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What’s the one online platform where you can find an answer to all your questions? Well, we are sure your mind went straight to Wikipedia. Being the biggest encyclopedia on the internet, Wikipedia is considered one of the most reliable and most authentic sources of information on the web.
No matter whatever you are looking for, Wikipedia will have an answer for you. It is among the top 15 most visited sites on the internet and reaches over 20 billion views annually. The site is not restricted to any geographical location or a particular set audience but it is for all! No matter wherever you are on the globe or what language you speak or what age group or gender you belong to, you can find your answers on Wikipedia.
The best part about Wikipedia is that not only does it allow everyone to view but also to edit and publish an article on the web. So, whether you want to create a Wikipedia page for yourself or your business, you can do it. All you need to do is follow the Wikipedia guidelines to its core.
Answering the Ultimate Question: Why Do I Need To Create a Wikipedia Page for My Business?
If you are among those business owners who keep wondering “why do I need to create a Wikipedia page for my business?” we have got the answers for you. As we mentioned, Wikipedia is one of the most viewed sites on the internet, it provides you a larger ground to reach out to a global audience and boost your brand awareness.
Having a Wikipedia page for your business will help you add credibility to your brand because if you do a few searches, you will find all the big businesses or companies listed on Wikipedia. For example, Tesla Inc., Apple Inc., McDonald’s, etc.
Moreover, Wikipedia is one of the highest-ranked websites on search engines, so if your business has a Wikipedia page, there is a good chance that it will be shown at the top of the search results for your relevant keyword. Also, do not confuse Wikipedia as a marketing platform, it is an information source. Your goal with your Wikipedia page is not lead generation or boosting sales, it is to increase your brand’s visibility on the web and bring credibility to it.
All in all, if you think creating your business’s Wikipedia page is not necessary, you might need to think again because a business’s success is not just determined by the number of sales it makes but also by the level of recognition it reaches on a global platform.
A Step-By-Step Approach to How to Create a Wikipedia Page for Your Company
One of the most asked questions by many business owners on the internet is how to make a Wikipedia page for my company? While there are many ways to do it, we bring you a step-by-step guide to help you understand how to make a Wikipedia page for your business. This guide aims to answer all your queries about creating your business’s Wikipedia page in contrast with the rules identified by Wikipedia!
Step 1: Make Your Wikipedia Account
When looking for ways to create a Wikipedia page for your business, keep in mind that you can’t start with Wikipedia page creation for your business until you have a registered Wikipedia account. Because as per the policy of Wikipedia, only registered and verified Wikipedia accounts can publish or edit Wikipedia pages.
The process of creating a Wikipedia account is as simple as creating any other social media account. Click on the create account tab on the Wikipedia page, and fill in the relevant information. Make sure you add a verified email because Wikipedia will verify your account through that. It is also advised to use a human name to create an account because it brings the element of authenticity required in account verification. Using irrelevant names might also recognize as suspicious and can cause problems in Wikipedia’s account verification.
Add CAPTCHA and confirm your email address by following the confirmation link sent to your email address, and there you have your account ready. Get back on Wikipedia and log in to your account for further actions.
Step 2: Identify Your Target Audience
The next step on the ladder of how to create a Wikipedia page for a business is identified as defining your target audience. Before you start with “what and how” you must answer “for who” to achieve your goals. You must be fully aware of which groups of people are going to be reading your article and what they can achieve from it.
For example, if your business categorizes in the female fashion industry, your target audience would be women looking for fashion items. So, with that in mind, you will be able to create a page that attracts them. This can be achieved by adding creativity and uniqueness to your content that would directly impact female fashion choices for your readers and they will look into your brand when they need to make a purchase.
For example, the Louis Vuitton Wikipedia page is targeted toward both men and women interested in some high-end fashion products. Take a look at the outline and it will help you understand how they used their brand’s information to increase their brand recognition among their target audience.
Step 3: Prove Your Existence
What are the first few things that you do as you enter the business world? Create a position for your business in the market, run marketing, and advertising campaigns to let people know you exist and use guest posting or hire affiliate marketers to create a digital reputation for your business.
Similarly, when you bring your business to Wikipedia for the first time, you need to prove to Wikipedia that your business exists on the web and has reliable online visibility. That’s the only way Wikipedia will allow your business page creation as per Wikipedia notability policy.
Now, you might wonder how you can increase your brand’s notability on Wikipedia, well, the easiest way to do this is to practice editing on Wikipedia. Search for relevant Wikipedia pages to your business industry and try to edit a few aspects in relation to your specific business.
To be eligible to create a Wikipedia page for your company, you will need at least 7 verified sources to address the visibility of your business. Moreover, make sure that the edits you are making are not too biased towards your business because then you might have to deal with Wikipedia COI editing errors.
Step 4: Create Your Business Page
Once you have surpassed Wikipedia’s notability requirements, the next step in your how to create a Wikipedia page for a business guide is to create your business page. This process is further divided into two simple steps for your ease;
1. Find the Red Link
We are sure your business would have a unique name that is also defined as your brand identity, but what if there’s already a Wikipedia page with the same name? In this case, Wikipedia will not allow the creation of your page and will show you a blue link which would mean it can’t be used.
To move forward with your business page creation, you need to achieve the red link on Wikipedia which would mean that the name you are looking for is unique and available, which means there is a possibility of Wikipedia page creation with your given business name.
However, chances of getting a blue link for your business’s Wikipedia page are quite rare considering all businesses have a unique name. But there is a possibility that a business running on the west side of the world might have a similar name to an east side business. In that case, whoever creates the Wikipedia page first, will get the red link and the other one might have to edit the name.
2. Request for Page Creation
If you are successfully able to generate a red link for your business, the next step is to create a Wikipedia page for your company would be to click on the “ask for the page to be created” (you can see the link in the above image) and there, Wikipedia will create your business page. Now, you can get started with drafting your article for the page!
Step 5: Get On Article Wizard or Sandbox
Hang on, you are almost there! You have successfully passed the first phase of the creation of your business page on Wikipedia, now all you have to do is draft your article and publish the page live on Wikipedia.
Go to the Article Wizard page on Wikipedia that will direct you to an empty text page, where you can write the content you want to add to your Wikipedia page. However, what you will be adding to Article Wizard will be the final draft of your article, so, if you need to do a practice run before finalizing, go to the Wikipedia Sandbox. At Sandbox you have a free hand over editing, rewriting, checking errors, etc.
Step 6: Generate Optimized Content
Whether you are writing directly to the Wikipedia Article Wizard or Sandbox or you are practicing in an offline file and later on uploading the content, the one thing that needs to be checked on is content optimization. Google and other search engines rank articles based on their content optimization. This is one reason why Wikipedia’s page is always shown at the top of the search results for any specific keyword.
For example, consider the following example of the google search for “Elon Musk,” you can see that a link to the Wikipedia page is the first one shown in the results.
The reason behind this is that the content published by Wikipedia is always highly SEO optimized. This means the inclusion of relevant keywords, internal and external linking, the addition of headings and subheadings, and improved readability of the content.
Pro Tip: Get a Professional Content Writer
If you are a little inexperienced in terms of writing content and have an un-cleared mind on SEO, the best way to produce SEO-optimized content for your Wikipedia page is by hiring a professional SEO Content writer to do the service. This way you will not have to worry about getting your content optimized or writing it at all, you can just direct your requirements to the writer and they will be responsible for your content!
Step 7: List down Your Citations
Being an Encyclopedia, Wikipedia does not allow any information that has no reliable source to back it up. It does not support original content so whatever you are uploading on your Wikipedia page, must have a backup source to verify the credibility of the information.
Moreover, it is highly important to cite all the sources you are using throughout your content and also at the end of the article. The more references you use, the more credible and notable your page would be.
Also, make sure you follow the format for citation that is identified by Wikipedia Citation guidelines, most commonly the Harvard format of citation is used in referencing sources on Wikipedia, but there is an option to use MLA or APA format citations.
Step 8: Submit For Approval
Coming to the last step in your journey to create a Wikipedia page for your company, the submission. This will be the last thing you would have to do and then Wikipedia will do its work. However, keep in mind that getting your page approved by Wikipedia is no child’s play. It takes time, and everything needs to be checked out according to the guidelines set by Wikipedia. Your page is tested based on three basic elements, notability, credibility, and reliability.
If Wikipedia finds any breach of policy guidelines, it would reject your page which will result in failure of publication.
Make Your Business Page Prepared For Wikipedia Tests
As we mentioned earlier that Wikipedia runs a brief set of tests on your page content before providing approval for page publication, it is better to prepare your business page beforehand so there’s less risk for rejection.
When your page passes all of these tests, there’s no stopping from being on Wikipedia, so, with learning how to make a Wikipedia page for a business, also learn how to make it worthy to pass the Wikipedia eligibility tests.
- Notability Test
No matter whether you are creating a page for your business, or your own profile, Wikipedia runs a notability test on all the user-request in order to make sure the page being requested covers the contents that has online visibility. If your Wikipedia page does not check out with the notability standards set by Wikipedia, it will be rejected right away and you will have to do it all over again. So, before you set to start a page for your business on Wikipedia, you must get your business mentioned on reliable internet resources such as business magazines, press releases, etc.
- Verifiability Test
The second test that plays a vital role in influencing your Wikipedia approval is the reference verifiability test. Wikipedia has a very strict policy when it comes to checking up citations and references. Each link that you add to your Wikipedia page is double-checked by Wikipedia, whether it be a reference from a book, a journal, a newsletter, or a press release, if it is added to your Wikipedia page, it will be checked. This is really important because often many people use fake references to add weight to their content. So, this tactic will not work with Wikipedia and if you try to use a fake one, Wikipedia will reject your page right away. This could also result in getting your account blocked for citing fake sources.
The Bottom Line
Having a Wikipedia page for your business is absolutely necessary for the growth of your brand recognition and increased online visibility. It is an opportunity to spread the word for your business to a global audience. However, we do understand that with Wikipedia’s specific guidelines, you might find it hard and hectic to go through the complete process to create a Wikipedia page for your company. How about we do it for you? Contact us now at Wiki Specialist Inc. and let us take care of everything for you and your business so you can focus on the other aspects to run a successful business!
FAQ’s
Step 1: Make Your Wikipedia Account
Step 2: Identify Your Target Audience
Step 3: Prove Your Existence
Step 4: Create Your Business Page
Step 5: Get On Article Wizard or Sandbox
Step 6: Generate Optimized Content
Step 7: List down Your Citations
Step 8: Submit For Approval
