This is a shortened version of my talk for Cardiff Internet, carried out the following day for colleagues at Box UK. Just like the main talk, it covers rel="author" and includes information on its benefits, how to implement it and even contained a live demo showing implementation via WordPress and the Yoast SEO plugin.
Copy & paste this link to see a screen capture video of the live implementation demo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RVg9-5tqjIU
Uneak White's Personal Brand Exploration Presentation
Getting Your Face In Google | Box UK Tech Talk
1. Getting Your Face In Google
rel="author" implementation – Box UK Tech Talk
2. What is rel="author"?
Introduced: June 2011
Type of markup in the form of a rel attribute
In short: it ties your Google+ profile to pages/posts
that you’ve authored
11. “Within search results, information tied to
verified online profiles will be ranked
higher than content without such
verification, which will result in most
users naturally clicking on the top
(verified) results. The true cost of
remaining anonymous, then, might be
irrelevance.” (emphasis added)
Eric Schmidt
Executive Chairman, Google
From his upcoming book:
The New Digital Age
Scrooge McSchmidt image source:
http://www.siliconbeachtraining.co.uk/blog/eric-schmidt-google-verification/
12. How do you implement rel="author"?
Google recommends two ways on its Support page:
Author information in search results
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1408986
13. Link Google+ using a
1 verified email address
So for http://seono.co.uk...
Email address on the same domain:
e.g. steve@seono.co.uk
+
“a clear byline identifying you as the author
(for example, "By Steve Morgan")”
Pros: Easy to do!
Cons: Only works for sites where you have an
email address (e.g. your own blog)
+ unreliable (not guaranteed)
14. 2 Add the ?rel=author link parameter
On any post you write,
add a link to your Google+ profile with
?rel=author at the end of the URL, e.g.
https://plus.google.com/109807087957970967076?rel=author
Pros: Requires a little more effort, but…
Cons: Google takes it as a much stronger hint!
15. 3 Code in the page header
*Not recommended!*
Google no longer suggests this as a
method of implementation
(...but it’s still good to know)
Put this in the <head> section of a page:
<link href="https://plus.google.com/[yourpageID]"
rel="author" />
Pros: Easy on to do site-wide!
Cons: Gets messy if it’s a multi-author blog
16. Also…
Add the site to the
‘Contributor to’ section of
your Google+ profile’s
About page:
17. Test it!
Check it’s working with Google’s
Rich Snippets Preview Tool:
http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets
20. Track it!
Get (rough) impression/click data from
Google Webmaster Tools
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/labs-author-stats-1
Home > Labs > Author stats
21.
22. Additional reading:
The ultimate rel="author" implementation guide (IMO):
http://www.blindfiveyearold.com/how-to-implement-rel-author
A case study I’ve written – what happened when I had
two authors attached to one page:
http://seono.co.uk/2013/02/20/confusing-google-a-rel-author-case-study/
In summary: bad things happened…!
23. Any questions?
(Kudos to Gafyn, Craig and Dayle for volunteering
their blogs for the implementation demo!)