Google+ Author Snippet Photo not showing in search

Question

I have set up my google+ account with everything linked to my website, my website linking to Google+ as per instructions, but photo is not showing in search results, even though the google testing says all is fine.

My site is www.mikegeorgiades.com (Google+ link code in homepage). My Google+ page is https://plus.google.com/u/0/b/105269586899946171489/+Mikegeorgiades-guitarist-for-hire

Is there any reason why the test would appear OK but not for real? Is there a lag? Thanks!

Answer 1

that can have multiple reasons:

1. On their help pages the Google guys wrote that "Your Google+ profile picture should be a good, recognisable head-shot". When you browse the web via Google’s search engine you probably see a lot of images which do not show “good, recognisable head-shots”. I think it belongs to Google whether the picture shows up or not.
2. Google Authorship does not work when you link to a Google+ business page instead of a real profile page.
3. You did not add a link back from your site to your Google+ page (see this help page (Option 2)).
4. Your author info is hidden to the public. Google don't like hidden stuff. Make sure that your reciprocal backlink is not hidden via CSS.
5. Very obvious: Your Google+ profile has no profile picture.
6. Your site is cached and the backlink is not yet integrated into the source code. Try to clear your cache.
7. Your backlink is missing the rel="author" attribute.
8. Your backlink is missing the ?rel=author attribute in the URL (ex. href="http://plus.google.com/u/0/123456789/?rel=author")
9. Check that your E-Mail Address (if added to your Google+ profile) is on the same domain as your content (read more about it here: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1408986)
10. Make sure that the byline of your content includes the same name as in your Google+ profile. For example: When your Google+ Profile is "John Doe" your byline has to be "By John Doe" and not "By Doe John" or anything else.
11. You have not submitted your E-Mail address via this page: http://plus.google.com/authorship
12. Your Google+ profile is not visible to the public.
13. Your Google+ profile has been excluded to the search (so no one can find you via Google`s search engine).
14. There are multiple authors on one page. Google always uses only the first author that has been mentioned on a page.
15. You did not add your website to "Contributor To" section (click here to do that now: http://plus.google.com/me/about/edit/co)
16. The "Contributor To" section is not visible to the public.
17. The Rich Snippet Testing Tool throws errors (even if they are not related to authorship)
18. Last but not least: Google just does not want to display your profile picture

Update 1: More reasons can be:

1. Some users said that it also won't work when your website was not confirmed as yours in Google Webmaster Tools.
2. Some said that they got it to work after adding the same URL in Google+ as in Google Webmaster tools (Within Google webmaster tools you can setup the preferred domain (www or non-www).)

I'm not working at Google but I think when the Rich Snippet Testing Tool shows your picture it should appear in search results after some days.

Update 2: One more:

1. You have deactivated the option that noone can find your picture in Googles search results. To solve this go to https://www.google.com/settings/plus and scroll down to the "Profile" section. Activate the checkbox beside "Help others discover my profile in search results." (in German this is: "Andere sollen mein Profil in Suchergebnissen finden können").

Update 3: One more:

1. John Mueller (Webmaster Trends Analyst @ Google) announced that in the near future Google will not longer show the profile picture in search results. Instead it will show up on Google News only. However the name will still show up on search results pages. Preview image can be found here: https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/1408986

Answer 2

I recently experienced my photo disappearing from the search results and I, too, verified that everything else was correct under the structured data testing tool. At first my photo snippet was showing in the SERP but then it vanished. I was also trying different profile photos. I had one with dimensions of 400x400 pixels and another one with dimensions of 256x256 pixels. I didn't fully verify it, but Google apparently didn't like my 400x400 photo. Google wants a clear profile photo of your face. Perhaps some algorithm found my larger photo too grainy or something along those lines. Changing my photo back to the 256x256 version caused my photo to reappear in the search results! I'd suggest trying different dimensions, different photo formats, perhaps even changing the color profile. The search results were updated fairly quickly after I uploaded a working photo. Seems like I saw results in under an hour, YMMV.

You can refer to the photo I used, along with my Contributor to links, at my Google+ page at https://plus.google.com/108810746834291116055. The page that I have my authorship set at is http://blog.ikiapps.com using rel=author.

Update on 2014-Apr-27:

I can confirm my advice worked for me again after completely changing my Google profile to another account and losing the visibility of my authorship associated photo in search results for a brief period of time. It is now restored after following what I posted here.