What a Business Fact Box Should Contain

When someone opens a business profile, they are usually looking for a small set of facts. What does this business do? Where is it? How do I contact it? How long has it been around? Is the information current? A well-built fact box puts those answers in one place, near the top, in a form that can be read in a few seconds.

It is a small piece of design with large consequences. A good fact box makes a profile quick to use and easy to trust. A poor one buries the basics in marketing language or leaves out what people most need.

What a fact box is for

A fact box is not a summary of the business's story or an advertisement. It is a reference panel. Its job is to give consistent, labelled facts so that visitors can find what they need without reading the whole page, and so that they can compare one profile with another.

Consistency is the key. If every profile in a directory uses the same labels in the same order, readers learn where to look. They can scan down a list of profiles and compare founding dates or locations in a second. This is one reason encyclopaedias and reference sites use panels of this kind.

The core facts

These are the lines that nearly every business profile should carry.

Name

The name the business uses publicly, as it appears on its sign and website. If the legal name differs, show it on a separate line.

What it does

One sentence, in plain words, saying what the business offers and to whom. Avoid slogans. A reader should be able to repeat it accurately.

Category

The main category from the directory's list, with any secondary ones. This lets readers see where the business sits.

Location

The city or town, and the country. If there is a public address that customers can visit, show it. If the business is mobile or remote, say so and show the area it serves, not a made-up address.

Contact

At least one way to reach the business: a contact page, an email address, a phone number. Show what the business is happy to publish. Google's guidance on organisation markup lists properties such as a telephone number and email address as ways to indicate how to contact a business.

Website

The main address, checked to work and to belong to the business.

Founded

When the business started, with a note on what the date means: incorporation, first trading, launch. Schema.org's Organization type includes a founding date property, which shows how standard the fact is.

Status

Active, closed, acquired or unknown, with a date if known.

Facts that add value

Beyond the core, some facts help readers judge or compare, if the business can supply them accurately.

• Legal name and registration number, where public. Schema.org describes legal name as the official name of the organisation, for example the registered company name.
• Size, as a range, with a date and a definition.
• People: founders or key roles, with consent.
• Languages served.
• Opening hours, for businesses that customers visit.
• Accessibility information.
• Memberships and registrations, where documented.
• Social and professional profiles, if active.
• Service area, for businesses that travel to customers.

Choose the ones that matter in your sector, and show them in the same order on every profile.

Add provenance: where facts came from

A fact box should tell readers how much to trust each line. A lightweight way is to add a short note to the facts that matter most.

• Source: the business itself, an official register, a document the directory has seen.
• Date: when it was last checked or when it was provided.
• Status: whether it is verified, and what that means.

You do not need to decorate every line. A simple "Last checked: March" at the bottom of the box, and a mark beside the facts that have been verified, is often enough. Explain what each mark means on a separate page, in plain words, and keep that explanation honest and specific.

Google's guidance on helpful content emphasises trust, supported by clear sourcing and evidence about who is behind content. Provenance in a fact box is the compact version of that principle.

Keep marketing out

The fact box is not the place for claims.

• No superlatives. "Leading", "best", "premier".
• No unverifiable statements. "Trusted by thousands".
• No calls to action crowded into the facts.
• No keyword lists.

Put claims and stories in the main text, where there is room to explain and support them. A fact box that stays factual is more credible, and it is more useful for comparison.

Design for scanning

People glance at a fact box. Make it easy.

• Labels on the left, values on the right, or labels above values on a phone.
• Consistent order, the same on every profile.
• Short values. If a line needs a paragraph, it belongs in the text.
• Plain language. "Founded" not "Established date".
• Clear spacing and enough contrast in light and dark modes.
• Words as well as symbols. A tick should be accompanied by a word like "Verified", so that the meaning does not rest on colour or an icon alone.
• Real text, not an image, so that it can be read by screen readers, resized and found by search tools.
• Responsive layout. On a narrow screen, the box should stack neatly and not push the main content out of view.

Handle missing information honestly

Not every fact is known. Show unknowns clearly.

• Not stated. The business has not supplied it.
• Not disclosed. The business has chosen not to share it.
• Not applicable.
• Unknown. The directory could not find it.

Avoid leaving a line out silently, or filling it with a guess. A visible "Not stated" is honest. Consider hiding lines that are not applicable to a type of business, so that profiles do not look full of gaps.

Think about machines too

Fact boxes are read by people, search engines and assistants. If your profile pages support structured data, mirror the box in markup. Google's documentation treats every organisation property as optional, but encourages including those that apply, such as name, URL, logo, address, telephone, email, description and links to other profiles. The markup must match the visible content, so do not add facts that are not shown. Our article on structured data for profile pages goes into detail.

Keep it current

A fact box with out-of-date contents is worse than none. Show the last-checked date, and set reviews. When a business updates a fact, update the date. Where possible, flag boxes that have not been checked for a year, so that readers know to double-check.

A worked example

A directory has a profile for a small bookshop. The fact box reads:

• Name: The Hartley Bookshop
• Legal name: Hartley Books Ltd (England and Wales), verified against the register
• What it does: Independent general bookshop with a children's section and a small cafe
• Category: Bookshops
• Location: 14 Mill Lane, Hartley, United Kingdom
• Opening hours: Monday to Saturday, 9am to 5.30pm; Sunday, 10am to 4pm
• Accessibility: Step-free entrance via the side door; accessible toilet on the ground floor
• Contact: Contact page and shop phone
• Website: Official website link
• Founded: 2011 (incorporated)
• Status: Active
• Last checked: March

A visitor can answer their questions in ten seconds. The mark beside "Legal name" is explained on a short page. Nothing in the box is a claim that cannot be checked. Below the box, the main text tells the story of the shop and its events.

Common mistakes

1. Too many lines. A fact box with thirty rows is a document, not a box.
2. Marketing language.
3. Inconsistent labels between profiles.
4. No date.
5. Vague verification marks with no explanation.
6. Colour-only signals.
7. Facts as images.
8. Guessing missing values.

A checklist

• Name, what it does, category, location, contact, website, founded, status
• Extra facts that matter in the sector
• Provenance: source, date, verification
• No marketing language
• Consistent labels and order
• Accessible, responsive and real text
• Honest handling of unknowns
• Markup that matches the visible text
• Regular review

The categories page here shows how profiles are grouped, the search page helps visitors find them and the submit page starts a profile, which its owner updates from the account.

Adapting the box for different kinds of business

Different sectors need different lines. A restaurant should show cuisine, price range described in words, opening hours and booking options. A tradesperson should show areas served, response times for emergencies, accreditations and insurance status. A professional firm should show regulators, registration numbers and the services offered. An online shop should show delivery regions, returns policy summary and customer service hours. Decide on a standard set for each category, document the labels and use them across every profile in that category, so that visitors comparing two businesses see the same lines in the same order and can judge them like for like.

Testing the box with real visitors

Ask three people who do not know the business to open the profile and answer five questions in under a minute: what does it do, where is it, how do I reach it, how long has it existed, and when was the information last checked. If anyone fails, find out which line was missing or unclear and fix it. Repeat the exercise whenever you redesign the box. Short tests like this reveal problems that no amount of internal review will catch, because insiders already know the answers.

Frequently asked questions

How many lines should a fact box have? Eight to twelve is usually enough. More becomes hard to scan.

Should every profile have the same fields? The core fields, yes. Others can vary by sector.

Can a business edit its own fact box? Usually, yes, with checks on key facts and a visible record of when they were last confirmed.