As a small business owner, you probably devote much time to attracting new customers and improving cash flow.
Several traditional approaches may help your business achieve these goals, such as marketing, advertising, sales training, and more. However, there are other strategies that you might not have considered before that could give your business the extra leg up it needs.
Companies often overlook one potential path to growth: becoming a verified business. Verification powers smarter business decisions and can give you access to many valuable perks. Read on to discover five meaningful ways that your business could benefit from being verified by Markaaz.
Verification increases visibility. No matter what types of products or services your business offers, you need customers to purchase them from you. As a supplier, becoming a verified small business can make it easier for potential customers and business partners to find you amid a dynamic and often cluttered digital landscape.
Here’s a real-life example of how being a verified business could help you. Larger companies frequently contract with or onboard small businesses to demonstrate supplier diversity. In some cases, these big corporations must work with a certain percentage of small business vendors to fulfill contract requirements (think federal government contracts here). If your verified small business is more visible online, such opportunities may become more accessible to you.
Additionally, being verified by Markaaz can help you communicate who you are and your values to the outside world. This makes it easier for like-minded companies to find you, engage with you, and do business with you.
1. Verification builds credibility and trust.
Not knowing who you can trust online is a real and significant problem that many businesses face. Supplier fraud is rampant, especially for small businesses. Almost 40% of business fraud starts from outside forces, such as vendors or suppliers. And when companies rely on Google searches and other online research to verify potential suppliers, the risk of fraud only increases.
As a result, having a business that’s highly visible online isn’t sufficient. Just because other companies can find you easily doesn’t mean they will feel comfortable working with you or purchasing your products. Verification, however, is different and can be a powerful tool to help your business overcome these reservations.
When you activate your business with Markaaz, you undergo several essential verification checks, including:
- Know Your Business (KYB)
- Know Your Customer (KYC)
- Anti-Money Laundering (AML)
- ID Verification
Activating your business with Markaaz can empower you to securely share your business details, like your company’s legal name and address, ownership structure, articles of incorporation, tax information, licenses, credentials, permits, and more. In addition, Markaaz can also give you and potential partners access to your business risk score created together with Equifax.
Completing these steps can communicate to customers, other businesses, and even lenders that your company is trustworthy and verified to the highest standards.
2. Verification can save time and money.
Becoming a verified business also has the potential to save you time and money. When your business is verified, you may:
- Shorten the vendor onboarding process. As a business that’s ‘verified by Markaaz,’ you can avoid the need to re-credential each time you begin working with a new company. Instead of having yourself or a staff member tied up with repetitive verification tasks, you can dedicate those valuable person-hours to something more profitable.
- Reduce the risk of fraud and cybercrime. Fraud happens to many businesses, but it can be incredibly costly for smaller organizations. According to the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners (ACFE), small companies lose nearly twice as much money per fraud scheme, with a median loss per incident of $200,000.
- Make supplier searches faster. Markaaz saves small businesses an average of 255 minutes, or over 4 hours, per supplier search. When you’re trying to stand out from the competition, making it faster and easier for potential customers to find you can go a long way to them selecting you.
3. Verification can give you a competitive advantage.
No matter what types of products or services your business offers, chances are high that another company offers something similar. Most businesses have competitors. Therefore, it’s critical to find effective ways to stand out from among the crowd.
Verification is one way your business can gain an advantage over non-verified companies. You can even display a “verified by Markaaz” badge on your website to build credibility and become more attractive to those who might hire you or purchase from you.
Another opportunity you have to set your business apart takes place within the Markaaz Directory itself. Markaaz boasts a robust network of more than 119 million small businesses—making it dramatically easier to connect with trusted suppliers.
As activated businesses, you receive priority placement in the platform’s search results. How can priority placement help you? If someone is looking for a company that does what you do or supplies what you supply, being verified may place you near the top of the list. In a digital sense, it’s all about location, location, location.
4. Verification leads to better business relationships.
As important as attracting new customers and business partners may be, nurturing the relationships you have already established may matter even more. Strong supplier relationships, in particular, can prove to be successful for businesses both small and large.
When you take the time to verify your business, you make it easier for those you contract with to build trust and confidence in your partnership. Those partners can also use Markaaz to monitor your business (as you can monitor them) on an ongoing basis.
How to verify your business
Markaaz makes it simple for small businesses to get verified and verify their suppliers. The platform offers best-in-class technology with business risk scoring created together with Equifax, so small businesses make supplier decisions with greater confidence.
There is no cost for your business to become verified by Markaaz.
With Markaaz, each member undergoes the same verification process. This ensures that every business and user on Markaaz is secure, helping you minimize credit risk and maximize profits.
Fabi Hubschmid, Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder, Markaaz
About the author: Fabi Hubschmid is the Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder of Markaaz, the world’s first and only global platform to verify and connect every small business on the planet and the network of partners that support them. Hubschmid is an entrepreneur with global experience in the platform, construction, and smart cities industry with a track record in global and complex transformations across private and public sectors. Before co-founding Markaaz, Hubschmid was Strategic Development Officer for AXA’s Global Enterprise & Partnerships, Founder & CEO of the Enix Advisory, Tutor for the ‘Beyond Smart City’ course of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and a member of PwC’s Global Smart Cities Team. The Markaaz team is developing the next generation of tools and resources for small businesses. Hubschmid is focused on creating a positive and sustainable impact for small business owners. Hubschmid is a member of the WEF Global Innovators and Global Shapers and the Young Entrepreneur Council (YEC).
