Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
How important are author bios to SEO?
-
I'm trying to understand the importance of author bios to Google and its latest algorithms. Some say author bios affect rankings, but others say that has not been specifically stated by Google — but it does affect the user experience. Anyone have input on this? Thanks!
-
Yes, our subject matter experts who write content have multiple degrees and belong to professional associations. The author bios were originally kept short, so I may have to fill them out a bit, but they're definitely the "real deal" when it comes to their expertise and credentials. Thank you for your insights!
-
"Would having an author page for subject matter experts who legitimately write content (courses and/or blogs) be helpful to SEO/rankings? "
Maybe yes. Maybe no.
The answer depends upon the strength of your authors' bios and their relevance to the content area of your website.
And, here is something to think about... If your authors are using their real names, that is likely more valuable for SEO than if they are using a nickname. Why? Because Google can use a person's real name to confirm professional registrations, college degrees, work history, licenses, and many other signals that will be valuable for determining E-A-T.
If a person has a website about SEO and uses his/her real name on the articles there, then it is probably a good idea for that person to use their real name when posting in an SEO forum. IF a person is posting in Moz Q&A and receiving lots of "good answers" and "endorsed answers" that might be valuable for a person's authorship credibility on the SEO site. If your website is not about SEO then the reputation earned in this form is probably of much lower value.
-
This is very interesting information
-
We have been running multiple sites, all for over a decade and the authors have degrees that either exactly or closely match the topic areas of the websites. Until two years ago we considered that all articles were written by "our staff". However, we then added author bios with degrees, certifications, years of experience, Google scholar, relevant employment history spanning decades. Within a few months after that these sites received a rankings boost that was surprising.
Now, you ask about "the importance of bios". Adding bios for the sake of adding bios is probably not going to do much for you. Instead, it is the quality of the authors that is important.
If you have authors who have substantive, long-term, quality education, experience, and work history, then that, I believe will do something for you. If your authors have a publication history on important sites, with lots of links and citations for their work from government agencies, academic publications, professional societies - all of this that you can link to, then you have built a gold mine. Very hard to fake, easy for Google to confirm, will attract links like bugs to a Georgia porch light.
It will be really hard to fake a publication history over three or four decades with links from loc.gov and important websites across your discipline and professional registrations on government websites.
-
Thank you for your response! I have a follow-up question, if that's OK. Would having an author page for subject matter experts who legitimately write content (courses and/or blogs) be helpful to SEO/rankings?
-
At this point it's more about how Google defines and records search entities. If Google sees an author bio on a post that looks legitimate, they might link the post to that author's personal search entity (if they are big enough for search data to form one) and that could create some beneficial piggyback traffic for the publisher. But they're not really considered a distinct, separate thing in the way that people often reference them. It's no different to writing a news post about Coca Cola and then the post temporarily appears for Coca Cola's main brand term for a bit (in universal-search news results). We as human see one as an author and the other as a company / brand, but to Google they're mostly all just interrelated 'search entities' which have meaning only insofar as they are a 'thing' that 'recent search data' shows 'people care about it'
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How do you optimize a blog post for SEO after the RankBrain?
Hi Guys Just curious to hear what you guys do to rank blog posts in the top in Google especially onsite, after the RankBrain update? Do you still use SEO tools to optimize this or are the SEO tools outdated for this? If yes which tools do you use to get success with? Cheers John
Algorithm Updates | | igniterman751 -
Is using REACT SEO friendly?
Hi Guys Is REACT SEO friendly? Has anyone used REACT and what was the results? Or do you recommend something else that is better suited for SEO? Many thanks for your help in advance. Cheers Martin
Algorithm Updates | | martin19700 -
On page vs Off page vs Technical SEO: Priority, easy to handle, easy to measure.
Hi community, I am just trying to figure out which can be priority in on page, off page and technical SEO. Which one you prefer to go first? Which one is easy to handle? Which one is easy to measure? Your opinions and suggestions please. Expecting more realistic answers rather than usual check list. Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | vtmoz0 -
Do the sub domain backlinks count for main domain and increase authority?
Hi all, I just wonder if the back links for different sub domains will be counted and considered to rank the main domain better or they are just limit to sub domain pages? There are many websites which has got multiple sub domains which receive backlinks? So the backlinks to main domain and sub domain weigh same at Google? Thanks
Algorithm Updates | | vtmoz0 -
Directories and Domain Authority
I read all the time about how directories have very little weight in SEO anymore, but in my field, a lot of our competitors are propped up by paying for "profiles" aka links from places like martindale-hubbard, superlawyers, findlaw, nolo, Avvo, etc (which are essentially directories IMO) yet all those sites have very high DAs of 80 and above. So, are links from these sites worth it? I know that's a vague questions, but if Moz's algo seems to rank them so highly, I'm guessing that's reasonably close to what google thinks as well...maybe? Thanks for any insight, Ruben
Algorithm Updates | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
How Additional Characters and Numbers in URL affect SEO
Hi fellow SEOmozers, I noticed that a lot of websites have additional characters and words at the end of the URL in addition keyword optimized URL. Mostly for E-Commerce sites For example: www.yoursite.com/category/keyword?id=12345&Keyword--Category--cm_jdkfls_dklj or wwww.yoursite.com/category/keyword#83939=-37292 My question is how does the additional characters or parameters(not necessarily tracking parameters) affect SEO? Does it matter if i have additional keywords in the additional stuff in the URL (1st url example)? If you can provide more information, that would be helpful. Thank you!
Algorithm Updates | | TommyTan0 -
Non .Com or .Co Versus .ca or .fm sites - In terms of SEO value
We are launching a new site with a non traditional top level domain . We were looking at either .ca or .in as we are not able to get the traditional .com or .co or .net etc . I was wondering if this has any SEO effect ? Does Google/Bing treat this domain differently .Will it be penalized ? Note : My site is a US based site targeting US audience
Algorithm Updates | | Chaits0 -
Singular vs plural SEO
Hi everyone, OK I've been looking at the Google adwords keyword tool and it's thrown some of my On-page SEO into question (everything said here are examples, I haven't used any real life terms or figures). Lets say my page is about "Green Apples", let's say the keyword tool shows that the singular version "Green Apple" gets more searches (as an example). Should I optimize for the singular or the plural? Also lets say my title tag for that page is "Green Apples | Apples Galore UK" would Google/SEOmoz count that as an optimisation for the singular "Green Apple" or do the search engines take the title literally and don't differenciate between singular and plurals? Thanks in advance everyone! Regards, Ash
Algorithm Updates | | AshSEO20112