Last weekend I came up with one of those wicked little ideas that I tend to do every now and then.
I was talking to someone about Google Author Rank at the time so I set this little test page up with different sections on the page talking about different factors of Google Authorship and Google Author Rank – What is Google Author Rank
One of those sections I named Is There An Author Rank Checker and then Bingo the idea hit me! – Google Author Rank Checker
I forgot about what I was doing and off I went to create a little spoof Author Rank Checker 
It was initially very basic, people entered their Google+ ID number and a random number between 40 and 80 was generated.
I then expanded the idea by combining it with my Google+ Widget which pulled the persons name and Avatar from Google+ based on the number they submitted.
With it looking and working well I added a spoof comment and shared it on Google+
It got quite a bit of initial interest with most people getting the joke.
Over the next couple of days I improved it and instead of having a random number (that changed on a refresh) I made it so the number generated was just based on 2 numbers in the persons Google+ ID
What this meant was if the person refreshed the page they always saw the same number.
I then came up with the idea of having a Hall of Fame for anyone who had a Google Author Rank of 80 or more but to stop anyone achieving this set the number generator so the maximum was 79.
At the same time as I did this I added a Share Button to the page to see if anyone would share it.
It was than that I came up with the idea to try a little social experiment
The 1st day I defaulted the number generator so no one could Achieve an Author Rank above 59 (average) and left it running all day to see if people would share their Author Rank if it was only average or below – Result was not many shares
The next day I adjusted the Author Rank generator so everyone received a Google Author Rank above 70 (good or very good) and again left it running all day to see if people would now share their Author Rank Score if it was good or very good – Result was a massive increase in Shares.
Conclusion: People are more prepared to Share things that paint them in a better light.
Tip: If you want people to Share your things more – Flatter them and boost their ego.
PS. I will be truly flattered if you Share or +1 this 
To Learn more about Google Authorship and decide for yourself whether Google Author Rank is real or just a myth come and join the Google Authorship Community on Google+ »
To all of those who used the Sim64 Google Author Rank Checker and saw the funny side of it – A very big THANK YOU
A special thank you to my old compatriots from Mangeur de Cigogne
Great job Terry. I stumbled upon this by searching for “google author rank” after I overheard a conversation between two others in the SEO world. I did read somewhere else that Google are looking to launch AuthorShip some time in 2013 – is this true?
Hi Iain,
Google Authorship has been around a long time.
i.e.
You can create a Google Profile and claim Authorship of content you have published anywhere online.
Author Rank is currently just speculation despite what you may read.
I actually predicted a form of Author Rank in a post I made about Google delegated authority evaluation system http://www.v1seo.co.uk/11/primary-authority-contributing-authorities/ back in 2011 (you commented there too)
People are saying it is only a matter of time before Author Rank is used as a ranking factor, but I personally hope it isn’t used too much, as it seems to put more importance on who writes something rather than what is written.
It will make my definition of Google+ http://www.sim64.co.uk/uk/definition-of-google/ even more true.
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