Below are essential tips I also extracted from the Google Authorship Help Article:
Create a rich Google Profile
• Update your Google Profile with links to any of your other author pages around the web.
• Your profile picture must be a photograph of yourself and of high quality (to be eligible for a thumbnail to display in search results).
• To easily link to your Google Profile, add the Profile button to your site.
Single-author blogs and sites
Once you’ve linked to your Google Profile from your blog, add your blog URL to the Links section of your Google Profile.
Multiple-author blogs and sites
In confirming authorship, Google looks for two things:
• Links from the content page to the author page (if the path of links continues to a Google Profile, they can also show Profile information in search results).
• A path of links back from your Google Profile to your content.
These reciprocal links are important: without them, anyone could attribute content to you, or you could take credit for any content on the web.
Example of an inclusion of rel=“author” from a Wired.com article:
Don’t forget the last step!
After you’ve followed the instructions on the Google Authorship Help Article, fill out the form at the bottom of the article. This will allow Google to inform you of any implementation issues (although they do not guarantee they can get back to everyone individually).
