages.
- Address conflict: storefront, service-area, mailing address, old suite, or no-public-address rules are mixed together.
- Hours conflict: emergency hours, office hours, appointment-only windows, holiday hours, or seasonal availability disagree.
- Service conflict: old services, unsupported locations, outdated financing, discontinued offers, or stale emergency claims remain live.
- Human review rule: do not let AI choose the winning fact. A business owner or manager must approve the source of truth before the web page, listing, or AI draft is updated.
Copy/paste citation conflict log
Conflict ID: [CIT-001]
Fact type: [Business name / phone / address / hours / service / area / price / policy / booking link]
Conflicting versions found: [Version A + URL] / [Version B + URL] / [Version C + screenshot or listing]
Likely stale source: [Old landing page / directory / social profile / ad / review reply / PDF / cached listing]
Approved source of truth: [Website page, GBP field, operations doc, owner-approved policy, CRM, booking system]
Owner to confirm: [Name/role]
Fix owner: [Website / GBP / directory / social / ads / CRM / partner listing]
Risk if not fixed: [Wrong calls, bad directions, unsupported service requests, false hours, refund/policy confusion]
Status: [NEEDS OWNER REVIEW / approved / fixed / cannot edit / monitor]
Next review date: [Date]
Five places to check first
- Homepage and contact page: compare NAP, hours, service areas, and booking links against the current operating policy.
- Google Business Profile: verify primary category, services, phone, hours, holiday hours, appointment link, and service areas.
- Top directories: check major citation pages, marketplace profiles, chamber pages, partner pages, and industry directories.
- Old content: scan old landing pages, blog posts, PDFs, case studies, press pages, review replies, and campaign pages.
- Automation sources: check chatbots, autoresponder templates, CRM snippets, AI prompt libraries, and sales scripts that might reuse stale facts.
AI audit prompt
You are helping a small business find citation and source-of-truth conflicts before updating pages for AI search visibility. Use only the URLs, listing text, screenshots, business policy notes, and owner-approved source documents provided. Do not invent the correct phone number, address, hours, service area, price, policy, emergency availability, license, warranty, or guarantee. Return a table with: fact type, conflicting versions, source URLs, likely stale source, recommended source-of-truth question, risk if wrong, fix owner, status, and next review date. Mark every unresolved conflict as NEEDS OWNER REVIEW.
Source-of-truth decision rules
- Newest is not always right: a recently edited directory can still copy a stale phone number or service description.
- Most common is not always right: many listings may share the same outdated aggregator data.
- Paid ad copy is not policy: confirm offers, guarantees, and emergency claims against current operations before reuse.
- AI summaries are evidence to investigate, not evidence to publish: if an AI answer quotes a bad fact, trace it back to a real source before editing.
- Document the fix: keep the conflict log so future assistants, agencies, and AI tools do not reintroduce the same stale fact.
Where this fits in SEO After AI
This worksheet pairs with the AI Search Local Citation Consistency Checklist, AI Search Source Citation Log, Footer and NAP Checklist, Google Business Profile Services Checklist, and SEO After AI.