Symptoms you may be seeing
- Ask ChatGPT for suppliers of your product in your region, and competitors are named. You are not.The assistant cannot read or match enough about you, so it names the suppliers it can.
- Vendor registration stalls over documents you already hold.Certificates, approvals and company facts that are missing, out of date or different from place to place.
- Most new enquiries come through B2B portals, where you are one of many quotes.Your own website does not win the buyer directly, so you pay to be compared on price.
The moment it matters
A vendor-registration team compares your website, your GST registration and your Google listing before approving you. The three addresses are different.
What the buyer sees
A Google listing under an old trading name. An IndiaMART page with a former salesman's mobile number and a product list from five years ago. A LinkedIn page with a different founding year. A website footer whose company name does not match the GST registration.
What it costs you
Mismatches slow vendor registration and make a careful buyer wonder what else is out of date. Old phone numbers lose calls without anyone knowing.
AI assistants build their picture of a company by comparing sources. Where the sources agree, they tend to describe you with confidence. Where they disagree, they may hedge, mix you up with another company, or leave you out.
What the buyer is asking at this point
"Who runs the company?"
He is checkingWhom he is really dealing with, and whether they will answer when something goes wrong.
A good answerA founder or management page with names, background and a photograph, linked to their LinkedIn profiles.
"What are your payment terms?"
He is checkingFit with his company's policy.
A good answerUsually discussed in the quotation; the website can say which terms you work on in general and whether you are an MSME supplier, which affects his payment timelines.
"What is your registered name and GSTIN?"
He is checkingWhether the company on the website is the one on the invoice.
A good answerLegal name and address on the website exactly as on the GST registration, with the trading name explained if it differs.
"Why do your Google listing, IndiaMART page and website show different addresses?"
He is checkingAsked only after the doubt has set in.
A good answerOne company fact sheet, agreed once and used everywhere, so the question never comes up.
"Are you an MSME?"
He is checkingProcurement preference, and his payment obligations.
A good answerUdyam registration stated where it applies.
All 62 questions industrial buyers ask, with good answers →
Check your own website in two minutes
- Write down, from your website: company name, address, phone, founding year and main products.
- Compare each with your Google Business Profile, IndiaMART, TradeIndia, JustDial, your LinkedIn company page and your GST registration.
- Mark every difference, however small.
What good looks like
- One company fact sheet, agreed once: legal name, trading name, address matching the GST registration, phone, hours, founding year, certificates.
- The same facts on the website and every listing.
- A Google listing with the right categories, recent photographs and a product entry for each product.
- A LinkedIn company page with the right details and the founder's profile linked to it.
How this gets put right
This problem rarely comes alone. It usually shares a cause with others on this list: a website written once, years ago, without the facts the plant and the sales team hold. Patching one page at a time seldom changes what a buyer concludes.
The AI Search Visibility Blueprint shows how far your own site has this and every related problem, how Google and the AI assistants read it today, and what to correct in what order. A Website Transformation rebuilds the site from your own documents so the whole set is put right together, and measures what moves each month.
Written by Arun Agrawal, founder of EbizIndia and author of Before the Buyer Calls, a free guide to what industrial buyers check on a supplier's website.