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Canonical Entity Fact Record Template

Create one reviewed internal record for an organization's, product's, person's, brand's, or location's approved identity facts and relationships.

What this template is for

A canonical entity fact record is an internal reference for the facts an organization has reviewed and can support. Use it to compare website copy, structured data, feeds, maintained profiles, listings, and relevant third-party sources without asking any one public page to serve every operational purpose.

Create one record per meaningful entity. An organization, brand, product, person, and physical location may be related, but they should not share one record when they have different names, identifiers, URLs, states, or owners.

This record documents an approved position. It does not make a fact independently authoritative, require an outside publisher to adopt it, or guarantee how a search or AI system will represent the entity.

Copyable record

Copy the sections below into the system your team already maintains. Replace the prompts, remove fields that do not apply, and add jurisdiction-specific identifiers only when they are relevant and appropriate to retain.

# Entity fact record: [approved public name]

## Record control

- Record ID: [stable internal identifier]
- Entity type: [organization / brand / product / person / location / other]
- Lifecycle status: [planned / active / renamed / discontinued / closed / other]
- Accountable owner: [person or team]
- Approved by: [person or role]
- Approved on: [YYYY-MM-DD]
- Last reviewed: [YYYY-MM-DD]
- Next review trigger: [date, role change, rebrand, product release, acquisition, closure, other]

## Approved identity

- Preferred public name: [name]
- Legal or registered name, if relevant: [name or not applicable]
- One-sentence description: [plain factual description]
- Canonical public URL: [URL]
- Stable public identifier or @id: [URL or identifier]
- Primary market or jurisdiction: [market, jurisdiction, or not applicable]
- Distinguishing facts: [industry, location, parent, product category, or other facts that resolve ambiguity]

## Names and identifiers

| Name or identifier | Type and issuing system | Current status | Evidence | Notes |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [value] | [brand name / former name / registration ID / SKU / GTIN / professional ID / other] | [current / former / pending] | [source or record] | [scope, language, effective dates, or limits] |

## Relationships

| Subject | Relationship | Related entity | Effective dates | Evidence | Owner |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [this entity] | [brand of / owns / works for / author of / located at / successor to / other] | [record ID and name] | [start and end, if relevant] | [source] | [person or team] |

## Maintained first-party sources

| Source | URL or system | Facts supplied | System owner | Last checked |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [About page / product catalog / feed / profile / other] | [URL or system name] | [fields] | [person or team] | [YYYY-MM-DD] |

## Public identity matches

| Candidate URL | Entity represented | Exact identity match? | Evidence | Action |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [URL] | [name shown by the source] | [yes / no / unclear] | [why] | [retain / remove / investigate] |

## Known ambiguity and transitions

- Likely name collisions: [similar entities and distinguishing facts]
- Former names or URLs: [value, effective dates, and successor]
- Ownership, role, or status changes: [change and effective date]
- Facts still under review: [field, question, owner, and due date]

## Decisions and evidence

| Date | Decision | Evidence considered | Decision owner | Follow-up |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| [YYYY-MM-DD] | [approved or changed fact] | [source records] | [person or role] | [next action or none] |

Decide what belongs in the record

Include facts that help a reader or system distinguish the entity, understand a relevant relationship, or use the correct current value. Record the evidence and effective dates when a fact can change.

Keep secrets, private contact details, security information, sensitive personal data, and irrelevant internal attributes elsewhere. The fact record should be safe for the people who need to use it, even though it is not intended as a public page.

Do not place observed third-party errors in the approved identity fields. Put those observations in the reconciliation log so the reviewed fact and the conflicting display remain separate.

Filled fictional example

This compact example is fictional. It demonstrates a record structure and does not describe a real organization, identifier, profile, or approval.

FieldCompleted example
Record ID and typeORG-EX-014; organization
Preferred public nameNorthstar Field Tools
Legal nameNorthstar Field Tools LLC
DescriptionA fictional manufacturer of handheld inspection instruments for utility crews.
Canonical URL and stable IDhttps://example.test/about/; https://example.test/#organization
Market and disambiguatorUnited States; equipment manufacturer, not the unrelated Northstar Field Services contractor.
Alias“NFT Tools,” current internal and customer-support shorthand; not used as the legal name.
IdentifierMFG-4821, fictional manufacturer catalog identifier; evidence: maintained product system.
RelationshipNorthstar Field Tools LLC owns the fictional “Northstar Inspect” brand, effective January 1, 2025; evidence: approved corporate record.
Maintained sourceProduct catalog supplies model and availability fields; catalog operations owns it; last checked September 19, 2026.
Identity-match URLhttps://social.example.test/northstarfieldtools; yes, after confirming the profile names the same organization and canonical domain.
Candidate that is not a matchA trade-publication review of one product; no, because it is an article about the entity, not its identity URL.

If the trade-publication review used an obsolete brand name, that observation would belong in the reconciliation log. It would not replace the approved preferred name in this record.

Review identity-match URLs

Treat a URL as an identity match only when it identifies the same entity represented by this record. An official profile can qualify. A news article, partner page, reseller listing, customer review, or page about a related entity generally does not.

Record uncertain candidates before using them in sameAs markup. Follow the URL, confirm the name and subject, check whether the profile is current, and document why it represents the exact same entity.

Validate the record

  1. Ask the accountable owner to confirm the preferred name, description, status, and canonical URL.
  2. Check every identifier against its issuing system or maintained source.
  3. Confirm each relationship from both the subject’s and related entity’s records when both are controlled internally.
  4. Compare the approved facts with the primary website page, structured data, feeds, and maintained profiles.
  5. Move every mismatch into the Entity Reconciliation Log with an owner and next action.
  6. Reopen the record when its review trigger occurs rather than copying an old value into a new surface.

Official references

Completion check

  • Give the record one accountable owner and a defined review trigger.
  • Support every identifier, relationship, and public identity URL with an appropriate source.
  • Distinguish approved facts from observations about third-party sources.
  • Exclude private or unnecessary personal and operational information.