In the process of finalizing my 2014 business strategy, part of which involves re-branding, I attended...

In the process of finalizing my 2014 business strategy, part of which involves re-branding, I attended +Jason T. Wiser's HOA a couple weeks ago: https://plus.google.com/u/0/events/c27angq05dcfsjuqb8enqojmv90 . The discussion about creating a brand strategy prompted me to question if there would be SEO implications as a result of re-branding or refreshing a brand.

+Sam Stormborn Ormandy graciously responded and steered me toward this informative and instructional video by +martin shervington  and +Mark Traphagen about Google Authorship. It reminded me that my online visibility is no longer tied exclusively to my domain name or my business name.  That’s because Google Authorship connects ME – the person – to all the content I create and put online.
 
I’m including click-able time codes here so I can embed this in a blog on my site where people who aren’t spending so much time on Google Plus (yet) can benefit from the convenience of moving easily through this 46-minute recording.

1:05 – Martin tells us what we’ll cover here.
1:40 – What is Google Authorship?
3:07 – Why use Google Authorship? Touches on the theory of Author Rank.
5:50 – How to create Authorship
8:43 ­– Connecting your Authorship to your content across the web via your G+ profile
10:15 – Verifying your content via the email method; easiest to do, but not the first recommended.
11:30 – Providing a link back from the content to your G+ profile. 
14:20 – Instructions for connecting your Blogger account
15:20 – Instructions for connecting your WordPress account; older themes may need an authorship plugin, e.g., YOST SEO
20:15 – Google Plus Brand Page verification
22:00 – Rich Snippets testing tool, aka structured data testing tool
 
Scenarios
25:14 – Individual who only uses G+
25:40 – Individual has a personal blog; no other contributors to that blog.
26:00 – You are the brand.
26:40 – A business with several contributors to the blog; you have a G+ brand page.
 
28:21 – Mark talks about the importance (and risks) of having a human being representing your business; e.g., Men’s Wearhouse
30:45 – Removing a “Contributor to” link from a G+ profile; what are the consequences?
32:05 – Apps and the use of enterprise accounts – Mark explains what this is. Martin poses follow-on questions. The discussion includes these takeaways
33:00 – Addressing the challenge of choosing to work under a business vs. personal account
35:20 – Don’t create a situation where you have to “break up” with every employee; cites the Search Engine Watch article, “Breaking up with your spokesperson.”
38: 50 - Create policies; compares new approaches with traditional methods for creating policy.
42:22 – Martin muses – “Is there a per-click charge potentially that could emerge for the content that appears in search of these authors, after they’ve left the company?”
43:23 – Google provides author stats in Webmaster Tools

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