In today’s digital-centric world, a business’s success heavily depends on its online visibility. The internet has become the primary platform where potential customers discover, evaluate, and decide on their purchases. As a result, highlighting your business’s attributes online with business annotations can help shape consumer purchasing decisions.
Business Annotations
With business annotations, advertisers can showcase specific aspects of their business directly in their ads and business profiles, such as services offered, location, and business identity. These annotations are designed to provide potential customers with more information about your business, encouraging higher engagement rates by making ads more informative and relevant. Business annotations can appear in various formats, including text or visual cues, and they are generated based on the information provided in your Google Merchant Center account and Microsoft Ads account settings.
Business Identity Attributes
A type of business annotation, business identity attributes include Asian-owned, Black-owned, disabled-owned, Indigenous-owned, Latino-owned, LGBTQ+-owned, veteran-owned, and women-owned, with the latest addition being small business. Applying these attributes helps users discover businesses with which they share values and wish to support and also significantly enhances your business’s visibility and appeal in the digital marketplace.
When you add business identity attributes, customers will see a small icon signifying that your business identifies as such when searching on the “Search,” “Maps,” and “Shopping” tabs on Google. Business identity attributes are optional and only available to retailers in the US. Below are examples of three businesses on the “Maps” tab that have implemented business identity attributes:
Customers can also filter for businesses using the identity attributes. For example, conscious-minded consumers who care about small companies can easily filter for small businesses on Google. The small business annotation shows on both the “Search” and “Maps” tabs but isn’t available on the “Shopping” tab.
Enable Business Identity Attributes on Google Shopping & Google My Business (GMB)
You can apply business identity attributes by editing your Google Merchant Center account.
- Click the gear icon in the top right corner.
- Select “Business information.”
- On the “About your business” tab, scroll down to the “Business identity attributes.”
- Select business identity attributes to enable this feature.
Google will review changes and ensure your business complies with the selected business identities. To qualify for the small business annotation, your business cannot be a franchise and must have revenue of less than $10 million. Google may automatically opt-in companies as a small business based on signals, such as offer price and web traffic.
Below are three examples of Google My Business profiles with business identify attributes enabled:
Enable Business Identity Attributes on Microsoft Advertising
Microsoft Advertising offers four categories of business attributes: inclusion, environmental, community responsibility, and accessibility.
You can apply these attributes by editing your Microsoft Ads account settings.
- Use the navigation menu on the left, and select “Settings.”
- Select the “Account level options” tab.
- Scroll down to the Business Attributes section.
- Select all business attributes that apply, and save.
In Microsoft, these attributes will only show in the “Search” results along with a text ad. Below is an example of a Microsoft ad highlighting an environmental business attribute with a small icon and text.
In our rapidly evolving digital landscape, online visibility for businesses is increasingly important. By leveraging business annotations and identity attributes in Google Shopping, Google My Business (GMB), and Microsoft Ads, businesses can profoundly enhance their digital footprint, making it easier for potential customers to discover, connect with, and support them. As the digital marketplace expands, utilizing these business annotations is crucial for standing out and fostering connections with your audience. Start incorporating these valuable business identity attributes into your digital strategy today to elevate your online presence and customer interaction.
