It looks attractive to see an author image appear next to post titles with a small snippet on the homepage of a blog (like you see on Shoutmeloud). What if the same happens on Google Search Engine as well? Yes, we can achieve the same effect on Google Search Engine using the Authorship Tool. Just take a look at the following screen shot for better understanding.
Isn’t it cool? Well, definitely yes! Why should I implement this? Simple! This will indirectly claim the authorship for your content which in turn reduces plagiarism. Moreover, Amit Agarwal on his blog suggests that it’ll increase our Google CTR as well. So, let’s get started…
1. CREATE AN ABOUT ME PAGE
I’m sure many of you possess an “About Me” page on your blog. If you don’t, then I strongly suggest to make one! Now, make sure you provide a link to your Google Profile with rel=”me” embedded in the anchor tag. Your anchor tag should be similar to the one shown below.
<a href="http://gplus.to/yourprofilename" rel="me">My Profile</a>
To find out your Google Profile link, click here – My Google Profile. The one that you see on your navigation/address bar, is the link. You may use the following service – GPlus.to to avoid the numbers that appear at the end on link. In other words, to shorten your profile URL.
2. LINK THE ARTICLES TO YOUR ABOUT ME PAGE
You’ve to link each article on your blog to the ‘About Me” page on your blog with rel=”author” embedded in the anchor tag. Your anchor tag should be similar to the one shown below.
<a href="http://www.yourblog.com/aboutme" rel="author">About the Author</a>
It is better you add the above mentioned tag to your “Author Info” box – the one that appears beneath each article published on your blog. Don’t forget to add the same tag on your homepage, as well.
3. ADD A CUSTOM LINK ON YOUR GOOGLE PROFILE
This is the last step to enable the authorship for your blog. Just navigate to your Google Profile and click Edit Profile. Under the links section, add a new custom link that links to your “About Me” page with a tick enabled for the option that says “This page is specifically about me” and save the changes. That’s it! Take a look at the screen shot below for better understanding.
To know whether you installed these stuffs properly, visit the rich snippet tool on Webmaster tools and copy-paste your recent URL on the box there and hit the preview button. If you find the result saying Verified, then your done!
As far as I know, Google has started to roll out this option only for renown authors initially and it’s still not effective for all the authors around the web. Anyway, I’ve enabled this authorship markup for my blog. How about you? Share your opinions via comments!
Subscribe Updates, Its FREE!
→ 
→ 
{ 31 comments… read them below or add one }
Adding author profile image will add trust to the posts
and can get huge traffic as well as sales…
I’m not sure about the later but it’ll definitely add some trust to your articles!
This is one of the coolest tricks, I would surely go with this in my blog profile. Thanks mukund for sharing this tricks with us.
Yup! Thanks for the comment Rakesh!
Hey buddy, I have done this and I also had got the Authorship on Rich Snippet, but still our G+ Profile does”nt showing on Searches.
As I said at the end of the article, this option has been rolled out to the renown bloggers initially. Soon, they’ll implement the same to all! So, keep your fingers crossed and wait for the same:)
Not every time the image of author appears in search results.
Yes! It’s clearly mentioned in the rich snippet tool! It’ll vary as per the search query!
I did this markup a few weeks ago, still waiting to see if and when Google decides to throw my profile image in the search results
Same here buddy! I did this a couple of days back and waiting as you do:)
You wont wont believe but I was quite amused after seeing Amit Agrawal’s Photo in Google Search few days back and I also wanted to put My photo there, and finally i found this on your blog. I like it.. thanks.
I’m glad that you found the article on SML. I hope you enjoy the other articles as well! Thanks for the comment:)
thats a nice tutorial on how to add profile images.. gotta try it…it really looks cool.
Yup! Try it and let us know once you successfully complete it! Anyway. thanks for the comment!
thanks for article bro
displaying bloggers photo in search engine 
Recently during searching i found the authors picture along with the search result…now i have find that how he do that…Nice tutorial
I think this will really give some professionalism as a blogger. I have already added this to my blog. Waiting to appear in search result.
thanks for this mukund, i will look into this as it sounds interesting.
Yes! Definitely! Try it and let me know if your profile appears on Google Search for some query:)
Before this artical I was thinking that google show picture of only most reputed bloggers only . It might be good to attract visitors from search engine
Your right partially! It’s first opened to reputed bloggers. Soon, it shall be enabled to other bloggers as well!
I willl surely try this after some time. I will be cool to display pics next to the post.
Let me know when your profile picture appears for some query on Google Search:)
Nice tutorial dude ! Are you going to be a permanent contributor of SML . Have Harsh given a proposal to you or you are making money by adsense revenue sharing program ?
Thanks for the comment! Well, yes! I took the offer from Harsh and your right! I’ll be a permanent contributor of SML and you’ll find most of the articles related to web design and blogging from my side!
I’ve implemented this authorship mark-up a week back. Though its showing in the rich snippet tool, I am yet to find my profile pic in the real search. Waiting eagerly…
Same here! Many including me have enabled this authorship stuff! Let’s keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best!
It will be great !! now going to do this.
the picture would be nice if my blog comes to the First Search Result for any keyword..
Please help me I cannot get this to work.
I have all my things setup, my image is appearing in the rich snippets correctly but not appearing in google actual search results. It’s almost 3 months now.
Please Help!
In my blog , i have two author . is it possible to get author photo in google result in for both of of them according to the post we have written. i.e. if i write a blog them my pic should come and my second author write a blog then his photo should come. please reply if its possible and how to do that