According to its press release, Twitter officially announced Blue for Business, a subscription geared towards companies who want to “verify & distinguish themselves on Twitter,” according to its press release.
This service allows companies to link their main accounts to those of their employees, making it easier for them to prove that they do work for them. The company is currently testing the service with “a selected group of businesses,” which includes its employees.
Esther Crawford is the director of product management at Twitter. She has a little bird badge right next to her blue checkmark. This verifies that she is an employee of the company. As you can see, this tweet from her announcing Blue for Business.
Craft Ventures, a venture capital company, also appears to have affiliates. It uses a badge that has its logo.
Twitter has yet to share many details about the service so far. We have yet to determine how much Blue for Business costs, who is eligible, or how it will verify that an account belongs to a business.
According to the company’s press release, it does state that it will allow more businesses to subscribe next year. Twitter warns (in a very small footnote) that Blue for Business features may only be available across some platforms. They also “may change periodically.”
Some features began to appear before the announcement. We’ve already looked into the square profile photos and affiliate badges that started appearing on Monday.
Twitter’s role is clear. The company wants to make money from subscriptions and could create an enterprise tier for its Twitter Blue service.
The company gives examples of Blue for Business use cases, such as sports teams becoming affiliated with their athletes, movie stars getting a logo next to their names, and journalists being issued badges that show they work for a particular outlet.
Twitter also has a gray checkmark badge that can be used to identify “government and multilateral accounts.” It might already be available on the @WhiteHouse Instagram account. In November, the company said it would begin rolling out gray badges.
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