Google Authorship And The Importance To SEO

Posted on February 20, 2013 in SEO | 1 comment

While the race to get to the first page of popular search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing is on, there are always new algorithms being introduced by search engines to improve the accuracy of search results. The most popular search engine, Google, not too long ago introduced the Penguin and Panda updates to weed out a lot of websites out there that were using negative SEO techniques to gain ranking. So far the results from any SEO efforts has been that positive SEO will always be a long lasting solution to better search engine ranking. Those who use white hat SEO techniques will seldom be penalized when these new updates are rolled out by Google.

Say Goodbye to PageRank and Hello to Google Authorship

Regardless of which black and white animal update is launched next by Google, trust is becoming a bigger factor as each day passes. You may have heard about the importance of Google’s PageRank, which was used to decide how credible a website and its domain are. This PageRank technology is now slowly being overtaken by a new phenomenon called Google authorship. If you haven’t already heard about it, chances are that you have at least seen it in search engine results. You can see Google authorship results when a picture of an author pops up right beside a link in search results.

An Author’s Reputation on the Web Matters

Now the quality of content measured by search engines will not solely be based on a domain’s authority or web page. More preference will be given to a web page based on the authority and reputation of the person who has written the content. Google will derive a grade based on every author’s reputation on the web and it will then use it to rank web pages and list search engine results.

What the First Step Is

The regular way for any author on the internet to start with Google authorship is by creating a Google Plus profile. This profile will be the hub which will be used to tie in other pages an author has written on the web. Various snippets can be used on the profile but of course, the quality of content will matter a lot. The more engaging and dynamic the content is, the better ranking Google will allocate to the author.

Social Endorsements Count

Social endorsements will also count for a lot as the world shifts to social media for credibility checks on companies. So the more likes and +1’s a business has, the better Google will rank it on its results. This all may sound easy to do, however, there are a lot of different working components in this arena that have to be tied in together at the end. The social media aspect has to be taken care of and at the same time, any author’s ranking will not increase tenfold overnight. The process takes time, effort, and most importantly, knowledge about SEO. That’s why hiring help in this regard may enable a company to reach the coveted first page of Google.