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Has Google Authorship Proven That Some Marketers Are Liars?

Actually all marketers are liars...but this is different

Not too long ago the big buzz in marketing was about setting up your Google Authorship account and linking it to your website. The idea here was that you were suppose to receive some big boost in rankings and that you were suppose to have a huge click through rate because your face was in the search engine. Basically by being a trusted author you would have endless traffic.

While I never subscribed to this theory, many (and I mean many) marketers in the industry did. Now in a very under the radar move, Google has pulled the plug on authorship images saying that in their test they hadn’t noticed any real difference in traffic or searcher intent.  No difference, how’s that possible?

The question is how could there be no difference in click through rate or user intent. I mean all these marketers were saying that they had seen massive increases in traffic from their little head shots and that everyone needed to be using this ‘tactic’ to increase their businesses.

Now the one thing I know is SEO guys are the first ones to start crying foul play when things don’t go their way. With every Google update the industry is always in an uproar complaining about the evils of Google and how they could be better. Yet this time, nothing but silence through the industry.

Why? Because they were called out and aren’t sure what to say to make it right. If there were in fact such massive spikes in searchers from the Google Authorship images then surely somebody would be talking about a massive decline in search volume right?

I mean there are business models dedicated to the Google authorship approach, how are those guys doing now? I’m not saying these guys aren’t ‘experts’ in the field, just more along the lines that Google authorship was greatly over exaggerated. As always, now clients are left trying to figure out who in the industry they can trust, and who is selling the next new shiny object.

Terrence Kent
by joey urban 15 Sept, 2023
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