Identities will matter the most for getting organic rankings in the coming years. Google has been shifting its algorithm into the research area where it is able to find out about the author of the resource and then define a score for that page based on the reputation of the author and the quality of the content, both. So, how does that reputation of the author (a.k.a. Author Rank) gets calculated? Well, this is where the SEO will step into. online identity and google authorship will be required if someone needs to rank higher in Google (some
exceptions apply).
Matt Cutts has been constantly hinting towards research being made in the area that if Google is able to identify the person behind any content present on any site then backlinks as a ranking factor will lose some of its importance. Web documents will start ranking based on the importance of the author of the page or the author rank.
Two Aspects of Identity Building
There are 2 aspects of identity building namely individual identity and Brand identity:
Individual Identity – Building up an individual entity is required in order to rank for search queries/research queries where Google must find resources written by authoritative authors. As for example, if you are searching for an article related to “search engines” and Google is able to find one that matches the context of the search query and written by credible author like Danny Sullivan then Google will rank the resource higher up in the search results. Thus, identity power has become a component of Google search algorithm and we quickly need to adapt ourselves with these changing user and machine behaviour needs. Individual identity is affected by the following metrics:
1- Presence of Google Authorship.
2- Quality of content written by the author.
3- The number of social shares received on the written content.
4- The quality of sites where the author’s article gets published.
5- The number of niche mentions the author receives on a regular basis.
6- The number and quality of backlinks the author’s written resource receives.
Brand Identity – Building the reputation of a brand will affect the overall organic presence of the brand. A brand with a high popularity score is more likely to perform well in the organic search listings as compared to a brand that has a low popularity and authoritative score.
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| Image credit: liveinspiredmag.com |
Brand score can be judged by the following metrics:
1- Overall Domain Authority.
2- Number of backlinks pointing to the domain.
3- Quality of backlinks pointing to the domain.
4- Number of brand mentions happening on a regular basis.
5- The overall social media presence.
6- Reputation and author score of individual authors associated with the brand (if any).
7- The amount of NEWS and trusted seed coverage the brand receives.
So, folks, are you gearing up for this next level of SEO- the identity building?
Please discuss your thoughts in the comments below.
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