Tag Archive for: Twitter Blue

Twitter Blue Expands To Brands With Blue For Business

After a somewhat chaotic rollout for Twitter Blue Verified for standard users, the company is beginning the process of launching Blue for Business.

The new subscription option will distinguish verified businesses from verified individuals through a unique gold checkmark, square profile pictures, and the ability to link affiliated Twitter accounts.

Those who are linked as an affiliated account, such as accounts of employees, will be given a different badge next to their verified individual checkmark. 

For example, you can see the difference between the official Twitter account and the linked affiliated account for an employee below: 

Blue for Business example

It is unclear what other benefits Blue for Business accounts receive by subscribing – other than the ability to distinguish themselves from potential impersonators.

However, the announcement does describe some ways Twitter sees Blue for Business being used by brands:

“By creating this connection, we’re making it possible for businesses to create networks within their own organizations–on Twitter. Businesses can affiliate their leadership, brands, support handles, employees or teams. Journalists, sports team players or movie characters can all be affiliated. You name it, we got it. Each affiliate will be verified and officially linked to their parent handle based on a list provided by the parent business. We will share any new criteria, pricing or process as we update them.”

Currently, Blue for Business is limited to a pilot run of select accounts. It is expected to roll out broadly to brands that want to subscribe early next year. Most likely, we will learn more about exactly what the service has to offer brands other than verification.

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Twitter Relaunches Twitter Blue and Other Profile Verification Labels

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After a false start, Twitter is relaunching its verification system including the much-discussed Twitter Blue program. 

To distinguish those who are paying for verification from celebrities or well-known businesses, the new take on the system is also introducing unique labels for businesses and official accounts. 

During the initial rollout of the Twitter Blue system, there was a wave of confusion as parody accounts, trolls, and other bad actors were spending the $8 fee for Twitter Blue to impersonate public figures and companies. 

Following this confusion and complaints from several companies facing PR fiascos, Twitter CEO Elon Musk temporarily retracted the program. In theory, the new badges for official and business accounts, along with restrictions on who can apply for Twitter Blue, should help prevent bad actors from abusing the system. 

Below, we will get into what each badge stands for and who is eligible for each.

Twitter Verified (Twitter Blue) – Blue Checkmark

The classic blue checkmark will be available to users subscribing to the Twitter Blue verified program.

The program costs $8 per month if you subscribe through a web browser or $11 for those subscribing through the iOS app. Musk says the increased cost for Apple users is reflective of Apple’s commission on in-app purchases.

Along with the blue checkmark, Twitter Blue accounts will soon start receiving a number of benefits including:

  • Priority placement in replies, mentions, and search results
  • 50% fewer advertisements
  • The ability to edit tweets
  • The ability to publish longer videos

To be eligible, accounts must meet a number of criteria including:

  • Be Complete: Your account must include a display name and profile photo
  • Recent Activity: There must be activity on the account in the last 30 days
  • Established: Accounts must be older than 90 days and include a phone number for verification
  • Non-Deceptive: Twitter must find no signs of deceptive activity on your account, including signs of platform manipulation or spam.

Verified Businesses – Gold Checkmark

While verified businesses or public figures used to share the blue checkmark, they will now be distinguished with a gold checkmark. The intent is to prevent confusion between individuals paying for verification and brands established on the platform. 

For now, brands that already have a blue checkmark will see their badge automatically converted to the gold option. However, Twitter’s product lead, Esther Crawford, says the company will soon be opening up portals for businesses to apply for gold checkmarks.

Important Verified Figures – “Official” Labels

Lastly, the social network is granting important public figures an “Official” label next to their account names. This label will be applied to all of the following types of accounts:

  • Government accounts
  • Political organizations (such as parties) 
  • Commercial companies & business partners
  • Major brands
  • Media outlets

For more, explore the new Help Center page for profile labels.

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Twitter Reveals New Features Including A Long Awaited Edit Button

Twitter has revealed several long-awaited features this week, including new ways to filter the content on your timeline, the ability to limit who can see your tweets to a specific group, and even the ability to edit tweets.

Let’s explore what each feature does in detail and when you might see it in your feed below:

Topic-Focused Timelines

Twitter is publicly testing new timeline options for users which will gather content related to recent events or themes. 

Though the feature was previewed earlier this year, users finally saw the first example of one of these topic-focused timelines on August 24th around the airing of ABC’s “The Bachelorette”. 

While some are calling these “custom timelines”, these topic-focused timelines will be generated via Twitter’s content algorithms using a combination of search terms, usernames, topics, and manual curation. 

Twitter Circles

The social network is introducing a new way to limit who can see specific tweets.

Twitter Circles allow you to select a number of specific users who will be able to see specific tweets that other users cannot. 

The most obvious use of this feature will be letting public figures publish more casual or personal tweets to their close friends while still maintaining a professional appearance for most users. 

Additionally, brands might use Twitter Circles to give access to an exclusive group of up to 150 followers – potentially delivering exclusive promotions or product sneak peeks. 

Edit Published Tweets

After years of requests from users, Twitter has confirmed it is finally testing an edit feature that would let users change the contents of their tweets for up to 30 minutes after posting. 

The company announced the test via a tweet, though a since-published blog post provided more details about how the feature will work and who will have access.

As the blog post says:

“We’re hoping that, with the availability of Edit Tweet, tweeting will feel more approachable and less stressful,” Twitter said in the blog post. “You should be able to participate in the conversation in a way that makes sense to you, and we’ll keep working on ways that make it feel effortless to do just that.”

Once edited, tweets will also include a timestamp, icon, and label indicating it has been updated.

While the feature is hotly anticipated, users may be disappointed to hear that the edit button will be limited to paying Twitter Blue subscribers – at least initially. 

The company says its next stage of testing will give early access to subscribers so that Twitter can monitor how the edit feature is used by the public.

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Leaked Previews Detail The Upcoming Twitter Paid Subscription Service

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New data extracted from the Twitter app gives us the clearest picture so far of what the company’s upcoming subscription service will look like when it reaches the world. 

Rumors have swirled for quite some time that the company was planning to launch a paid service, which was confirmed earlier this year. However, pretty much nothing has been known about what features would be included, it’s pricing, or even the name of the subscription service. 

Information pulled by reverse engineering expert Jane Manchun Wong may potentially change that, though. 

In a series of Tweets, Wong revealed the service is tentatively being called “Twitter Blue” and will offer prices starting at $2.99 a month. 

She also revealed the service will include the ability to “undo” sent tweets, manage bookmarked tweets, and access to ad-free news articles. 

All of this information is subject to change until an official announcement is made, but here’s what we know about the paid features currently. 

Undo Sent Tweets

Obviously, it is pretty much impossible to completely remove something from the internet once it’s out there. Still, Twitter wants to give you the next best thing. 

With the undo sent tweets feature, the social network will give users a short chance to rethink what they are about to send out to the world.

When enabled, the feature delays the publishing of your tweet for about 6-seconds after hitting Post. This gives you the extra chance to look over your tweet for any typos or reconsider publishing something incendiary. 

This means literally no one will have the chance to see impulsive, poorly written, or incomplete tweets if you hit undo within the short time window. 

Bookmarks Collections

Twitter Blue seems set to also offer users the ability to organize and manage their Twitter bookmarks into separate folders. 

Currently, bookmarked tweets are all put into a single “Bookmarks” list. This means the feature unfortunately becomes less effective the more you use it, as it gets harder to find what you are looking for in your growing list of saved content. 

With Collections, users will be able to keep their increasing bookmarks collection organized and easy to search through. This also opens the potential to being able to share Collections with others in the future, similar to creating and sharing pinboards on Pinterest. 

Ad-Free News Articles

Following Twitter’s recent acquisition of Scroll, it has been widely assumed the social network planned to integrate the news service into its paid subscriptions. 

Wong’s discoveries confirm this, with ad-free news offered to higher-tier paid users.

The reason for the heightened cost is that Twitter plans to share revenue with publishers on the news platform – making the service a win-win for both readers and publishers alike.

Given where the data was pulled from, it seems likely we are getting close to the official public reveal of Twitter Blue to the world. Until then, however, Wong has given us a glimpse into just what Twitter is planning for its upcoming subscription service.

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