Google is rolling out verification badges to Google+ users who qualify as celebrities, public figures, or those who have simply been added to a lot of circles (though they do not specify how many circles this requires). But fret not. That’s just the beginning.
Google’s Wen-Ai Yu writes in a Google+ post, “For now, we’re focused on verifying public figures, celebrities, and people who have been added to a large number of Circles, but we’re working on expanding this to more folks.”
Here’s a video she shared talking about this:
“Many celebrities and public figures are joining Google+, and if you’re like me, you want to be sure the person you’re adding to a circle is really who they claim to be,” she says.
No dispute there.
Some celebrities have had a little trouble keeping their G+ account up and running in the past (see William Shatner).
Getting people to add others to circles is obviously an important factor in continued Google+ user engagement. And nobody is going to get more followers than celebrities and public figures, so it makes sense that they would start the verification process here.
Celebrity use has been huge for Twitter’s growth (and probably hasn’t hurt Facebook’s either). Verified celebs and the recent addition of games should be tremendously helpful for Google to keep people coming back to their Google+ accounts.