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Rel="Author" and Your Google Profile: A Simple SEO Trick

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Claim Authorship of Your Content, Beat Plagiarism

Use the rel="author" tag to help people find your content, to boost your traffic, and to protect your content from plagiarists, scrapers, and copycats. If Google likes your content, it'll put your author icon next to your pages in search results (example, left), which makes your link stand out so that it attracts more clicks!

If you consistently write original, useful content that people link to, you'll start to build up authority -- "AuthorRank," as Google's Matt Cutts put it. This "AuthorRank" may help your pages rank better in Google search results, bringing them more traffic. At the very least, implementing rel="author" and its companion tag re="me" correctly will ensure that Google lists your content ahead of any scrapers or copycats who have stolen it.

Image credits: File and v-card icons in this article are from Pixel-Mixer.com.

rel="author" Explained

The HTML equivalent of luggage tags labeling your stuff

how to add rel=author to linksrel="author" has been around for HTML for years, but at first, only web geeks used it.

To use it, you need two things:

  • An "author" page: it could be a bio, a member profile, an "About the Author" page on your blog, or any sort of mini-page on you.
  • Content you've written.
Somewhere on each page of content, credit yourself as the author. In that credit byline, link back to your author page and label that link with the rel="author" tag. For example:

by <a href="http://www.squidoo.com/lensmasters/Greekgeek" rel="author">Greekgeek</a>

You don't have to use your real name (although you may) as the author. You're simply identifying all the content written under that username.

***On Squidoo (and Hubpages), you do NOT have to do this step: each lens automatically does it for you with that author link in the bio box at upper right.***

rel="me" explained

Hooking your different user profiles together

Adding rel=meWhat if you have multiple user profiles, and you'd like to tell people and search engines about your content on other sites?

Then you need to link from each user profile page to each user profile page with a rel="me" tag, which means "that user profile over there is also me."

*** On Squidoo and many social media sites, there is a place in your Profile (My Settings > Profile) where you may enter links to your other profiles on Facebook, Twitter, Google. These links are rel="me" links, so all you have to do is fill them in.***

On blogs or other sites where there's not a spot to list your other profiles, you can do it manually if there's a spot on your profile's page to enter HTML:

<a href="http://greekgeek.hubpages.com" rel="me">Greekgeek on Hubpages</a>

Getting rel="author" Authenticated by Google

How to Prove You're Who You Say You Are!

My Google ProfileYou've probably noticed a problem. Anybody could slap rel="me" on one of their own user profiles and link to yours! Also, a competitor could write junk and spam, then link to your user profile with rel="author" to make you look bad.

So Google won't recognize -- "authenticate" -- authorship except when there's two-way links, reciprocal links, proving that you control both "ends" of these links. Also, Google demands that you make a Google Profile (Google+ OR an old Google profile like mine) with your name and photo. This last point is annoying: in order to get the Google gravy train, you have to abide by Google's notions of how the web should be, which don't include nom de plumes, privacy, or protection from that creepy ex.

Anyway. if you're willing to jump through Google's stupid hoops, there's TWO ways to set this up, depending on whether you have an author page (user profile, bio, "About Me", etc) on the same website as your content (preferred) or not.

OPTION 1:

User profile or "About Me" page on same site as your content.

rel=me with Author profile Page

OPTION 2:

Treat Google Profile as author page.

rel=me with Google profile Page



Let's tackle Option 1 first, since it's what works with Squidoo. Also, it's more likely to be recognized correctly not just by Google, but by mobile apps and any search engines. Rel="me" is supposed to point to author profiles, not content, so I don't like the hack Google has offered us with option two.

Using Rel="author" with Your Own Author Profile

Implementing rel="author" and rel="me" on Squidoo

rel='me' and rel='author' with Google profileI saw a promising Google traffic increase starting a few days after implementing the following. I can't be sure this was the reason for the uptick, but as much as Google's been pushing authorship lately, it's worth doing.

Summary of what we're trying to set up:
I. Link from content pages to author profile on the same website with rel="author"
II. Link from that author profile to our Google profile with rel="me"
III. Link from the Google profile link back to our author profile with rel="me"

(Squidoo users: SKIP to step 2; Squidoo does step 1 for you. I'm including this step for people using these instructions OUTSIDE of Squidoo. So please, stop asking about step 1 on Squidoo! :) )



 
Step-by-step, in more detail:
  • 1(Squidoo users: SKIP to Step 2. Squidoo does step 1 for you automatically in the Bio Box.)

    On the same website with your content, you must have a member profile, author profile, or "About" page. Link ALL your posts and content to that page using a rel="author" link. For example, you could put this in the footer:

    by <a href="http://www.myblog.com/about" rel="author">Hypatia Q. Squidbottom</a>

    Wordpress users: if your posts have a "by so-and-so" author credit line, you can add rel="author" to that link. To edit the code for single posts, go here on your dashboard: Appearance > Editor > Single Post. For more guidance, see my links to other people's Wordpress / rel="author" tutorials below.
  • 2You MUST have a Google Profile. It doesn't have to be Google+, but your Google profile must include your real name and a photo of yourself. Boo Google for hating on pseudonyms!
  • 3Edit the links on the "About" section of your Google profile. Add a link to your author page (on Squidoo, your lensmaster profile) and click the "Other Profiles" section (which adds rel="me" automatically). For example:

    Google profile links to Squidoo profile
  • 4Find your Google profile's URL. For old Google profiles, it'll be something like: https://profiles.google.com/ellenbrundige . For Google Plus profiles, it'll be something like: https://plus.google.com/104336642453738074076. I chopped the /about off the end of mine, but I think it'll work either way.
  • 5Now you need a link from from the author/member/user profile on your website back to your Google profile with a link tagged rel="me".

    On Squidoo, this is easy! Go to "My Settings" at the top, click the "Profile" tab, scroll down, and enter the link to your Google Profile in the "Google Plus" box. (It doesn't actually have to be a plus profile, by the way; Squidoo won't punish you for sticking with an old Google profile.)

    On sites where there's no built-in "other profiles" slots, such as your own blog's "About" page, link to your Google profile manually with HTML:

    <a href="linktoGoogleProfile" rel="me">My Google Profile</a>
  • 6Time to test it!

    --First, go to your author profile (lensmaster profile) and click the link from there to your Google profile. Click the link on your Google profile and make sure it leads back to your author profile.

    --Go to the Google Rich Snippet Tester and put in the URL of your lensmaster profile (http://www.squidoo.com/lensmaster/yourname).

    If all's well, you should see something like this:

    Google profile rel='author' verified

Automatic rel="me" links on social media sites

If they give you spaces to fill in links to your other profiles...

Many social media sites include boxes on your user profile where you can link to your profiles on other sites. These links are usually marked with rel="me" automatically, without your having to do anything!

In fact, on your Squidoo lensmaster profile, there are places for you to list your blog, your Facebook profile, and your Twitter account. (Edit these links in My Settings > Profile (scroll all the way down). Unfortunately, there's no built-in field for your Google profile, which is why I added it manually to the bio box.

On sites that let you fill in links to your other profiles, check to see if they're marked with rel="me" for you. Do this by choosing "View Source" in your web browser while looking at your profile page, then search for that link on the page (or search for rel="me").

Unfortunately, Hubpages doesn't have a built-in place for you to list your other profiles, and it doesn't let you edit HTML on your profile page. I haven't found a way around this yet.

Using Google Profile as Your Author Profile

On a site where you don't have an "About" or or "User Profile" Page

Google profile page authenticated authorship I don't like doing it this way, because rel="me" is supposed to point to pages about you, user profiles, bios, or at least an "About" page. But on websites you don't own, you may not have one of those available.

This is also a lazy way of assigning authorship to your blog.

Basic idea of this strategy:
I. All your content pages link to your Google profile with rel="author"
II. The Google profile links to the TOP LEVEL of your website, its homepage, with rel="me".

Step-by-step:
  • 1From each page of content, give yourself an author credit. Link to your Google Profile with rel="author" like so:

    by <a href="https://profiles.google.com/ellenbrundige " rel="author">Greekgeek</a>

    On Wordpress, you could tuck this link into the footer (as I did on Mythphile) or in the "Links" Sidebar, assuming you're using Wordpress 3.2 where you're allowed to select "me" as the relationship. (When adding a new Link in the dashboard, scroll down; there's a "relationship" section.)

    TIP: On sites that do NOT let you enter code, Google has a hack you can try in lieu of adding rel="author" as above. Instead, make a link like this:
    by <a href="https://profiles.google.com/ellenbrundige?rel=author">Greekgeek+</a>
    For this hack, you need to add a + at the beginning or end of the link, and the clickable text must be your Google Profile name.)
  • 2From your Google Profile, link back to the homepage or top level of your content and choose "this page is specifically about me" for the link. (For example, I linked back to http://www.mythphile.com).
  • 3Test it! Time to test it!

    --Check each link to make sure they point back and forth where they should.

    --Go to the Google Rich Snippet Tester and put in the URL of your lensmaster profile (http://www.squidoo.com/lensmaster/yourname).

    If all's well, you should see something like this:

    Google profile rel='author' verified

Recommended Links

More Pages explaining rel="author"

Google's tutorial on using rel="author"
Note that Google has a "new" way of doing it, but the "old" way still works and is recognized by more search engines and apps. So I taught you the old way.
How To Implement Rel=Author
A fairly easy-to-follow explanation of how to get rel="author" up and running on a blog.
Authorship Markup rel="author" tag coming with WordPress 3.2
Wordpress is implementing rel="me" and rel="author" so you don't have to hand-code it. Here's how it's going to work. (My theme doesn't have it yet; yours might depending on what version of WP you're using.)
Yet another Wordpress tutorial on rel="author"
I did it, but I'm not sure I did it the best way; that's why I'm sending you to other people's tutorials. ONE of these should get you through it. :)

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Greekgeek

Storyteller, fomer Latin teacher, student of mythology and the ancient world: I've worn many hats, but always I've dabbled in computers and the web.

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