Today’s technology landscape is jam-packed with social networks like Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and loads more. Sometimes it is hard to see how all these social networks will translate to serving an actual business purpose. Well Google Authorship connects them with a big black Sharpie line. Authorship is a feature that Google has that ties your personal Google+ profile to the content you produce on the internet. Bloggers, small biz owners and just about everyone is jumping on board and getting their Authorship set up.

Setting up your Google Authorship is quick and painless. Just sign into your Google+ account then follow the steps from this Google Authorship page. And, there are tons of detailed posts to help you set up your Google Authorship, including KISSmetrics, and Huff Po. So now that you know what Google Authorship is, here’s why you need Google Authorship for you and your blog:

Rich Snippets:  You may have seen rich snippets creeping all over your search results. Videos, reviews, music track listings and more, they’re all over the place! They help enhance your search experience and Google Authorship takes full advantage of rich snippets. When your Google Authorship is correctly set up, you’ll notice your very own profile picture in the SERPS (Search Engine Results Page). Google pulls your profile picture from your linked Google+ profile, so comb your hair, put your best hoodie on and smile for that authorship profile pic.

Higher Click Through Rate: We would like to attribute it to our striking good looks, but higher click through rates are attributed to Google Authorship’s rich snippets. Viralheat claims as much as a 30% increase in click throughs for some posts. One thing is for sure; searchers seem to like people’s faces being associated with their content. Another great feature is that searchers have instant access to other posts you’ve written. There has been some interesting tests to see if someone having glasses in their authorship photo had any affect on the click through rate. We say test ’em all out!

Claim Your Content: Setting up and verifying your content lets Google know you’re the content’s legit owner. If your blog’s content is getting used without your permission, having your authorship set up will ensure your post will rank higher than the person, or blog that’s using it.

Pro Tip: Be sure to include some great internal links in every blog post, so if your post gets shared via your permission or otherwise you will get a backlink!

SEO Love: Google and Bing have made it clear they like it if you have high authority. If you have the best cupcake store in town, with lines out the door and biz is booming, it would make sense that you would be an authority on cupcakes. If someone has questions about the best cupcake recipe, or newest icing trends they will come to your Cupcake Blog for the answer. Other cupcake blogs will link back to yours, which will build authority and so on. So if you write for an authoritative blog, some of that blog’s authority is passed to you the writer and vice versa. The SERPs are always changing and we believe that sometime in the future, Google will serve up results that have more authority. If and when Google starts doing that you don’t want to be last to the party.

Google Authorship is quick to set up and provides a plethora of benefits so get on it and let us know how it goes!

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