You have probably noticed that Google search results often show the details of an article’s author as part of the organic result. You can take steps to achieve this for yourself by following Google’s instructions, but then there’s no guarantee when (or if) your name and thumbnail will show up. These instructions will tell you how to set it up, then I advise you to investigate further using the troubleshooting link at the bottom.
Sort out your Google Profile
The first thing you need to do is have a Google+ Profile with a good recognisable headshot as your profile photo. Then you have to associate your content with your profile. You can do that one of two ways.
Option 1: Use a verified email address to link your content to your Google+ Profile
For this to work, you need to have an email address that’s on the same domain name as the site where your content is published. Each article you publish on the website must have a clear byline such as ‘By Joe Blogs’. Verify the email address in your Google+ Profile (you can do that here)
Option 2: Link your Google+ profile to your content
Make sure your web page has a link to your G+ profile using the “rel=author” attribute, like this:
<a href=”https://plus.google.com/110634793618892944838?rel=author”>My Google+ Profile</a>
You could add that into your biography field in your WordPress profile, for example, or just manually on the page somewhere. Note that the rel=author parameter is what helps Google associate your blog content with you.
Go to the ‘Contributor To’ section of your Google+ Profile by editing the profile. Select ‘Add a custom link’ and enter the URL of the website you are linking your author profile to. Save it.
Now test to make sure it’s all correct
Google Webmaster Tools offers a rich snippets testing tool. Rich snippets are those additional pieces of information that Google displays with search results – such as the number of reviews, map info or author information. Go to the Rich Snippets Testing Tool and type in the URL of one of the pages for which you should be identified as author. If Google tells you all is well, you are good to go, BUT you may not see your face appearing in search results for some time or at all. Google is not informative about the ‘when’ or the ‘why not’ but you can try some further reading here.
Read the previous articles in this series
1. How to write a blog: Knowing your audience
2. How to write a blog: Hatching article ideas
3. How to write a blog: Headlines that work
4. How to write a blog: Content promotion
Steve Masters
Steve started professional life as a magazine journalist, working on music magazines and women’s titles before becoming a web editor in 1997, then joining MSN to work purely in online publishing. Since 1999 he has worked for and consulted to a broad range of businesses about their online marketing. Steve is a Campaign Delivery Manager for Red Rocket Media.
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