NAP consistency
Keeping your business name, address and phone number exactly the same on your website, Google Business Profile, social media and directories.
NAP stands for name, address and phone number. NAP consistency means those details match everywhere your business appears online: your website, your Google Business Profile, Facebook, Apple Maps, Bing, Yelp, industry directories and local listings. Mentions of your business details on other sites are sometimes called citations.
Why it matters to a small business
Search engines and AI assistants build their picture of your business from many sources. When those sources agree, they can be confident. When one lists an old address or a disconnected phone number, it creates doubt, and customers may call the wrong number or drive to the wrong place.
Google’s Business Profile guidelines ask businesses to represent themselves as they’re consistently known in the real world. Consistent details also make your schema markup and profile reinforce each other.
Small formatting differences, like “St.” versus “Street”, are generally understood. Real problems are old addresses, old phone numbers, different business names and duplicate listings.
Example
A massage studio moved across town three years ago. Their website and Google profile are correct, but Yelp, two directories and an old Facebook page show the old address. AI assistants sometimes give the old location. The owner updates each listing in an afternoon and keeps a list of every place the business is listed for next time.
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