Starting Wednesday, U.S. businesses may choose to self-identify as LGBTQ+ owned on Google. Only business owners who have a verified profile on the platform will be able to use the feature. Should they choose to activate it, their business will show up in search results for LGBTQ+ owned businesses. They will also be labeled as such in Google Maps.
Additionally, business owners who choose to use the feature will be able to “report negative or abusive reviews that you believe you’ve received as a result of identifying your business as owned by someone of the identity you’ve selected.”
“This builds on our previous work with the globally available LGBTQ+ friendly and transgender safespace attributes, and offers a more objective attribute that only businesses can add to their profiles,” said Google Product and Marketing Inclusion Lead Mackenzie Thomas.
