How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90% • Hacker News Board

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#41

Post by noodle » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:04 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #38

Not surprised at all. Any time I ever see a social photo next to a search result, I automatically assume it's a social media post or page and won't even bother to look at it, if I'm looking for anything else. Why on earth would anyone want a face associated with a program, website, or anything that's not a social media account? But, very good to know the statistical result.

I'm in the same boat. If I'm looking for actual information, products, etc., I'll skip the posts with the headshots. It strangely reduces my trust level of the content.

Having said that, we're all in the tech field and this guy's product seems to be geared towards the tech field. Perhaps the result for the population-at-large is different?

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#42

Post by muyuu » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:11 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #38

Not surprised at all. Any time I ever see a social photo next to a search result, I automatically assume it's a social media post or page and won't even bother to look at it, if I'm looking for anything else. Why on earth would anyone want a face associated with a program, website, or anything that's not a social media account? But, very good to know the statistical result.

I actively avoid mug shots. Face pics are often used to manipulate, esp. if it's "happy faces".

I've developed a rejection to faces in websites. But honestly I didn't expect this to be common. Much the opposite.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#43

Post by gfodor » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:18 PM UTC

The author's takeaways are pure speculation as to causation, but he presents them as if they are facts. I could claim that people just don't like the color of his photo, and I would have as much evidence to support this has he has for his other claims re: authorship placement. And he doesn't mention that since he is not doing a split test (since it's not possible) and he's not measuring confidence intervals that his "A/B test" may be meaningless.

His intuition makes sense, and his conclusions are probably correct in this specific case, but this is shoddy analysis and shouldn't be presented in a generalized manner as he's done here.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#44

Post by 6d0debc071 » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:32 PM UTC

On seeing what it did, my first thought was that the result with his picture next to it was one of those horrible promoted pages/adverts. I'm used to just skimming over the first results that look different to the rest with Google.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#45

Post by agrona » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:35 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #38

Not surprised at all. Any time I ever see a social photo next to a search result, I automatically assume it's a social media post or page and won't even bother to look at it, if I'm looking for anything else. Why on earth would anyone want a face associated with a program, website, or anything that's not a social media account? But, very good to know the statistical result.

>Why on earth would anyone want a face associated with a program, website, or anything that's not a social media account?

A coworker runs one of those aggregate-amazon-affiliate-link sites (think http://www.thisiswhyimbroke.com/) for camping and outdoorsy things. He saw a noticeable increase in traffic by associating his wife's picture in his search results. He's of the opinion that a pretty face helps sell things.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#46

Post by unreal37 » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:37 PM UTC

pdx wrote: post #2

I wonder if your Google+ Profile picture was your JitBit Name + Logo, you would have done better. I think it is your face that is the problem. Not because it's ugly, but because it's obviously a face, which is out of context when searching for "macro recorder". We naturally gloss over things that don't sync with what we expect.

I do think the actual photo chosen is a turn off though.

I wonder if he tried a better more professional photo if the results would change.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#47

Post by unreal37 » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:38 PM UTC

Nursie wrote: post #34

pfortuny wrote: post #5

The photo is a tell-tale to me. Each time I see one on the first search results, they get filtered out by my brain (they are either 'news' or 'youtube'). But this is just my reaction.

Yup. It screams blog/editorial content. I'm very, very rarely interested in blogs or editorials. Usually I seem to be after hard data or documentation.

Also screams "this site has been SEO'd to death". Better when every top result has a picture then it doesn't stand out so much.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#48

Post by nhebb » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:42 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #38

Not surprised at all. Any time I ever see a social photo next to a search result, I automatically assume it's a social media post or page and won't even bother to look at it, if I'm looking for anything else. Why on earth would anyone want a face associated with a program, website, or anything that's not a social media account? But, very good to know the statistical result.

It makes the search result look like it's to a personal site or a blog - not a business. It would be good of Google if they allowed you to associated authorship with your site but opt out of the head shot in search results.

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#49

Post by specialp » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:43 PM UTC

Google is basically twisting everyone's arms to join G+. Here is the Google progression of things:

1. Hey we support all open protocols all you need to do is use our FREE service that is superior to all others.

2. OK now you need to unify your profile with Google+

3. Either kill the product entirely or drop the open standard support because the open standard does not support some awesome feature they made.

4.You are stuck in a proprietary world

Re: How Google Authorship decreased our traffic by 90%

#50

Post by nhebb » Thu, May 30, 2013, 4:49 PM UTC

massarog wrote: post #35

My question is, why did you add authorship sitewide? Authorship should be established only on jitbit.com/news/ where your blog is, NOT on your entire website. For example, if I search jitbit in google, your authorship photo is appearing for your domain, not good.

If you hadn't mentioned this, I wouldn't even know that Authorship could be associated with just a directory. I bet a lot of people, including the OP, fall into that category. If the OP just associated it with his onsite blog (/news/), then essentially the only purpose of Google Authorship would be promote his company blog, not his overall site. So he would be G+ blogging to promote his blog to promote his products. Sounds a bit convoluted to me.