How to: Verify your social media channels
Have you ever noticed the little blue / grey tick next to certain social media accounts (usually celebrities or brands)? They mean that these accounts have been verified; they are the authentic account of that person / entity.
Most social media channels now have a verification process. For schools, some are easily obtainable and some are more difficult to get - each channel has their own prerequisites for verification.
Facebook and YouTube are two of the simplest, taking no more, generally, than 10 minutes to obtain each one. We highly recommend that every school verifies both Facebook and YouTube, as there are benefits in doing so.
Most schools are now on Facebook, all schools should be! The Facebook community is enormous - in fact, they passed 2 BILLION users last month! It has reach that cannot be rivalled, and the vast majority of your parents will be using Facebook.
As a school, you will have a Business Page to help promote and engage with your community. This is what you are looking to get verified. Luckily, the process is very simple.
PROS:
- Build trust with your community
- Merges "Unofficial Page" (this is often an issue for schools, and can often crop up in searches ahead of your own real school Page. Verification will merge the Unofficial Page automatically most of the time, and give you the ability to do manually if not)
- Your school will feature higher on search results
- More likely to get higher engagement
PREREQUISITES:
There are a few criteria that should be met before you attempt to verify your school's Page:
- Have a profile picture (the little, square thumbnail)
- Have a header image (the long, rectangular picture at the top of the Page)
If these are met you should see the option to verify in your Page's Settings.
STEPS TO VERIFY YOUR PAGE:
- 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
It is also possible to verify using a business document. Simply follow the same steps but click Verify this Page with documents instead, at the bottom-left of the window that appears. You can then upload a picture of an official document (e.g. phone bill / utility bill) showing your school's name and address.
YouTube
YouTube is the king of video! It is a great platform for schools and has a new type of community to market to.
YouTube is the second largest search engine online (losing out to Google...who own it!) so having a verified account is a good idea.
PROS:
- Build trust with your community
- Your school will feature higher on search results
- Is good for SEO (a verified account on YouTube will help when people search for you on Google)
- More likely to get higher engagement
- Enables some handy features on the YouTube platform - the most notable being Custom Thumbnails (meaning you can pick the image you video previews with) and being able to upload videos longer than 15 minutes
PREREQUISITES:
None...other than have a YouTube channel!
STEPS TO VERIFY YOUR PAGE:
- Click your Channel Icon at the top-right of page
- Click the Gear icon (YouTube settings)
- Click View additional features, then click Verify
- Choose the country you are in and whether you would like to receive a call or text message
- Enter a phone number and click Submit
- Enter the 6-digit verification code and click Submit
And it's done!
In having these channels verified you are showing that your community can trust you, something that goes a long way on social media. For 10 minutes work to sort both Facebook and YouTube out, the return on this alone is great.
Twitter and Instagram
These two channels are a little more complex to verify as a school. We have seen many top universities and colleges, such as Oxford (as seen on Twitter) or Harvard (as seen on Instagram), with verified accounts - but none from the independent school sector.
While it is harder to verify these two, we firmly believe it is possible.
Twitter's leading rule for verifying accounts is: 'the account should be of public interest.' While there are some guide lines as to what this covers (i.e. music, acting, fashion, government, politics, religion, journalism, media, sports, business, and other key interest areas) there is a deal of ambiguity too.
To be able to complete the form, your account must have the following:
- a verified phone number
- a confirmed email address (this should be a school email address)
- a bio
- a profile photo
- a header photo
- a website
- Tweets set as public (in Tweet privacy settings)
When submitting a request to verify an account, Twitter asks for additional information to help evaluate. Here are some tips to keep in mind:
- Why should your account be verified? As a business, the core detail Twitter will be looking for will be in your mission statement.
- When providing URLs to support your request, choose sites that help express the account your newsworthiness or relevancy in the education field.
Give it a go! Submit a request to verify an account by filling out this form.
Instagram is another that can be difficult; perhaps the most difficult. 😕
Many of the same rules as with Twitter apply here but the overall consensus on verified Instagram accounts is proof that you are an influencer on the platform (i.e. you have a solid Followers list).
Here are a few tips that could help you verify your Instagram:
- a good amount of Followers
- real followers and real likes - Instagram are more likely to verify if your account is authentic and has not "cheated" its way to a large following
- a strong social presence outside of Instagram - this could be the winning factor to getting your school verified! Prove to Instagram that you have great influence on other channels (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest, LIVE-streaming services...any channel with top levels of engagement)
- It is worth noting that a verified Facebook / Twitter / YouTube account does not guarantee a verified Instagram account
- a complete profile - be sure to have: a profile pic, bio and website on your Instagram Page. You can also link to your Instagram account from your other channels!
Currently, Instagram does not have a section of their site where you can request account verification. This means you may have to try and get in touch with them in other ways to request this. For this reason, our recommendation is that you weigh up the pros and cons of verifying Instagram, and only try if the positives outweigh the negatives.
Having a verified account is a sign of trust for most businesses. In a world where social media accounts number in the billions - you want it to be as clear and easy as possible for people to find you. Having that tick is a large step in achieving this.
For Facebook and YouTube, the effort required is minimal. This should be a priority for any school account.
For Twitter and Instagram, there are certainly variables and no guarantees to getting verified. However, we do not feel this should be a determent and our recommendation is to at least give it a go (Twitter in particular).
Have you tried to verify your accounts in the past or have any thoughts about this article? We'd love to hear your stories and thoughts. Please comment below.