If a customer asks ChatGPT, Google's AI overview or Gemini about your business today, there's a real chance it gives them the wrong opening hours, the wrong address or an old phone number. That's AI wrong business information, and it's happening while you sleep. The fix is to audit what these tools actually say about you and correct the sources they pull from. Here's how to do both.
People used to check your website. Now a growing number ask an AI assistant first, get an answer, and act on it without ever clicking through. If that answer is wrong, you never find out. The customer just goes somewhere else.
Why AI wrong business information hurts more than a bad review
A bad review at least gives you a right of reply. A wrong AI answer is silent. Nobody tells you the machine sent someone to your old premises, or said you close at 17:00 when you're open till 20:00. The customer turns up to a locked door, or doesn't turn up at all, and blames you.
Think about what that costs. A tradesperson who's told the wrong service area loses the job before the quote. A shop listed with last year's hours loses the walk-in. A restaurant marked as permanently closed, which happens more than you'd think, loses the whole evening.
And it compounds. AI tools learn from each other and from the same public sources. One wrong listing gets repeated across several answers. Fix nothing and the error spreads.
Where the AI gets its information
These tools don't invent your details out of thin air. They scrape and summarise from places that already exist. Get those right and the AI answers usually follow. The main sources are:
- Your Google Business Profile, the single biggest factor for local answers.
- Your own website, especially the contact and footer details.
- Directories and listings like Bing Places, Apple Maps, Yell and industry sites.
- Older cached versions of your site the AI may still be holding.
If your address changed and you only updated the homepage, the old address is probably still sitting in three directories and a stale cache. That's what the AI repeats.
How to audit what AI says about your business
This takes twenty minutes and you can do it yourself right now. Open ChatGPT, Google (look at the AI overview) and Gemini, and ask each one the questions a real customer would ask.
Ask the obvious questions
- What are the opening hours for [your business name] in [your town]?
- Where is [your business] located?
- What's the phone number for [your business]?
- Does [your business] do [your main service]?
- Is [your business] still open?
Write down every answer. Mark anything wrong or out of date. Pay special attention to hours, address and phone, because those are the details that decide whether someone shows up.
Then check the sources
Search your business name on Google and look at every listing on page one. Open your Google Business Profile and read it as a stranger would. Check Bing Places and Apple Maps too, because Apple feeds Siri and a lot of iPhone users never touch Google.
How to fix it
Correct the source, and the AI answer corrects itself over the following weeks. Work through these in order.
- Google Business Profile first. Update hours, address, phone, services and category. This has the biggest and fastest effect.
- Your website next. Make sure the contact page and footer show the exact same details, worded the same way. Consistency matters. If your website says one thing and your listings say another, the AI can't tell which to trust.
- Directories after that. Fix Bing, Apple Maps, Yell and any industry directories. Match every detail to your Google profile exactly.
- Add structured data. Proper business schema on your site tells search engines your name, address and hours in a format they read cleanly. Our SEO work covers this.
Then wait a couple of weeks and re-run the audit. The wrong answers should have started to shift.
I've run businesses for 19 years, and the thing that still catches owners out is assuming the internet updates itself when you move or change your hours. It doesn't. You have to go and fix each source by hand. One of the clients we've worked with for years saw the difference clearly once their listings all matched up.
"07 Heaven's SEO work brought a noticeable surge in organic traffic to our website and substantially improved our search rankings. They transformed our digital presence." Lloyd Seymour, Poppy Productions
Getting found by AI is really just an extension of good local SEO and clean, consistent content across the web. Do the basics well and the machines follow.
Common questions
Why does AI show the wrong opening hours for my business?
Because it's pulling from a source that's out of date, usually an old Google Business Profile, a stale directory listing or a cached version of your site. Update the source and the AI answer follows within a few weeks.
How do I check what ChatGPT says about my business?
Open ChatGPT and ask it the questions a customer would, such as your hours, location, phone number and whether you offer a particular service. Note anything wrong, then correct the underlying listings and website details it draws from.
Can I get AI to remove wrong information about my company?
You can't edit the AI directly, but you control the sources it reads. Fix your Google Business Profile, website and directory listings so they all agree, and the wrong information stops being repeated over time.
Book a free discovery call and 07 Heaven Marketing will audit what AI says about your business and fix the details that are costing you customers.