Under a guide to shoulder rehab on a physiotherapy practice's website, it says "By our team of experts". No name, no photo, no link. Nobody can tell whether a physiotherapist with fifteen years of practice wrote it or an agency that delivered copy for a car dealer the same afternoon. Readers wonder about exactly that, and so do the people who rate search results on Google's behalf. This article is about making experience and expertise visible in a way others can verify, and about the markup that mirrors it.
Calling yourself an expert proves nothing
Google has a shorthand for quality: E-E-A-T, short for experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trust. What lies behind it, and why it is not a score anyone can measure, is covered in E-E-A-T signals. For this article, one point from Google's Search Quality Rater Guidelines (version of 11 September 2025) matters most: E-E-A-T should rest on the content, on reputation and on verifiable qualifications, not on a site or creator simply claiming "I'm an expert!". Self-declared expertise that is exaggerated gets rated Low.
Deception is treated even more harshly. Fabricated author profiles, such as AI-written text with AI-generated portraits as author photos, or false claims about qualifications land at the lowest rating. A "Dr." in front of a name nobody can find does more harm than good.
Raters do not affect individual rankings; their ratings help Google evaluate its own systems. And according to the guidelines, a small site with little reputation information is neither better nor worse for it. You don't need to be famous. You need to show who you are and what you can do, in a way a stranger can check.
Google asks site owners plainly: Is it clear who created the content? Is there a byline where readers would expect one? Does it lead to more information about the person? That is the yardstick for everything that follows.
A good byline is visible, linked and names the role
The byline is the author line on the piece, the smallest and most important building block.
Visible. The name appears with the text, not only in the source code. Ideally under the headline, together with the date.
Linked. The name leads to a page with more about the person. A name without a link is a start, but a dead end.
With a role. Half a sentence that explains why this person writes about this topic is enough: "Jane Sample, physiotherapist, has treated patients after shoulder surgery since 2011." That is a claim, but one the author page backs up.
A made-up example of how this could look on example-physio.com:
By Jane Sample, physiotherapist · Published 12 Sep 2026 · Updated 30 Sep 2026
The name links to her author page, for example example-physio.com/team/jane-sample.
If several people wrote a piece, name all of them. "Anna and Ben" in a single field makes sense to readers but not to machines; more on that in the markup section.
What belongs on an author page
Google has no official checklist. But its questions make clear what an author page needs to do: show who the person is, what they write about and where their knowledge comes from. Google's John Mueller said in 2020, roughly, that author pages are not a must, but make sense if you want people to trust your information. That is the point.
For Jane Sample on example-physio.com, a good author page could look like this:
| Element | Example | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Real photo | Portrait in the practice, no stock image, no placeholder | Shows the person exists |
| Name and role | Jane Sample, physiotherapist, co-owner | Establishes who is speaking |
| Qualification | Licensed physiotherapist since 2011, further training in manual therapy | A verifiable basis |
| Concrete experience | Focus on shoulders and knees after surgery, around 15 years in practice | Says what she actually does |
| Topics | Post-surgery rehab, exercises at home, back pain at the desk | Google's "areas they write about" |
| External proof | Link to her professional association, LinkedIn profile, a talk at the local sports club | Others confirm what she says |
| Her articles | List of all her posts with dates | Connects person and content |
| Contact | The practice's booking or contact route | A real person, a real way to reach her |
The biggest difference between a good and a weak author page is verifiability. "Renowned expert with many years of experience" cannot be checked. "Licensed since 2011", a link to an external profile and a list of real articles can.
Regulated professions have an advantage here: doctors, tax advisers or architects are listed with professional bodies and in public registers. A link there is the cheapest way to have a qualification confirmed from the outside. What such professions usually have to disclose anyway, and where advertising rules limit health professions, is covered in YMYL pages. Factual information about qualifications and focus areas is generally fine.
The About page needs real names
On many small sites, the About page says something like "We are a young, dynamic team", under a stock photo that smiles on a hundred other sites too. Anyone who wants to know who is behind the business learns nothing. The rater guidelines name the About page explicitly as the starting point for what a site says about itself, and Google asks whether content links to an author page or the site's About page.
A good About page shows people: names, roles, real photos from the business, a few sentences of history, memberships in associations or trade bodies with a link. Everyone who also writes content links to their author page. And the page leads to your legal notice and contact details. What else builds trust, from your address to your reviews, is covered in website trust signals.
"Reviewed by" is a line for readers
Not every piece is written by the person who knows the subject best. That is where a visible review note helps:
Reviewed by Jane Sample, physiotherapist, on 28 Sep 2026
Here too, the name links to the reviewer's author page.
For topics that could affect people's health, financial stability or safety, Google says its systems give even more weight to strong E-E-A-T. That is where the note matters most. The review must actually have happened, though. A review note nobody stands behind is a false claim.
Schema.org has reviewedBy and lastReviewed for this, and both belong to WebPage, not to Article. Google does not document reviewedBy anywhere and generates no special search feature from it. Mueller said in 2019, roughly, that Google tries to recognize such details in a number of ways, and that information hidden only in markup is not very useful for users. The visible line is what counts. You can add the markup, but there is no documented effect.
Show first-hand experience
Experience cannot be claimed, only shown. Google asks whether content demonstrates first-hand knowledge, for example from actually using a product, and how the content was created.
Google's guidance on writing reviews is the most concrete: back up your own experience with visuals or links, share measurements, describe pros and cons based on your own research, link to useful further resources. That fits almost any small site:
Your own photos instead of stock images. The exercise, photographed in your own treatment room. The screenshot from your own tool.
Measurements. How many sessions a typical course of treatment takes, what changed in load time. Numbers with a time frame are harder to fake than adjectives.
Case examples. An anonymized case with starting point, approach and result shows more than three paragraphs of theory. For health topics, without promising outcomes.
Explain your method. A short "How we did this" paragraph answers Google's question about how content was made. If you use AI, say so here too.
Name the limits. "This helps with muscle tension, not with a slipped disc" is a sign of experience, not an admission of weakness.
Your company as the author is fine if it's honest
A services page, a price list or a notice about new opening hours comes from the business, not from a person. Then the company is the correct author, and Google's markup provides the Organization type for exactly this. Honest means: your About page shows who is behind it. When a piece rests on personal experience or expertise, such as a rehab guide, a named person as author or reviewer is the better choice. Putting the business forward so nobody notices that no qualified person has seen the text is not honest.
Markup mirrors what is visible
Structured data describes visible content for machines; the basics are in structured data for AI. Two rules matter most for authors: markup must not contain anything readers can't see, and according to Google it does not improve rankings. Mueller said in 2025, roughly, that structured data won't make your site rank better. It helps Google identify authors unambiguously. Nothing more.
author in Article: just the name, plus a URL
Google's Article documentation has no required properties, but clear rules for the author. Use Person for people and Organization for organizations. Put only the name in name: no title, no job description, no "by", no publisher name. Each author gets their own object. And url points to a page that uniquely identifies the person, typically their author page. Google also understands sameAs, for instance with a link to an external profile.
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "BlogPosting",
"headline": "Shoulder after surgery: five exercises for the first weeks",
"image": ["https://example-physio.com/images/shoulder-exercises-16x9.jpg"],
"datePublished": "2026-09-12T09:00:00+01:00",
"dateModified": "2026-09-30T14:20:00+01:00",
"author": [
{
"@type": "Person",
"name": "Jane Sample",
"url": "https://example-physio.com/team/jane-sample"
}
],
"publisher": {
"@type": "Organization",
"@id": "https://example-physio.com/#organization",
"name": "Sample Physio",
"url": "https://example-physio.com/"
}
}
</script>
Wrong would be "name": "Jane Sample, physiotherapist" or "name": "Jane Sample and Tom Example". The role belongs in the byline and on the author page, a second author in a second object.
When the business itself is the author, it looks like this. For organizations, Google names the homepage as the url:
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "Article",
"headline": "New opening hours from November",
"datePublished": "2026-10-01",
"author": {
"@type": "Organization",
"name": "Sample Physio",
"url": "https://example-physio.com/"
}
}
</script>
ProfilePage and Person for the author page
Since November 2023, there has been ProfilePage markup for author pages, About Me pages and staff profiles. The only required property is mainEntity, the person or organization the page is about, with its name. Recommended properties include description, image (no placeholder images), sameAs and the date fields. URL and name are the same as in the article's author.
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "ProfilePage",
"dateCreated": "2024-03-01T10:00:00+00:00",
"dateModified": "2026-09-30T14:20:00+01:00",
"mainEntity": {
"@type": "Person",
"@id": "https://example-physio.com/team/jane-sample#person",
"name": "Jane Sample",
"jobTitle": "Physiotherapist",
"description": "Has treated patients after shoulder and knee surgery since 2011.",
"image": "https://example-physio.com/images/team/jane-sample.jpg",
"url": "https://example-physio.com/team/jane-sample",
"worksFor": { "@id": "https://example-physio.com/#organization" },
"knowsAbout": ["Physiotherapy", "Rehab after shoulder surgery", "Manual therapy"],
"hasCredential": {
"@type": "EducationalOccupationalCredential",
"name": "Licensed physiotherapist"
},
"sameAs": [
"https://www.linkedin.com/in/jane-sample-physio"
]
}
}
</script>
jobTitle, knowsAbout and hasCredential are valid schema.org, but no Google documentation describes them as being used. According to schema.org, knowsAbout suggests possible expertise without implying it; it is self-reported. Use these fields when the information is visible on the page, and expect nothing from them.
Organization on the homepage or About page
According to Google, Organization markup belongs on the homepage or on a single page that describes the organization, such as the About page. There are no required properties; the logo should be at least 112 by 112 pixels. Name and address must match your legal notice.
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "Organization",
"@id": "https://example-physio.com/#organization",
"name": "Sample Physio",
"url": "https://example-physio.com/",
"logo": "https://example-physio.com/images/logo-512.png",
"description": "Physiotherapy practice focused on rehab after surgery.",
"telephone": "+44-117-496-0100",
"address": {
"@type": "PostalAddress",
"streetAddress": "12 Example Road",
"postalCode": "BS1 4ST",
"addressLocality": "Bristol",
"addressCountry": "GB"
},
"sameAs": [
"https://www.instagram.com/samplephysio"
]
}
</script>
For a practice or shop with a physical address, LocalBusiness fits too; Google points to it itself. The @id ties the blocks together: the article names the publisher, and the person works for that same business.
What Google ignores: meta author and rel=author
Many themes add <meta name="author">, and many plugins add the Open Graph field article:author as well. Neither is on Google's list of supported meta tags, and according to its documentation, Google ignores meta tags it doesn't support. What counts for Google is the byline and author in Article markup. The tags do no harm, and other systems such as social networks read them. Keep them identical to the byline.
rel=author is dead entirely. Google showed author photos in search results from 2011 until mid-2014 and announced in August 2014 that it would stop processing this data. Old authorship plugins and Google+ links can go.
Setting it up in WordPress and Drupal
WordPress. In your user profile, enter first and last name, set "Display name publicly as" to your real name and fill in the biographical info. If it says "admin", Yoast does not output the Person block at all, according to its own documentation. Otherwise Yoast builds Person markup from the profile with name, description, image, URL and profile links; whether author archives are indexed is set in its advanced settings. In Rank Math, author pages are set to noindex by default. If your author archive is meant to be your author page, switch it to index and fill it with bio, photo and profiles; Rank Math also offers ProfilePage schema for it. The alternative is a dedicated "About Jane Sample" page as the byline target and author.url. A bare list of posts is too thin to serve as an author page.
Drupal. The Metatag module handles meta tags including Open Graph, and Schema.org Metatag adds JSON-LD, with submodules for Article, Person, Organization and WebPage among others, filled via tokens such as [node:author:display-name]. For the author page, extend the user profile with fields for bio, photo and profile links, or create a "Person" content type. If your module version has no ProfilePage option, a custom JSON-LD block in the template does the job. Watch the date: [node:changed] updates on every save, including bulk operations. For an honest dateModified, a separate field for the last substantive change is worth it.
How to check the result
Google's Rich Results Test shows which markup Google detects on a URL, including Article, ProfilePage and the logo from Organization. The Schema Markup Validator at validator.schema.org checks the whole schema.org vocabulary, including reviewedBy, knowsAbout or hasCredential. Search Console has a dedicated report for profile pages, but none for Article or Organization. Its URL Inspection shows which structured data Google found and whether the page may be indexed, which quickly reveals an author page stuck on noindex. Setup is covered in set up Search Console. No tool shows whether Google considers someone an expert.
Where to start
- Read three of your most important guides as a stranger would: is there a name, and does it lead anywhere?
- Clean up your WordPress or Drupal profiles: real name, short bio, real photo, links to external profiles.
- Create an indexable author page for everyone who writes or reviews, with qualifications, concrete experience, external proof and a list of their articles.
- On your About page, replace stock photos and empty phrases with names, roles and real pictures, and link the author pages.
- On health, money and legal topics, add a visible review note with name, role and date, if a qualified person really reviewed the piece.
- Add your own photos, measurements or a case example to one piece that depends on experience.
- Check your markup:
authorwith only the name plus a URL, ProfilePage on the author page, Organization on the homepage or About page, all tested in the Rich Results Test and the Schema Markup Validator.
How Traffalyzer helps
Traffalyzer cannot measure E-E-A-T, because no such score exists. The scan checks the technical groundwork. It counts how many of your pages carry author information in their metadata (meta name="author" or article:author). According to its documentation, Google does not use these tags. The number is still useful as a pointer for other systems such as AI assistants, feed readers and social networks, and as an indicator of whether authors are maintained on your site at all. The scan also counts how many pages carry a publication or modification date, measures your structured data (schema.org) coverage and checks HTTPS.
It also spots modification dates that aren't credible: a page reports a fresh date although its content hasn't changed in weeks, typically because the theme sets the date anew on every request. The "Content to refresh" feature suggests pages that are going stale, and with Search Console connected you can see whether rankings rise after your changes. Whether your author page is convincing is for you to judge.
Frequently asked questions
Does a small website really need author pages?
If you publish guides or advice, yes. Google recommends bylines wherever readers would ask who wrote this, and asks whether they lead to more information about the person. On a one-person site, a good About Me page is enough.
Is an author page a ranking factor?
Not directly. Google's John Mueller called author pages not a must, but sensible if you want people to trust the information. They work through readers' trust, not as a signal of their own.
What goes into author.name in the markup?
Only the person's name, for example "Jane Sample". No titles, no job description, no "by", no company name; that is what Google's Article documentation asks for. Role and qualifications go in the byline and on the author page, and multiple authors each get their own object.
Does Google use meta name="author"?
No. Neither this tag nor article:author is on Google's list of supported meta tags. What counts is the visible byline and author in Article markup. The tag can still be useful for social networks and other systems.
Does reviewedBy markup help with health topics?
There is no documented effect. Google does not document reviewedBy and creates no special feature from it. What makes sense is a visible "Reviewed by" line with name, role, date and a link to the reviewer's profile. You can add the markup on the WebPage as well; it does no harm.
Should I keep my WordPress author archive on noindex?
That depends on where your byline points. If the author archive is your author page, it should be indexable and have real content; in Rank Math you have to switch it from noindex. If you use a dedicated About Me page as the target instead, the archive can stay on noindex.