*Update: Google Authorship is encouraged and supported at MyBlogGuest*
The idea of today’s chat was to look at various “possible” implications of “AuthorRanks” and various ways to rank people. However after some research of related papers around the web, I have come to conclusion, there will be too much “what if” for one chat.
Let’s not go too far from reality and create a handy reference guide where you can go as deep as you want.
Author Rank: Advanced Reading
For those who are interested to go more indepth, you are more than welcome to. Here are two related papers that use people and connections between them to rank content:
- {Paper 1} PeopleRank: Social Opportunistic Forwarding (pdf)
- {Paper 2} AuthorRank: Ranking Improvement for the Web
Author Rank: Google Patents
Speaking of Google, its AgentRank patent is not new at all. For those of you who are interested in the evolution of the patent, here is the timeline:
- 2007: Google publishes “AgentRank patent” and suggests using “digital signature” to assign the content to authors;
- 2009 and 2011: Two more similar patents are published, very similar in nature, also talking about “digital signatures” but the 2011 version applies “portable” digital signature, that is the one “not fixed to the site”. That most likely means a “third-party” service that is used to assign content to the author no matter where the author publishes his/her content.
- 2011: Google publishes “Author Badges” patent that suggests a complex algorithm of creating a badge for the author to attach to content he/she creates. The interesting part of the patent is that the badge can be used to protect authors against content theft as it can “detect and protect against revision of content after it has been posted by a person or entity.”
The number of times Google returns to “AuthorRank” again and again shows how seriously Google is taking the topic.
Author Rank: Claiming Your Content
Speaking of digital signatures, we now have two ways to assign our content (be it content hosted on our site or content hosted outside, i.e. *guest posts*) to our author names:
- Using your email address at your domain (the steps are described here). Obviously, it’s better fit for the sites you own.
- Using the identity service, i.e. Google Plus account “Contribute to” section links to your “Author page” or to your content on any domain and each of those articles links back to your Google Plus profile with rel=author at the end.
Author Rank: Benefits
- Official Google Statement: “We are not using the data yet but we are collecting it”
- The best benefit you get NOW: Better click-through from Google SERPs thanks to people seeing (and recognizing) your photo. Here’s a case study and here’s another quick case study that actually relates to me 🙂 (I guess we’ll talk more on Google Plus avatar in January)
Author Rank: Official Tools
- Use Rich Snippets Testing Tool to see if you have set up your authorship correctly
- Use “Author Stats” inside your Google Webmaster Tools to identify (1) your most viewed, (2) your most clicked, and (3) your best ranked articles about various domains where you have claimed your content at:
If you can never have enough:
- The ultimate list of Google Authorship resources by @RavenJeremy;
- Lots of insight by of @marktraphagen: Authorship and Author Rank
Next week, 11 am EST, we’ll have our PUSH chat featuring best guest articles of December. We’ll learn by examples!
Joseph
Latest posts by Joseph (see all)
- Chatting Guest Blogging at #Pitchboxchat - December 19, 2018
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- Ann Smarty Talking Influencer Marketing at #BW_Chat Twitter Chat - February 26, 2016
Mark Traphagen
Thanks for linking to my Google Authorship and Author Rank posts!
Azujoint
This is one great feature of Google plus over other social networks. but how can one manage his/her google authorship if he/she has so many websites and gmail accounts?
Ann Smarty
One should try and consolidate (or pick the main one!)