How to Appear on Google News? Requirements and Tips

Appearing in Google News will help you get more visits to your website since this tool allows you to find current content, both on mobile devices and on desktop computers.

As you know, every online business needs these visits in order to reach its business goals.

Therefore, you may be wondering how to appear on Google News.

Do not go! 

We tell you in this article in detail.

What is Google News?

Google News is a Google platform where you will find outstanding current news. 

Google News works the same as content aggregators since it searches for informative content online and displays it, adapting it to the different languages ​​of each country and user interests.

To enter the Google News website, you have to do is access this address ” news.google.com “

Once inside, you will see that the settings icon appears, to configure the language and region.

As you can see, the image of the home page shows outstanding news on topics such as health, economy, international, technology, sports, and local news, which come from organic search results.

Google News selects the news to be displayed, based on algorithms and the preferences and interests that the user has configured in their Google account. 

In this way, it determines what content, images, and videos it shows in a personalized way.

How to Appear on Google News?

Let’s go to the crux of the matter and that is, if you have a website, you must know how to appear in Google News.

First of all, you should know that the content you accept and publish is only informative. 

If your website is for sales, services, or an online store, abstain because it does not show that type of content. 

There is a team of people behind Google News reviewing each publication.

To appear in Google News, the first thing to do is enter the Google Publisher publisher center. 

You will see that a very simple interface appears, in which you are going to send your publication for approval.

General Tab

In the general tab, the basic information appears. 

In it, you must enter the name of the publication, the URL, and the location (country) of your headquarters.

Then you’ll see another tab where you need to check Google Search Console for the URL of the website property you’re trying to get Google News to add.

This can be a URL prefixed property (https://example.com) or a domain property including all subdomains (example.com).

Visual Styles

Once we finish configuring the general tab, we move on to the next step, which is the visual styles tab, in which we must upload a logo that represents your publication.

Logo

You will see how some guidelines related to logo images appear that you must comply with, in terms of design, file format, and recommended dimensions that are 400 pixels wide, and at least: 20 px wide.

Although the recommended logo is rectangular, it gives you the option to upload a square logo with dimensions of 1000×1000 px and a minimum of 512×512 px.

Uploaded Sources

In this section, you can upload your sources and give them a name. A ” +Add source ” icon appears.

Once you finish this configuration, ” add content tags ” appears for you to select if your content is “blog”, “opinion”, “user-generated”, “or satire”.

This categorization helps Google better understand your content.

As if that were not enough, there is also a list of available categories for you to choose the one that best suits your content: architecture, real estate market, leisure, home and garden, technology, art, and fashion, among others.

It would be ready for Google News Publisher to assess and publish it.

Advantages of Google News

Do you want to know how to appear in Google News and the advantages that this entails for your website? 

We tell you what are the main advantages of Google News:

  • The fact that a website appears in Google News brings with it some advantages, the main one being the improvement of positioning thanks to the increase in organic traffic. By publishing an article on Google News, you generate more organic visibility and with it, more traffic to your website.
  • Another advantage of being there is at the branding level and that is that, when your content is published, you show corporate elements such as the logo and images so that visitors can identify your website.
  • You access content from other publishers and current news that are updated every 20 minutes.
  • It allows you to share articles from other content editors on the same topic and thus the possibility of networking arises.

Now you should know that to appear in Google News you must meet certain requirements that we tell you below.

Requirements to Appear on Google News

Google News has content policies that must be followed. 

However, complying with them does not guarantee that the articles will be published in Google News, but it can increase the odds.

Google News has these content policies:

  • Sponsored content and ads are not allowed.
  • The content must meet the minimum requirements of ” transparency “: information about the author and contact information. In addition to the data of the legal notice and privacy policy, according to the LOPD organic law on data protection.
  • Duplicate content, which is when Google analyzes two pages and finds them to be very similar.
  • Deceptive practices or spam content.
  • Medical content.
  • sexual content.
  • Violent or hateful content.

If Google News detects content that violates these policies, it will stop showing it.

SEO Tips to Appear in Google News

At this point, we give you some SEO recommendations and tips to make it easier for your content to appear in Google News.

Quality Content

To appear in Google News, above all the content must be of quality

If you have a good on-page SEO strategy for your blog, you will have an advantage.

And if the content is aligned with Google search trends, it will have a better chance of appearing in Google News.

Friendly URLs

That your articles have friendly URLs so that Google News can easily understand and track them.

With Google Search Console you can check if a specific URL is easily accessible by the Google search robot.

You must enter your account and in “inspect URL” you choose the URL in question and a response appears telling you if it is tracked or not, and in the latter case, you can request indexing.

Charging Speed

Optimizing the loading speed of your page is another factor that Google News Publisher will take into account. 

Starting by using good hosting, you can compress the images, among other optimizations. 

If your website uses WordPress, you can use a WPO plugin to help you optimize loading.

Use Structured Data

Use structured data in articles to help Google News better understand your content and be more likely to get attention.

Optimize for Mobile Devices

Optimization for mobile devices is another factor to take into account if you want to appear in Google News since 92% of users use mobile devices.

Optimize the theme, images, plugins, etc. so that the content of your website is responsive for all devices.

Another option is what is called First Mobile, which refers to a web design that gives priority to a mobile device.

Google News App

You can have the Google News app on your mobile (if you don’t have it, you can download it here ), whether your mobile is Android or iPhone. 

From it, you can customize the Google news feed, see the latest featured news, check the weather, and read about the topic that interests you.

Performance Report in Google News

Google News Publisher offers you a performance report with different metrics:

Clicks

It tells you the number of clicks your posts have had on Google News.

Impressions

The number of links to your site seen by users in Google News. 

An impression is when visitors click on a link, but if they go to another page and then return to that same link, it doesn’t count as two impressions, just one.

Average CTR

The average CTR is the total clicks divided by the total impressions.

To set up the report, you must select the metrics you want to see, such as clicks, impressions, or average CTR.

You can filter the data by date and change the period from three months to one year at the top of the report.

In short, you already know how to appear in Google News and all the content requirements it requires. 

It was to be expected that SEO was an important factor to consider. 

The better the quality and originality, the more likely you will be that the Google news team will value and publish it. 

Without a doubt, this will help you increase the traffic to your website.

Thanks for Reading.

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