Since as early as 2005, Google has expressed interest – through various patents and interview comments – to establish a ranking factor that takes authors, or “agents,” into account when returning content in the SERPs.
Today, Google Authorship ties a personal Google+ profile to published content in order to establish AuthorRank. The result is a world where content written by established experts carries the most authority and ranks higher than content with less-credible authorship or no authorship whatsoever.
There are many benefits to companies establishing authorship and building the AuthorRank of their employees. However, there are equally compelling reasons for employees to care about building their AuthorRank:
1. Ownership
For marketers who work in client services, so much of the content you produce for clients is either completely ethereal or never credited to you. For non-marketers, blogging may be the only opportunity to create something tangible.
Even if the content you produce gets published under your name, without establishing authorship, content that you spend your valuable time creating isn’t tied to you – only the platform it is published on (which is most likely your employer’s blog).
Claim ownership of this content by establishing authorship, and gain credibility and AuthorRank through frequent publishing.
2. Personal Branding
As your AuthorRank grows, so too will traffic to your blog posts and your Google+ profile. Not only will your follower counts across all active social networks grow, but so will your reputation as a subject-matter expert – which can open the door to speaking events and earned media mentions.
3. Job Security
As your personal brand reputation and AuthorRank grows, you will become an invaluable asset to your employer. Your heavily trafficked content will generate leads and increase the brand standing of your company. Every business should have a handful of public-facing thought leaders – why shouldn’t it be you?
The best way to get started is to blog prolifically and make sure authorship is set up on the website you’re publishing on.
For more information about AuthorRank and setting up authorship, check out this excellent and comprehensive guide to Google Authorship Resources from Jeremy Rivera over at Raven Tools.
Steven Shattuck
@stevenshattuck
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Tags: AuthorRank, Authorship
