Now is a better time than ever to be a content marketer, and part of reason is because of Google’s AuthorRank. We are all-too-aware of the vast amount of content circulating the web and the difficulties associated with standing out amongst the competition in search results. For this reason, content marketers are constantly researching new and improved methods to increase their search engine rankings and traffic. Google’s Authorship markup could alleviate some of these challenges and could potentially become the new backlink.
AuthorRank helps content creators publicly connect their content to the websites or blogs their work appears on. By connecting authors with their websites and blogs, Google eliminates the people anonymously gaming the system in order to rank better — discouraging black hat SEO tactics. An authors content will be sorted in search results based on their authority and reputation. Verified content by an author will then be graded by Google and sorted into the results. For example, this is a screen shot of what showed up when I typed the title of my latest blog post into Google search:
I think it looks pretty slick. Personally, I’d be more tempted to click on a link that has the authors name, photo, and social connection, than click on a link that has none of the above. Wouldn’t you? In order to get started with your own Google Authorship so your content shows up in results like the example above, you will need to run through a few steps. The Google Webmaster team clairifies the process quite nicely in the video below:
AuthorRank could definitely be viewed as a sneaky way for people to use Google+, but it still doesn’t eliminate the fact that it will help your posts stand out in SERPs. Not to mention, I have a sneaky suspicion that Google will be incorporating AuthorRank into their ranking algorithm in the not-too-distant future. It totally makes sense on Google’s part to implement this. People want to read content from others who are credible and knowledgeable – AuthorRank will help bring the two together.
Here is a list of 7 reasons you should implement authorship markup:
- All the great content that you have produced from different sites will be gathered together in the search result pages (SERPs).
- It reduces the risk of your content from being plagiarized.
- Your picture alongside your content in the SERPs will help your article stand out amongst your competition and will strengthen your branding and recognition.
- Increased website search engine optimization performance.
- Content with author attribution have higher Click through rates, correlating to increased traffic to your website.
The implementation of AuthorRank will help level the playing field between huge brands with big corporate budgets, and small businesses. The big brands with huge link building budgets won’t necessarily have the upper hand anymore when it comes to ranking in the top 10 of the Search Engine Results Pages. What WILL matter are the people creating great content — the devoted folks who create something worth sharing every day. If I were you, I’d stay ahead of the curve and set yours up today!