✦ Key takeaway
ChatGPT may quote an outdated price, mention a discontinued product, or provide obsolete opening hours. These mistakes are not due to technical issues, but rather to sourcing problems: the tool relies on old web pages, outdated directories, and third-party content that freeze your offer in the past. ChatGPT’s reliability regarding your brand depends on what it reads. You can’t correct it directly, but you can influence its sources.
Why is ChatGPT’s reliability limited when it talks about your brand?
Old pages still online
AIs often cite outdated content. According to an Ahrefs analysis of 1.4 million prompts, the median age of a page cited by ChatGPT is around 500 days. A page published years ago and never updated remains accessible: if it contains an obsolete price list or an old product range, the AI may use it as is. Your own website can thus become a source of error: an old press release, an archived product sheet, or never-updated terms and conditions are enough to distort an answer.
Third-party sources never updated
Professional directories, comparison sites, news articles, and reseller listings are among the sources used by AIs and are beyond your direct control. A directory may display an address you have left, a comparison site an old price, or an article a service you no longer offer. This content accumulates without anyone reviewing it and feeds into answers even if your site is perfectly up to date.
Answers generated from memory
ChatGPT can answer in two ways. It can either perform a web search and consult current pages, which allows for relatively quick corrections, or rely on its training data, frozen at a certain date: in this case, corrections await a new model version. This distinction explains why some errors disappear quickly, while others persist for months.
Which errors most threaten ChatGPT’s reliability about your offer?
Type of information | Example of error | Commercial impact | Priority |
Price | Outdated price quoted as current | Disappointment, loss of trust | Very high |
Terms | Outdated warranty or return policy | Potential dispute, dissatisfaction | Very high |
Product range | Discontinued product shown as available | Unnecessary requests, frustration | High |
Availability | Incorrect stock or delivery time | Cancelled order | High |
Contact details | Outdated address or phone number | Lost customer, damaged image | Medium |
Services | Service no longer offered | Confusion, wasted time | Medium |
Errors regarding prices, warranties, or sales terms have the greatest impact, as they directly affect the business relationship and can lead to disputes.
How to check ChatGPT’s reliability about your brand?
- List the key information to verify: prices, product range, terms and conditions, contact details, opening hours, delivery areas, and warranties.
- Query major AI engines as a customer would: “What is the price of this product at this brand?” or “What are the opening hours of this store?”
- Note each error and the cited source: check the referenced page to understand where the information comes from.
- Prioritize by commercial impact: address prices, terms, and availability first.
Reviewing generated answers and their sources helps trace the origin of errors. Search AI allows you to understand how AIs perceive you by identifying the content they use to discuss your brand.
How to improve the reliability of ChatGPT’s answers about your offer?
Update or redirect your own outdated pages
Start with your website. Redirect or update pages that mention discontinued products, old price lists, or outdated press releases. If a page must be kept, clearly indicate that it is no longer current and link to the updated version. A well-indexed outdated page can continue to be cited for months.
Have third-party sources corrected
Contact directories, comparison sites, resellers, and websites that mention you to update your contact details, prices, or product range. Some platforms allow you to claim and edit your listing directly. This is a long-term effort, but it is the only way to correct information published outside your own site.
Publish a clear and dated reference page
Create a reference page with your up-to-date essential information: prices, product range, terms, and contact details. Structure it clearly, with structured data and a visible update date. Our article on technical GEO details best practices to make this content readable by AIs.
There is no correction button on the OpenAI side. The effects depend on how sources are updated, with varying delays depending on whether the answer comes from a web search or from training data.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is ChatGPT reliable for information about a company?
Not always. Its answers depend on the sources it consults or its training data, which may be outdated. For sensitive information (prices, terms, availability), it is best to check the official company website.
Can you ask OpenAI to correct an error about your brand?
There is no correction form for company information. You need to act on the sources the AI consults: your website, directories, and third-party content.
How long does it take for a correction to be reflected?
It depends on the response mode. With a web search, the correction may appear within days or weeks. For answers based on training data, you have to wait for a new model version, which can take several months.
Should you monitor all AIs or just ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is the most widely used, but Perplexity, Gemini, or Claude can also spread incorrect information. Monitoring several engines helps identify common sources of error.
About the author
Antonia
R&D & IA, CPO Search Ai
Antonia is Chief Product Officer (CPO) of Search Ai, a Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) platform for measuring, managing, and optimizing brand visibility on generative AI engines such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, ... With over 10 years of experience as an R&D engineer, she continues to work at the intersection of R&D and business, transforming AI advancements into concrete functionalities for marketing teams.