Google News is a newsgroup developed by Google. And it has millions of users who read daily news updates on Google News. Optimizing your website for Google News can bring more traffic to your website. Here is a beautiful guide on “How to optimize website for Google News and increase traffic to your website”.
Google News is a news aggregator, or we can say it is a content syndication platform. It keeps a continuous flow of news or links to news-centric articles coming from thousands of publications. With Google News, you can get thousands of clicks on your site. For that, you do not have to be a news site or journalist.
Wondering how to publish a website on google news? Well, if so, here is the answer to your question.
Google states:
“Publishers are automatically considered for top stories or the News Tabs. They just need to produce high-quality content and comply with Google News content policies.”
So now you know, to get your site on Google News, you do not have to have a news site. Instead, your newsworthy site, which has News of events as soon as the same unfolds, and regular news updates, to publish your site, Google crawler will automatically consider your story.
In Google news, official blog announcement, The Keyword, Google Product Leads, and News Engineerings wrote:
“We use a set of AI techniques to take a constant flow of information as it hits the web, analyze it in real-time and organize it into storylines.”
It means, every news-related article that you publish, if that chains to the latest News, is fresh and high-quality, the core technology of Google Crawler will take the link of your link to Google News automatically. This is one of the ways to publish a website on google news you must follow.
But now, as Google News is an open opportunity for all, smart bloggers, writers, digital marketers, news publishers, and other bloggers have started tapping into the field, increasing the competition. If you are in search of ways to drive more traffic to your site, then know that this chance of getting listed in Google News should have all your valuable efforts.
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Saying that it seems to be a challenge to bring your site to Google News. Since Google sends 6 billion clicks to publishers every month, worldwide getting a chance to get even 0.0001% clicks on your site will also be a celebrating moment.
So, if you are ready to get clicks on your site and tap into the latitude of the golden opportunity, here are a few best practices for getting added to the Google News crawler’s index. Custom methods that can optimize your site for Google News and bring you real-time traffic.
Table of Contents
How To Optimize A Website For Google News?
Read the points give below to learn the optimization process.
Conduct Keyword Research to Find News Search Terms
Want to know how to optimize a website for google news? The first thing you need to do is keyword research.
Though, these articles do not really have to be optimized with keywords but come on! Google will not show how the weather changed last week when you search for how the car accident on the highway happened today. So, keywords are important! It is one of the ways to optimize an article.
Read More: Free keyword Research Tools by Google
Furthermore, if you are planning to post a news article, you should use the ‘Explore’ tool in Google Trends. It will give you a list of possible searches or recent searches that users do.
Also, once Google’s VP of Engineering said:
“15 percent of searches we see every day are new—which means there’s always more work for us to do to present people with the best answers to their queries from a wide variety of legitimate sources.”
Did I hear, We should try coining our terms?
Okay, 100% right, you should do so. And this can also give you the privilege of being involved in high searches and clicks.
Adhere To Strict Standard Journalism Practices –
Good journalism is about adhering to a few principles that are never out of trend. They are standard and classic for all time. To skew in with the basic and the standard journalism, you have to do the following necessary things to keep up the life of the appropriate journalism practice right.
- Remember the old technique – 4W and 1H? Which is why, when, what, who, and how? You must keep this technique in mind.
- Be accurate and come up with valid points only. Avoid penning down your own assumptions or biased content.
- Be clear with your thoughts. Clarity and to-the-point information always keep the interests of the readers on the mark.
- As said earlier, never be biased towards any group. Be neutral with your content.
- Maintain your authoritative but balanced voice.
Bring Fresh & Original News Articles – Go with the Google News Publisher Guideline
If copying the idea or content is your type, Google news is not pulling you up. Google will not line up the same type of content but will pinboard the fresh and uncopied content with authority.
Can you imagine Google bringing up a story that is false or copied?
It will be a search engine’s disaster and a downhill way for its credibility.
So, if you want to reach high credibility, you have the chance to earn the same by writing up some interesting and fresh content.
Plus, speaking of Google wanting to maintain credibility, here is the Google news publisher guideline and a few algorithms you need to follow while writing the content to qualify and to bring the crawler to your site.
- Always post newly harvested stories & content.
- Bring news content from all walks of life and maintain the diversity of your news site.
- Crisp and innovative content with high readability
- Customize the content with user-friendly topics. Remember the keyword research part?
Take good note of these tips and tactics to rank high in Google News.
Write Headlines That Communicate The Story –
What do you think attracts the attention of the user to your article? It’s the HEADLINE!
The headline is not something you should be writing in two-five minutes because they are short.
Take time to find and create a creative headline that has quality. Because when the headline is unique and relative to a user search, only then users will click your blog. So read below what your heading should possess.
- Short and crisp. (But it’s fine if you take half an hour or even more to set the right headline). Heading should take half of your effort. Because if you do not emphasize headings and the user does not open the article, then whom are you writing for? Be very sure your headlines are rich and eligible to owe the attentive eyes of your users.
- The main keyword is a MUST HAVE in the headline. Adding keywords is one of the best practices for getting added to Google News. Having a keyword in the heading will show the user, YES, this is what I want. If there are keywords in the title and in the content as well that resemble the search of the user, clicks on the articles, and your article getting preference from Google crawler gets higher.
- Let the headline be in active voice, clear, and short. Do not use passive voice, as it keeps the subject later and is not direct to read.
- Keep the heading in the present tense. (old events, interests no one anymore). Even if the article has a chord with an older event, you need to represent what is happening in the present times. Because NEWS means any event that is currently happening. So, keep the news as belonging to the present day as you can.
- Capitalize words that are important and need to seek attention. Capitalizing the first alphabet of all the words will not let the user spot the important area. So, the words in a heading that are important should only be capitalized. Check the heading of the article you are reading!
Write News Articles & Know Timing Is Everything
When you indeed want to know how to optimize a website for google news you must know the timing of posting the content is everything.
When you search for the news, it’s often that you see BBC, New York Times, CNN, Huffington Post, Bloomberg, and so forth. Do you ever wonder why are they so popular on the News?
Well, this is because they update the news every minute, or if not minute, every hour.
They have a hound of writers, who keep writing, are working on different stories, and report immediately as the event unwinds. This is why they publish content on time and are in the top choices of Google News.
So, if you are working alone, get a few authors who can coordinate with you, produce more articles, and manage to post at least two times a day or more. It will let Google know you are regular and your site is worth taking up to the syndicate of Google News.
Be Consistent & Write Regularly
No one in any industry is fond of having irregular things. If you have a goal to gig in the Goggle News, get consistent and post regularly. As said earlier, you need to post at least 2 times a day, which will take hold of your presence, and establish your roots and authority.
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Being consistent might not be included in the Google news publisher guideline. But it is very much understood, if you try to be an irregular poster, Google will not entertain you. Google will not let you cross its top line that is secured for regular sites which have authority and are well-established. Thus, if you want to tap into Google News and drive more traffic, catch the speed and keep hold of the grip of posting regularly and consistently.
To Gain More Clicks Establish The Authority
Google is kind of strict about the guidelines they have released. They know not every article is News material.
Oftentimes, the news is made of a particular story as they are written in an angel of news and in that context. This is why we see lamestream media getting a higher ranking on the News page. We see stories of celebrities’ personal affairs on the News, you know why? Because they are penned in such a context.
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Next thing is, imagine if you and BBC news, both report with news and fresh articles on time, stay up-to-date, and you are now 4-5 months old on the web too.
But what if you do not have many web page link backs or links of user-friendly sites on your site, but the BBC has?
The established authority and greater search will be of the BBC, only, right?
So, to create the authority, the blogs you write, create a link back to different pages of your own site. Contribute to the other user-friendly, trustworthy sites, narrating your story naturally without adorning it, and you will get valuable links.
Link and authority building will not happen overnight or by posting several articles in one week. It will take time. So, the point is, stay consistent, never forget to create authority with your blogs, and make your site worthy to rank higher. To see how many links you have, you can check your site on the webmaster.
Extract: Optimize a Website for Google News
When you are in search of ways on how to optimize a website for Google News and drive more traffic to your site, you can not avoid practicing any of the points mentioned above.
Now, when you have read all points, and you know there is a possibility of your site being admitted into Google News, all you need to do is, follow the point religiously.
Wait! Doing this in a hurry might not fetch you the desired results. Construct a pavement for your blog, such that google spider or news bot can follow the same to crawl your site.
It’s suggested you add a Google News SiteMap to show the easy path to the crawler.
The extract here is, Make a plan, Follow steps, and reach the throne of Google News.
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