--- type: Article name: The first thing an agent gets wrong about your business. id: "https://selfe.ai/insights/ai-discovery/the-first-thing-an-agent-gets-wrong" url: "https://selfe.ai/insights/ai-discovery/the-first-thing-an-agent-gets-wrong" publisher: "did:web:selfe.ai" description: "The first mistake is rarely a spelling error. It is a reasonable-sounding assumption made when the information that changes the decision is scattered, missing or out of date." datePublished: 12 September 2026 author: The Selfe team --- # The first thing an agent gets wrong about your business. > The first mistake is rarely a spelling error. It is a reasonable-sounding assumption made when the information that changes the decision is scattered, missing or out of date. ## In short - An answer can sound helpful while still being commercially wrong. - The details that change a decision are often distributed across pages, systems and local knowledge. - Correcting the source of truth matters more than polishing one answer. An agent is often asked to narrow a choice: which option suits a particular need, whether a business can fulfil a request or what will happen after a purchase. When it does not have the deciding detail, it may still produce an answer that sounds reasonable. That is the risk. ## A plausible answer can still be wrong An agent is often asked to narrow a choice: which option suits a particular need, whether a business can fulfil a request or what will happen after a purchase. When it does not have the deciding detail, it may still produce an answer that sounds reasonable. That is the risk. For the business, the consequence is not merely a bad description. A customer can be ruled out, sent to the wrong option or arrive with an expectation the business cannot meet. The agent did not need to be careless for that to happen. It only needed incomplete inputs. ## The decisive facts are usually spread around The public description may be accurate in broad terms while availability lives in another system, the useful policy lives in a PDF and the local exception is known only by the team. Each source works for the person who already knows where to look. Together, they are difficult for an agent to combine with confidence. This is why discovery is not just an SEO task. Search visibility helps an agent find a business. Decision-ready information helps it understand when that business is the right answer for the customer in front of it. ## Find the facts that change the choice Review the questions that cause a customer to choose one option over another: who it is for, what is included, what is possible, what is restricted, how much it costs and what happens next. The important information is not every word the business has published. It is the subset that would change a recommendation or block a purchase. Then identify the owner for each fact. If the answer changes with stock, dates, location or customer needs, a static page may not be its source of truth. The agent needs a way to get the current answer, or a clear route to a person who can give it. ## Correct the record, not just the phrasing It is tempting to treat a bad result as a writing problem. Better copy is useful, but it cannot safely replace missing data or a broken hand-off. Start with the source that owns the claim, make its meaning explicit and connect it to the surface where an agent can use it. That makes discovery cumulative. Each clarified fact improves the next recommendation, comparison and transaction instead of fixing one isolated answer. ## Act on this - [Check whether an agent can buy from you](https://selfe.ai/agentic-commerce/buyability-check) — the free readiness scan. - [Discover venues](https://selfe.ai/api/registry/discover) — `POST`, semantic browse across the registry. - [Match a bookable answer](https://selfe.ai/api/registry/match) — `POST` with dates and party size. - [Verify Selfe's identity](https://selfe.ai/.well-known/did.json) — `did:web:selfe.ai`. - [Agent card](https://selfe.ai/.well-known/agent-card.json) — how to connect over A2A or MCP.