Facebook is making it easier for local business pages to get the sought-after verified checkmark.
As first reported by Marketing Land, Facebook is rolling out dark gray verified checkmarks for local business pages.
Facebook also updated a Help Center entry, explaining how a local business page owner could get the mark:
- Click Settings at the top of your Page
- From General, click Page Verification
- Click Verify this Page, then click Get Started
- Enter a publicly listed phone number for your business, your country and language
- Click Call Me Now to allow Facebook to call you with a verification code
- Enter the 4-digit verification code and click Continue
For users and other general (non-local) page owners, there’s still no real way to opt-in to acquire the verified checkmark. This does not apply to general users or non-local page owners. Celebrities, prominent news outlets and public figures have a blue checkmark to verify.
This new development makes it easier for local business pages to gain trust with consumers and fans.
Kristen Bury, a product marketing manager for Facebook pages, talked about the verified checkmark with Marketing Land:
At scale there will inevitably be duplicates and multiple entries for the same business. So this is one way businesses can make it easier for people to make sure that they are finding and communicating with the right Page. …
This isn’t the biggest product that we will launch in the next year, but it’s definitely a sign of our investment in making it easy for people and businesses to connect on Facebook and on Pages.
Local page owners could also verify with a business document, so long as the official document has the company’s name and physical address.
This again shows the importance of having your local business represented online using channels like Facebook and Google My Business. Having your Facebook local and Google My Business will also have an impact on your search engine optimisation.
Watch this space for more developments…
