Does your company have a website where, besides carrying out commercial activity, there is a regular section where articles are published in order to improve customer fidelity and, at the same time, increase simultaneously the visibility within the search engines and therefore on the Internet?
In this case, among the tools available to improve your visibility, have you ever considered using Google News to encourage users interested in your topics to view specific articles, thus also increasing the visibility of your company? Today, with our article, we want to help you understand why you should also consider this tool.
What is it?
Google News is a search engine that collects and combines news from thousands of sites across the world and makes them available to potentially interested people, based on the preferences they expressed. Actually the service, as well as being usable on browsers, is also available through a proper app, both on Android and IOS devices.
This service was launched in 2002 in response to the needs that emerged during the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 from numerous users searching Google for information about what had happened in New York and advice on what to do in the stricken areas. It became clear how important it was to have one place to look for information, to be updated promptly, and to be able to provide multiple perspectives on a vicissitude.
What does the service look like now?
To the present day, the main objective of the service is to detect and organize different news, letting each user of the service to be informed by trustworthy sources in relation to their interests. At the same time, Google News wants to privilege the sources considered most authoritative, increasing their visibility and the consequential flow of traffic to their websites.
Since the offered service is focused on every single user, also the indexing and management of information has been designed to organize different types of news and articles to satisfy everyone’s needs. One person, for example, might be interested in more international, news-oriented stories, while another might be interested exclusively in more in-depth coverage of a specific, more niche topic.
This is why Google News presents the various news subdivided into three different sections:
– Top News: this section deals with general news and in this section are collected the news’ articles that deal with the most relevant topics in a specific period of time.
– Custom News: in this section are showed all the news that regard the user’s specific interests. This service can also be utilized through Google Discover.
– News in-depth with different perspectives: In this non-customized section you can find several in-depth articles about the most relevant current topics.
How topics are selected
Most of the articles shown in the customized sections of the service are selected on the basis of the queries used on Google’s search engine, thus the service gathers information most suitable to the needs and requirements of the customer.
During the news selection process, the Google News algorithm does not consider sensitive information about its users (such as race or religion) or any commercial relationship of a publisher with Google, but focuses only on content by evaluating the usability, authoritativeness and technical performance of the sites displaying the news in relation to the user’s interests.
The requirement
The prerequisites for the insertion of a site or a blog in Google News are close to those that are used to manage its positioning within a search engine; such as technical requirements regarding usability (especially for mobile devices), speed, a good structure of content and metadata and, of course, quality content.
It is worth also remembering the relevance of the quality of the content offered. For most websites, good visibility depends mainly on the displayed content; this must necessarily be of quality, not only because the Web is an extremely competitive field, but also because low-quality content risks being harmful. The contents should also be verified with reputable sources and signed by the author.
Besides this information, it is also important to have pages on the site that explain the nature of the project, a description of the people who contribute to the content and, finally, a section with the contacts. The purpose of this information is, on one hand, to present to users the context of the project and, on the other hand, to help the search engines understand the authoritativeness and the identity of the site in order to evaluate its eligibility in Google News.
Google News, in fact, regards as very important not only the articles on a site, but also those who wrote them; for this reason it is required that each member of the staff has a dedicated section, with a description that can highlight their interests and expertise.
Generally speaking, articles submitted do not necessarily have to cover news or topics of international relevance or well-known to most, as even niche topics have their own committed audience.
The essential point is to deal with topics that are well known and that can give original information and points of view to the readers.
The Benefits of Google News for a site’s visibility
The benefits of using a news aggregation service like Google News can be many for a newspaper or company with a blog or news section with specialized articles.
Indeed, not only you have the chance to achieve greater visibility and attract traffic to your site, but also to be recognized as having greater authority, with a consequent positive effect on all connected projects.
Increased visibility of posted articles, moreover, can prompt an increasing number of users to post links that point to such content, with advantages for the SERP, not to mention that good articles presented on Google News have a greater chance of being indexed faster than other pages.
How to apply
To submit a request for inclusion of a site in Google News, it is necessary to send a request through the “Publisher Center” tool and indicate the main details regarding the website (title, a description of the project, some information about the type of articles covered, language and city where the site is located).
When the request has been sent, it is necessary to wait a few weeks (usually three) before getting a feedback from Google. If the request is approved, the content will be integrated into Google News, otherwise it will be mandatory to wait up to 60 days before submitting a second request.
Tools and support of Google News
To help guide anyone interested in creating a suitable product for inclusion within Publishers Center Guide News service, Google provides many tools. First, a Publishers Center Guide has been established, bringing together information and advice on how to embark on this journey. Recently, a new service has been introduced that is more oriented to those in the world of journalism, called News Initiative, with the function of cooperating with the news industry in order to help the world of journalism flourish in the digital age.
As part of this project, you can also benefit from customized advice and access to classes to learn how to write more searchable articles on the web and how to monetize your content.
Case studies
There is also a section in which you can find several “Case Studies” describing how Google News has helped companies (not only linked to the world of journalism) to increase the popularity of their websites and projects, hence increasing their value.
An interesting example of case studies concerns the Reviewed project, a portal founded in 1997 that provides reviews of consumer products with the aim of helping its readers by orienting them towards the best purchases.
In this case, in order to increase the number of visitors, their permanence and the quality of the User Experience, work has been done to decrease the loading times of the various pages and increase the efficiency of the cache. Subsequently, in order to allow a better sharing by the social platforms and by Google News, a work of organization of the contents (which have been divided into individual pages) has been performed.
Improved performance, along with user experience analysis and engagement with the team and the tools offered by Google News led the portal to increase the percentage of affiliate links by 128% and an increase in total users by 35%.
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SOURCES
Google – Norme di Google News: https://support.google.com/news/publisher-center/answer/6204050
Google – Best practice per le pagine degli articoli: https://support.google.com/news/publisher-center/answer/9607104
Search Engine Journal – How to Get Your Website Listed in Google News: https://www.searchenginejournal.com/how-to-get-listed-in-google-news/379701/
Google Blog – A look at how news at Google works https://blog.google/products/news/look-how-news-google-works/
NewsInitiative – How news works on Google https://newsinitiative.withgoogle.com/hownewsworks/mission
SemRush – Aumenta la tua visibilità entrando in Google News – https://it.semrush.com/blog/come-entrare-in-google-news/
News Initiative – Case Studies – https://newsinitiative.withgoogle.com/intl/it/success-stories/
News Initiative – Case Studies – REVIEWED
