A NAP audit finds every place your business name, address and phone number appear on the web, including the listings nobody at the business created. It then works through what it finds in order of the authority of the source.

The listings nobody created are where the damage sits. A record built from an old brochure, a directory that scraped a page you replaced three years ago, a duplicate somebody claimed in 2019 and forgot about.

Updating the three directories you already know about is a spot check.

What is a NAP consistency audit?

A NAP consistency audit is a systematic search for every instance of a business’s name, address and phone number on the web, measured against one agreed correct version. Each instance that differs is recorded, ranked by the authority of the source carrying it, and assigned a fixing process suited to that source.

NAP is the three details themselves, and how conflicting business details build up in the first place covers why making them match matters.

Decide the correct name, address and phone number first

Decide the exact trading name, address format and phone number in writing before you search for anything, because an inconsistency can only be measured against something.

The canonical version is that written record. One trading name as it should appear everywhere, one address in a fixed format down to the unit number, and one phone number somebody actually answers.

I have asked for it in a first meeting and watched three people give three different answers. The owner says Riverside Physio, the website says Riverside Physiotherapy, the invoices say Riverside Physiotherapy Pty Ltd, and nobody has decided which is the business.

Decide it. Write it down. Everything from here is measured against it, and it gives the rest of the Local SEO programme these details feed one version to work from.

  1. Write the canonical name, address and phone number down, exactly as they should appear.
  2. Compare your website and Google Business Profile against it character by character, and correct whichever is wrong.
  3. Circulate it to everyone who creates listings, sends invoices or writes marketing.

The seven places your NAP details turn up

Seven categories cover everywhere the three details turn up, and an audit is only as complete as that list.

Your own website comes first. If it disagrees with the written version, the audit starts at home.

Your Google Business Profile is the listing Google shows when somebody searches for you by name. A variance between it and the website is a high-priority finding.

Major directories are the handful of platforms with genuine authority for local search, and an error on one travels to the sites that copy from them.

Social profiles hold the three details in their own fields, filled in quickly when the account is opened and rarely checked again.

Industry directories and association listings carry details supplied once, often years ago, by whoever handled the membership renewal that year.

PR and editorial mentions are worth identifying even though they are slow to correct. A prominent article carrying an old address is a source Google reads too.

Cached and archived versions of old listings outlive the page they came from. Note them. Do not spend time on them.

Where corrected details come back later, one source has re-copied them from another. There is no upstream layer to fix once and forget, and which platform copied which is not safe to assume. Work it out from your own record of corrections and dates.

  1. Build an audit sheet with one row per source, grouped into the seven categories.
  2. Start with the website, the profile and the major directories.
  3. Work the remaining four categories once the top three are clean.

How to run a NAP audit, search by search

Search every variation of the name, the old phone number and the old address, not only the details you want to find. Then record what comes back, source by source.

The wrong listings are attached to the wrong details. Searching only the correct name returns the listings that were already right, which is pleasant and tells you nothing.

So run the abbreviated name, the full legal name with Pty Ltd on the end, and any earlier trading name. Run the old number and the previous address inside quotation marks, which pins the search to the exact string.

Record every instance as you find it: the source, the name, the address and the phone number as each appears, and whether the listing is claimed. Flag every field that differs, however small the difference looks on the day.

Note the authority of the source beside each one. A wrong number on a major directory is a different problem from the same number on a site nobody visits.

A duplicate listing is the same business listed twice on one platform, usually one record claimed and current and one unclaimed and old. Mark those separately, because they resolve differently and sooner.

The failure mode is doing this from memory, checking the sources you happen to remember and stopping once the first few look right. The method is the list, and the list runs longer than anyone expects.

Where the profile is the source of the conflict, the Google Business Profile audit that runs alongside it goes through it field by field.

  1. Run every search variation, including the old number and the previous address in quotation marks.
  2. Record source, name, address, phone, claimed status and authority for every instance.
  3. Mark duplicate listings separately from ordinary discrepancies.

What a NAP audit typically finds

Four patterns account for most of what an audit turns up.

An old phone number from a previous change, still live on several sources, usually a landline replaced by a mobile that nobody chased across the directories.

An old address from previous premises, still sitting on the listings that were never told about the move.

A trading name used inconsistently, with and without Pty Ltd, abbreviated on one listing and spelt out on the next. Each variation reads as a possible second business to a system matching records.

Duplicate listings on a platform that matters, one claimed and current, one unclaimed and old, both describing the same business.

In 20+ years of chasing these down I have rarely audited a business that had none of them.

  1. Check your findings against these four patterns first.
  2. For every old address or number, note the date it stopped being correct.
  3. Count the duplicates separately, because they are the first thing to resolve.

Which NAP errors to fix first

Work the highest-authority sources first, and move every duplicate to the top wherever it happens to sit.

High priority is any discrepancy on the profile or a major directory, the records most likely to be read closely and copied onward.

Medium priority is a mid-authority platform with real local traffic: a regional directory, an active industry listing, a social profile people actually visit.

Low priority is the obscure directory, the archived page and the editorial mention nobody will change. Note them. Fix them when it is cheap.

Duplicates sit above all of it. Two live listings for one business raise a question about how many businesses there are, which outranks a wrong digit anywhere on the sheet.

  1. Sort the audit sheet by source authority, highest first.
  2. Move every duplicate listing to the top, whatever platform it sits on.
  3. Work down in that order.

What it takes to correct each type of listing

Claimed listings update in days, unclaimed ones have to be claimed before anything can change, editorial mentions depend on the publisher, and archived pages cannot be changed at all.

Claimed listings update through the platform, usually live within days.

Google publishes its own figure for the profile. Edits “usually take up to 10 minutes to review, but sometimes it can take up to 30 days”, a range wide enough that a fortnight of silence tells you nothing.

A move brings an extra step. Google’s guidance reads “If you move your business to a new address after it’s verified, you must verify your business again”, so the profile repeats the check it passed at setup.

Unclaimed listings have to be claimed before you can touch them. The verification behind it was designed by whoever built the platform and rarely revisited. Allow a week, then update the listing or request removal where it is a duplicate.

PR and editorial mentions come down to asking the publisher, and the hit rate varies with how much they care. A prominent piece is worth an email. A passing mention on a minor site rarely is.

Archived pages cannot be changed. Note them and move on.

Be honest about the calendar. Some of this is same-day and some of it runs to weeks. A listing still showing the old number four weeks after your correction may be a source that re-copied the detail from somewhere you have not found.

  1. Group the fixes by source type and run each group as its own process.
  2. Log the date every correction was submitted, so a listing that reverts can be traced.
  3. Recheck the corrected listings at six weeks.

Updating your details in a fixed order

Set a fixed order of operations for every future change: the website first, then the Google Business Profile, then the major directories, then everything else.

Every change of phone number, premises or trading name starts the process again, and the inconsistencies it creates outlive it by years when nobody manages them.

Keep the canonical document current, and keep the audit sheet. The second audit runs far quicker when you know where every listing lives.

This work and the wider citation profile move together, so which local citations are worth building reads as a companion to this one. Conflicting details are also among the commonest reasons a business stops appearing in Google Maps results.

For clients, the audit is the foundation layer of the ongoing Local SEO work Belmore Digital runs.

  1. Write the order of operations into the process for any change of details.
  2. Keep the audit sheet and the canonical document together, and date both.
  3. Re-run the audit annually, and immediately after any change to the three details.

The NAP audit in one list

  1. Agree the canonical name, address and phone number in writing.
  2. Check the website and Google Business Profile match it exactly.
  3. Build a source list across all seven categories.
  4. Search every name, number and address variation, not only the correct ones.
  5. Record every instance with source, details, claimed status and authority.
  6. Flag duplicate listings separately.
  7. Sort by authority, duplicates first.
  8. Fix by source type, logging the date each correction was submitted.
  9. Recheck every corrected listing at six weeks and trace anything that has reverted.
  10. Set the order of operations for future changes and diarise the next audit.

FAQ

How do I audit my NAP consistency? Agree one canonical version of your name, address and phone number, then search for every variation of them across all seven categories of source. Those run from your website and Google Business Profile through major directories, social profiles and industry listings to editorial mentions and archived pages. Record each instance, flag every discrepancy and every duplicate, then fix in order of source authority.

Why do old details come back after I fix them? Because another source still holds the old version and something has re-copied it. Business details are copied between listings constantly, so a record you corrected can be overwritten from a source that was never corrected. Log the date of every correction, and a listing that reverts can be traced back from that log.

How long does it take to fix NAP inconsistencies? It depends on the source. Claimed listings usually update within days, and Google says profile edits “usually take up to 10 minutes to review, but sometimes it can take up to 30 days”, which is a wide range. Unclaimed listings have to be claimed first, which can take a week or more, while editorial mentions and archived pages may never change.

TL;DR

  • A NAP audit covers every category of source, including the listings nobody at the business created. Checking the directories you already know about is a spot check.
  • Agree one canonical version of the three details, in writing, before you search for anything.
  • Search the variations and the old details, because that is what the wrong listings attach to.
  • Prioritise by the authority of the source, and put duplicate listings at the top wherever they sit.
  • Fixing differs by source and so does the timeline, from same-day on a claimed listing to never on an archived page.
  • Log every correction with its date, so a listing that reverts can be traced.

If you’d like your NAP consistency assessed across every source that matters, get in touch with JB.