Hearing that Google Profiles are starting to be included in search results, I head over to my Google Profile page and see a little message:
Your profile is not yet eligible to be featured in Google search results.To have your profile featured, add more information about yourself.
A link is given for Add more info to my profile, and learn more. I follow the learn more link, as I’ve already added plenty of info to my profile and I can’t figure out what else they could need.
The learn more section has the basics — add info to your profile, add links to your web pages, etc, etc — and then a section for “Verify your name” and get a “Verified” badge on your account.
Sweet, I can be Google Official! I click on verify your name and am brought to a page that tells me I should:
- Sign in on the Knol homepage.
- Select Preferences from the My profile drop-down menu in the top right corner of the page.
- Click Name Verification.
- Select how you want Google to verify your name.
So I sign into the Knowl homepage and at first the My profile link isn’t up in the top right corner, but after a few clicks it suddenly appears. I click on the My profile link and go to preferences and then Name Verification.
Wow, two options — Phone or credit card. Each seems easy enough, so I go with phone. I enter my name, address, phone number and click the button to have Google call me.
Alas, I am not in the “directory”, whatever that is. So I cannot use this method for verification.
Whatever, credit card is just as easy. I click Verify name by credit card. Enter name, address, credit card number… and no — “We encountered the following problem: Error: please try later.” How descriptive.
So then I gave up and added a short biography of nonsense, and then added my special super powers, and then added something I can’t find on Google. Saved my profile one more time, and voila, my profile is eligible to be featured in Google search.
Huh?
