Guide
AI source corrections: fixing the pages behind a wrong answer
An AI source correction fixes the page an AI answer relied on, because no business can edit the answer itself. Write down the wrong answer, trace it to the page that says it, correct or retract what you own, ask other publishers to fix theirs, check crawlers can read the fix, then ask the same question again, with a date against every step, until the answer changes.
Write down the answer and name the kind of error
Start with evidence, before you change a word. Without a record of the old answer, you'll never know whether your fix worked or the answer changed for another reason. Note the product and mode each time, because Google says AI Mode and AI Overviews may use different models and techniques, so the responses and links they show will vary.
Then give the error a name. The table at the end of this section sets out the usual kinds, with hypothetical examples.
Capture the observed answer in full, the same way every time:
- The product and mode: a Google AI Overview, AI Mode, ChatGPT with web search, or Perplexity.
- The question, word for word, and the suburb you asked from.
- The date and time.
- The wrong statement, copied exactly, with a screenshot.
- The kind of error, from the table below.
- Every source link shown with the answer.
- For ChatGPT, whether memory was on. OpenAI says saved memories can shape the searches it runs.
| Kind of error | Hypothetical example | Where it usually comes from | Look here first |
|---|---|---|---|
| Old phone number, email or address | A plumber's previous mobile number | A footer, an old PDF, a profile or a directory nobody updated after the change | Your whole site, then every listing |
| A service you've dropped | Pool fencing listed for a builder who stopped two years ago | An old service page, a past offer or a brochure still online | Service pages, sitemap and PDFs |
| Wrong hours or a closed status | Says closed on Saturdays when you open | Profile hours, holiday hours never reset, a directory copy | Google Business Profile, Bing Places, directories |
| A credential you don't hold | Names a licence class the business doesn't have | A page that blurs your work with a supplier's, or a wrong directory category | About and service pages, directory categories |
| Mixed up with another business | Gives a competitor's reviews or address | A similar name, a shared building or a previous tenant of your premises | Whether each cited source is about you at all |
| Right facts, wrong conclusion | Says you don't service a suburb you do | An accurate page that's vague, or facts shown only in an image | The wording of your own page |
| Old fact, no source shown | Repeats a business name you changed | What the model learned in training | Nothing to edit; see the next section |
Trace the wrong fact to its source
Open every cited link and find the sentence that says the wrong thing. OpenAI's help page for ChatGPT search says search results and citations can be incomplete, outdated or incorrect, and tells people to open a cited source and check it supports the answer. As the business owner, you're running that check on your own name.
The page that misled the answer may not rank for the question you typed. Google says AI Overviews and AI Mode may use a query fan-out technique, issuing multiple related searches across subtopics and data sources to build a response. OpenAI says that when ChatGPT search uses partner search providers, it typically rewrites your question into one or more targeted queries. So a question like "emergency locksmith Mooloolaba" can quietly become searches for your business name plus "phone number", "hours" or "reviews". Run those narrower searches yourself and note which pages come up.
No source shown? Ask again with web search on. In ChatGPT you can regenerate an answer and choose Search the web, when it's available, and OpenAI suggests asking it to search again using a specific source, date or location when a result looks wrong. Where the wrong fact lives then decides who can fix it. Profile errors have their own routine, set out in the Google Business Profile audit checklist.
Sometimes no page says the wrong thing at all. That leaves three likely causes. The answer may come from training rather than search: OpenAI says that without search, ChatGPT's responses are based on what the model learned during training, and its models have a knowledge cutoff. You can't edit that, so make the current fact easy to find and retest with search on. The answer may misread an accurate page, which the next section fixes. Or the answer may merge you with another business. Check each cited source is genuinely about you, then make your distinguishing details plain on your own site: legal name, trading name, ABN, street address and the suburbs you cover.
Correct, retract or rewrite what you own
Fix your own material first. It's the part you fully control, and it matters beyond AI answers. The ACCC says any information a business gives about its products or services must be accurate, truthful and based on reasonable grounds. That covers websites and social media, whether or not the business meant to mislead.
Pick one action per page from the table at the end of this section, based on whether the page still does a useful job. The guide to AI citations and supporting evidence shows how to word a correction note, and noindex, canonical and redirects explained covers the technical choice in more depth. Google's rules decide how each option plays out. It removes already indexed URLs that return a 4xx status code, and treats a 301 redirect as a strong signal to process the target page instead. A noindex tag only works if robots.txt doesn't block the page. Google also says a page must be indexed and eligible for a snippet to appear as a supporting link in AI Overviews or AI Mode.
When the page is accurate but the answer still gets it wrong, rewrite it for clarity. Work through these checks on the cited page and any other page that covers the same fact:
- Put the fact in page text. Google lists making sure important content is available in textual form among its recommended practices for AI features, so an opening-hours graphic or a phone number inside a banner image needs a text version.
- Write the fact one way everywhere. Pick one format for your phone number, trading name and address, and use it in the header, footer, contact page and profiles.
- Remove contradictions between your own pages. An old blog post saying you no longer cover Noosa will compete with a service-area page saying you do. Correct or retract the older one.
- Say plainly what you don't do, where the misreading came from. "We don't offer after-hours callouts" is harder to misread than a page that simply never mentions hours.
- Keep structured data in step with the page. Google's structured data guidelines say not to mark up content that isn't visible to readers, and its AI features page recommends structured data that matches the visible text.
- Fix your owned profiles too. Edit your Google Business Profile from your own login. Microsoft says to use Bing Places for Business to claim or update a listing so the information in Bing Maps results changes.
- Search your whole site for the old fact before you close the job. A phone number fixed on the contact page but left in a footer or an old PDF is still a source.
| Action | Use it when | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| Correct | Most of the page is still right, but one fact is wrong or out of date | Edit the sentence, update the visible last updated date and add a short dated note saying what changed |
| Retract | The main claim is wrong, or the page describes a service or offer you've dropped, and customers may have relied on it | Replace the body with a short notice: what it used to say, why it was withdrawn, the date, and a link to the current page |
| Remove | The page should never have been public, such as a duplicate or staging copy, or no one needs a record of it | Delete it so it returns 404 or 410, or 301 redirect it to a page that answers the same need |
| Hide from search | People with the link still need it, such as terms that applied to past jobs | Add noindex and leave the page open to crawlers |
| Rewrite for clarity | Every fact on the page is right, but the answer draws the wrong conclusion from it | State the fact in a plain sentence near the top, using the checks above |
Ask other publishers, and what to do if they won't
You can't edit someone else's page, so make the correction easy to say yes to. Google's help on contacting a website owner says to talk to the owner, because they can take the page down. It also notes that even when Google drops a page from its results, the page is still on the web. Look for a contact link on the site, or ask the company that hosts it. Directories are usually quicker, since many let a business claim its listing and edit it directly, and citations and business listing accuracy covers keeping those listings in line.
For everyone else, send one short message that's easy to act on. Give the page address and the exact sentence that's wrong, the correct wording ready to paste, and public evidence they can check, such as your ABN Lookup entry or your own contact page. Sign it with your name, your role in the business and the date you'll follow up.
If a publisher ignores you or refuses, follow up once on the date you gave, then work through the routes below. None of them outvotes the wrong page. None of the Google, OpenAI or Perplexity help pages describes a rule that more listings outweigh one wrong page, so the aim is to give the systems a clear, current source to find, and to keep a record that shows you tried:
- Strengthen your own answer. Publish or improve the page on your site that answers the exact sub-question the wrong page ranks for, such as your current hours or the suburbs you cover, using the clarity checks in the previous section.
- Fix every copy you can reach: the listings you control and the directories that accept an owner's edit.
- Report the AI answer, pointing to your corrected page as the evidence for the right fact.
- Watch the page. Once the publisher edits or deletes it, Google's Refresh Outdated Content tool can update the search result. Google says it won't help while the wrong information is still live.
- Consider the legal route only for content you believe breaks the law or your rights. Google has a Report Content for Legal Reasons process; get legal advice before you lodge one.
- Log the unanswered request. If the wrong fact keeps coming back, the dated trail shows every route you tried, which helps if you escalate later or need to explain the history to a customer.
Check the fix can be read, then tell search engines
A correction that crawlers can't fetch changes nothing. OpenAI notes that its models may not be able to get information from a website because of technical issues, paywalls or robots.txt settings. Run the checks in the table at the end of this section on every corrected page before you ask anyone to recrawl it. The crawl versus citation guide explains why a successful fetch still doesn't promise a citation.
Once the page passes, signal the change. A fixed page changes AI answers only after the systems behind them read it again. Google says AI Overviews and AI Mode ground their responses in pages retrieved from its Search index, so start with Google, then the other routes:
- Google URL Inspection: request indexing for each page you corrected or retracted and kept live. Google says you can't request indexing for a page its live test finds non-indexable, so skip deleted and noindexed pages here. It also says there's a quota, asking twice won't speed things up, and crawling can take from a few days to a few weeks.
- Deleted or redirected URLs: let Google's next crawl pick up the 404, 410 or 301. Google's Removals help says old 404 pages need no urgent request, but the tool also covers a page that's already gone and still shows in results. Use it if a deleted page can't wait; the 404 or 410 is what keeps it out. Don't use it for redirects, since Google says the tool isn't for content you've moved.
- Noindexed pages: the tag only takes effect when Google next crawls the page, and Google says a revisit can take months. If that's too slow, the Removals tool hides a live page for about six months, and the noindex keeps it out after that.
- Your sitemap: update lastmod only on the live pages you corrected or retracted. Google says lastmod should reflect a page's last significant update and that it uses the value when it's consistently and verifiably accurate. Take deleted, redirected and noindexed URLs out, since Google says to list the URLs you want in its search results.
- IndexNow: submit the same URLs for Bing and other participating engines. The IndexNow FAQ says submissions are shared across all IndexNow-enabled search engines, and that redirected URLs and pages returning 404 or 410 should be submitted too.
- ChatGPT: check robots.txt doesn't block OAI-SearchBot. OpenAI says your content needs that access to be included in ChatGPT's summaries and snippets, and that a robots.txt change can take about 24 hours to take effect. Its publisher help describes no way to request a recrawl.
| Check | How to test it | What silently stops a fix |
|---|---|---|
| Crawlers are allowed | URL Inspection's Crawl allowed? field for Google; read robots.txt for OAI-SearchBot and other bots | A Disallow rule left over from a redesign |
| The server hands over the page | Run URL Inspection's live test and check Page fetch | Firewall, security plugin or CDN bot protection that challenges crawlers |
| No login or paywall | Open the page in a private browser window | Facts placed behind a customer portal or form |
| No stray noindex | URL Inspection's Indexing allowed? field | A noindex tag copied across from a staging site |
| The canonical points at this page | Compare the user-declared and Google-selected canonical in URL Inspection | A canonical tag still pointing at the old URL, which Google treats as a strong signal |
| The fact is in the text | Search the page source for the corrected wording | The fix exists only in an image or a script that loads later |
Record the dates, retest, then keep watch
A correction is done when the answer changes, or when you've used every route and written down why you stopped. Dates are how you judge that, so keep one row per wrong fact in a simple log. The columns in the table at the end of this section work in any spreadsheet. The guide to AI answers and accurate company facts lists each product's reporting route.
Add the date most people miss: Google's last crawl. URL Inspection shows the last time Google crawled a page, and says everything it shows comes from that crawled version. So hold off retesting Google's AI features until the page's last crawl date is later than the date you fixed it. Until then, the version Google has on record is the old one.
Closing a case isn't the end. A wrong fact tends to come back when something changes and one page or listing gets missed. Put your key questions on a calendar, such as your phone number, hours and the suburbs you cover, and ask them again in each product you logged. Recheck straight away after any change to a number, address, service or trading name. The guide on keeping AI visibility content current sets out a review routine for the pages themselves.
Whether it's a first retest or a routine check, keep it fair, so any change in the answer comes from your fix:
- Ask the exact question from your first record, in the same product and mode.
- Ask from the same place each time, or name the suburb in the question. OpenAI says ChatGPT may use an approximate location from your IP address for local results.
- Start a fresh conversation and check whether memory is on.
- Run it at least twice, since answers vary between runs.
- Copy the answer and its sources word for word, and note whether your corrected page is now cited.
- If the wrong fact is still there, report it: Google's thumbs down and Report a problem, ChatGPT's thumbs down under the message, or Perplexity's flag icon with the link to the query and the result you expected.
| Log column | What to write | Hypothetical entry |
|---|---|---|
| Wrong claim | The exact wrong wording | "Open until 3pm Saturdays" |
| Correct fact | The wording it should say | Open until 12pm Saturdays |
| Product and question | Where you saw it, word for word | AI Mode: "is the hardware store open Saturday afternoon" |
| Source URL | The page that says the wrong thing | A directory listing |
| Who controls it | You, the publisher, or no one directly | The publisher |
| Action | Correct, retract, remove, hide, rewrite or request | Correction requested by email |
| Date fixed or asked | When you changed it or sent the request | 4 Mar |
| Date recrawled | Last crawl date from URL Inspection, where you can see it | Not visible for a page you don't own |
| Retests | Each date, the product and the result | 11 Mar still wrong; 18 Mar correct; 25 Mar correct |
| Status | Open, waiting on publisher, or closed with the reason | Closed after two clean retests |
A worked example, date by date
Say a locksmith in Mooloolaba switched to a new mobile number in July 2026, but an AI Overview still gives the old one. This is a made-up case, and real timing will differ. The owner logs the answer and labels it an old phone number, the first kind of error in the table near the top of this guide. The cited source is the business's own lockout page. A site search turns up the same number in an old brochure PDF, and Perplexity repeats the old number while citing a directory listing.
First, URL Inspection confirms the lockout page allows crawling, fetches cleanly and has a self-referencing canonical, so a fix will be readable. The record shows how each source was handled:
| Date | Step | What was recorded |
|---|---|---|
| 1 Sep | Observed | AI Overview for "locksmith Mooloolaba" gives the old number and cites the lockout page; Perplexity gives it too and cites a directory |
| 2 Sep | Corrected and asked | Lockout page corrected, with a dated note and the number in plain text; Bing Places listing updated; directory emailed the new number |
| 2 Sep | Removed | Brochure PDF deleted so it returns 404, and links to it taken out; left to drop out at Google's next crawl |
| 2 Sep | Recrawl requested | URL Inspection request for the corrected lockout page only; IndexNow submission for that page and the deleted PDF |
| 7 Sep | Last crawl checked | URL Inspection shows Google crawled the lockout page on 6 Sep, after the fix |
| 8 Sep | Retest 1 | AI Overview gives the new number; Perplexity still cites the directory, so the answer is flagged with a link to the corrected page |
| 9 Sep | Followed up | No reply from the directory, so a second message is sent on the date promised |
| 10 Sep | Publisher fixed | Directory updates the listing |
| 15 and 22 Sep | Retests 2 and 3 | Both products give the new number in two runs each; case closed |
Common questions
How do I correct an AI Overview mistake about my business?
Fix the page the overview relies on, because you can't edit the overview. Open the links it cites, find the wrong sentence, correct it on your own site or ask the publisher to change theirs, then request indexing with URL Inspection. Google says AI Overviews draw on pages in its Search index, so the answer can only change after Google recrawls the fixed page. Report the overview with thumbs down while you wait.
Can AI give wrong information about my business even when my website is right?
Yes. Google says AI Overviews can and will make mistakes, and OpenAI says ChatGPT can produce incorrect or misleading outputs. The answer may rely on a third-party page, an old model memory or a misreading of vague wording. Check each cited source, then make your own page state the fact in a plain sentence, so a correct, readable source exists for the next answer.
What should I do when ChatGPT gives wrong information about my business?
Ask again with search on and open every source it cites. If one of your pages is wrong, fix it and check robots.txt doesn't block OAI-SearchBot. Then report the answer: OpenAI's help on reporting content says you can tap thumbs down under a ChatGPT message and choose an issue. Say what's wrong, give the correct fact and point to the page that confirms it.
Does schema markup fix a wrong AI answer?
No, not on its own. Google says there's no special structured data you need to appear in its AI features, and that it doesn't guarantee features that use structured data will show. Markup still helps keep facts consistent: Organization markup can carry your tax ID and sameAs links to your profiles. Keep it matching the visible page, and fix the wrong source first.
Will a 301 redirect stop AI tools quoting my old page?
It helps once each tool reads the old address again, though not straight away. Google says it uses a 301 as a strong signal that the redirect target should be processed instead, and nothing changes until it recrawls. Redirect only to a page that answers the same question with the corrected fact. A redirect does nothing about copies of the old wording on other sites, so check those too.
Can I use Google's Refresh Outdated Content tool on my own website?
No. Google says that tool is for pages you don't own, where the page no longer exists or has changed significantly. On your own site, fix the page and keep it live, then request a recrawl with URL Inspection. If you remove a page instead, make it return 404 or 410 so Google drops it at its next crawl. If it still shows in results and can't wait, use the Removals tool.
How long should I keep retesting a corrected answer?
Until the wrong fact is gone in two retests in a row, at least a week apart, in every product you logged. The help pages from Google, OpenAI and Perplexity give no timeframe for answers to change, and Google says crawling alone can take from a few days to a few weeks. If the fact survives a month after your fix was crawled, look for a second source you missed.
Should I contact customers who relied on the wrong information?
Yes, if they may have acted on it, such as booking a service you no longer offer. The ACCC's guidance on false or misleading claims tells businesses to keep consumers updated if things change and to correct any misunderstandings. A dated note on the page helps new readers. A direct call or email helps the people already affected, and it's worth logging that you made it.
