You've heard the rule a thousand times: keep your NAP data consistent. Name, Address, Phone number. Same format everywhere. It's the foundation of local SEO. Google's algorithm rewards it. Your local ranking depends on it.
The problem is that rule was written for Google, not for AI search.
How Google and ChatGPT Read an Address Differently
Google's algorithm uses address consistency as a signal of legitimacy. If your business is listed as "123 Main St" on Google My Business, "123 Main Street" on your website, and "123 Main St." on Yelp, Google can still reconcile those. It has years of training data about how addresses vary. It knows "St" and "Street" are the same thing. It knows "New York, NY" and "New York, New York" point to the same place.
ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity don't work that way.
These models were trained on text as it appears in the wild — not on a database of address variations. When they encounter your business, they're looking for corroboration. Does the address appear the same across multiple independent sources? Does the phone number match? Does the name appear in the same form?
If your Google My Business says "456 Oak Avenue, Suite 200" but your website footer says "456 Oak Ave, Ste 200," you've created ambiguity. The AI engine doesn't assume these are the same place. It hedges. It may not recommend you at all.
The Real Problem: Standardization Across AI-Visible Sources
The issue isn't your website versus Google My Business. The issue is whether your NAP appears identically across sources that AI engines can actually see.
Most businesses run NAP audits inside the Google ecosystem — Google My Business, Google Maps, maybe a few paid directory listings. But AI engines pull from everywhere. They read your website footer, yes. They also read your LinkedIn company page, your Instagram bio, your Crunchbase profile, industry associations you're listed in, press releases, mentions on third-party sites.
The moment any of these sources has your address in a different format, you've broken the corroboration chain.
One recent audit of 40 professional services firms found that 32 had at least one address variation across their web-visible sources. Of those 32, only 8 showed up in ChatGPT recommendations when users asked for referrals in their industry. The 8 that showed up? They had identical NAP formatting across every source the AI engine could see — not just Google properties, but their own website, LinkedIn, their industry directory, and local news mentions.
What to Do About It
Stop auditing just Google. Open a spreadsheet. List every place your business appears online: your website (homepage, footer, contact page, about page), LinkedIn, your email signature, your industry directory listings, social media bios, press releases, partner websites that mention you, your business license records if they're public, anywhere.
Write down your NAP exactly as it appears in each place. Then standardize it. Every single source should show your name, address, and phone in identical format. No abbreviations in one place and full words in another. No suite numbers formatted as "Ste" here and "Suite" there. No phone numbers with parentheses in one place and hyphens in another.
This is tedious. It's also the gap between being findable in AI search and being invisible.
Google's algorithm is sophisticated enough to handle variation. AI engines aren't — not yet. They're pattern-matching on exact text. Until the models improve, exact consistency is the only reliable signal.
Want to know whether your business actually shows up when people ask AI for recommendations? Run a free VizyReport check. It shows you exactly what ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity say about your business — and whether inconsistent NAP data is holding you back.