How Zensight evidence scores work
Methodology version 1
Zensight reports identity and compliance, operational activity, and digital readiness separately. A dimension receives a score only when governed evidence exists; missing evidence stays unknown instead of becoming a zero. Scores are recomputed from source data, never edited by hand, and payment never changes them.
Technology vendors and telephone line types are descriptive observations, not trust shortcuts. CMS, CRM, hosting, VoIP, or landline labels never change identity and compliance. Observable capabilities and evidence freshness contribute only to digital readiness or operating visibility.
Public standing 35% of the configured blend
- Current public credential
- Credential tenure
- Active business registration
- Years registered
Reputation 25% of the configured blend
- Average rating
- Review volume
- Review freshness
Longevity 10% of the configured blend
- Website domain age
Digital readiness 15% of the configured blend
- HTTPS enabled
- Mobile ready
- Structured data
- Contact path
- Online booking
- Recent website observation
Operational visibility 5% of the configured blend
- Reachable business phone
- Recent phone observation
- Hours published
Owner engagement 10% of the configured blend
- Claimed by owner
- Listing completeness
How each fact is labeled
Every dated entry on a profile's evidence timeline carries one of these labels, the source it came from, and the date the source reported it. The label says what kind of evidence it is, not how much to trust the business.
- Authority verified
- Direct evidence from the relevant public authority, such as a state licensing board or the Secretary of State, within its check window. An active credential proves an active credential and nothing more.
- Publicly observed
- An attributable observation from a public source: a website scan, a domain registration record, a carrier lookup, or a public review platform. Observations describe; they never verify.
- Business provided
- A fact the claimed business supplied or approved. Shown as the business's statement, never as a Zensight finding.
- Zensight review
- A dated operator review of the public evidence, with an expiry. A lapsed review is not a review.
Where a date is estimated rather than reported, the timeline marks it est. and says how it was derived. A missing entry means Zensight holds no evidence for it, not that it did not happen.
About ZensightBot
ZensightBot is the crawler that observes public business websites and chamber of commerce directories. It identifies itself as ZensightBot/1.0, honors robots.txt and stops when a site disallows it, fetches one page at a time per host with a delay, never logs in or submits forms, and never fetches private or internal addresses. It records only what a visitor would see on a public page. To have a site excluded entirely, add a robots.txt rule for ZensightBot or use the corrections page; exclusions take effect on the next crawl.
Credentials come from the issuing authority named on each listing. Websites, technology, reputation, contact, and operating observations retain their own source and observation date. Confirm government credentials directly with the issuing authority before relying on them.