Google News is a popular platform that aggregates and displays news articles from various sources around the world. It can help you reach new audiences, increase your traffic, and boost your credibility as a news publisher. However, getting your website approved and listed in Google News is not easy. You need to meet certain technical, content, and quality requirements that Google sets for news publishers. In this article, we will guide you through the steps and tips on how to approve your website into Google News for fast indexing and listing.
Step 1: Meet Google’s Technical Requirements
The first step to get your website into Google News is to make sure that your website meets Google’s technical requirements. These include:
• Having a clean, easy-to-navigate, and mobile-friendly website design that follows the best practices for web development.
• Using unique and permanent URLs for each news article, preferably with descriptive keywords that match the article’s title and content.
• Providing a clear and accurate title for each news article, preferably in bold and between 2 and 22 words long.
• Providing a meta description for each news article, preferably between 140 and 160 characters long, that summarizes the main point of the article.
• Providing a sitemap or RSS feed that lists all your news articles and updates frequently.
• Using structured data markup to provide additional information about your news articles, such as headline, date, author, image, category, etc.
• Using HTTPS protocol to secure your website and protect your users’ data.
You can use tools such as Google Search Console, Google PageSpeed Insights, or Google Mobile-Friendly Test to check and improve your website’s technical performance.
Step 2: Meet Google’s Content Requirements
The second step to get your website into Google News is to make sure that your website meets Google’s content requirements. These include:
• Publishing original, relevant, and timely news articles that provide value to your readers and cover topics of public interest.
• Publishing multiple news articles per day, preferably at least three, to keep your content fresh and updated.
• Publishing news articles of a sufficient length, preferably at least 250 words, that provide depth and detail to your stories.
• Avoiding duplicate, plagiarized, or rewritten content from other sources. You can use tools such as Copyscape or Grammarly to check and avoid plagiarism.
• Avoiding spammy, misleading, or clickbait content that violates Google’s policies on quality and webmaster guidelines.
• Providing attribution and sources for your news articles, especially when quoting or citing other publications or authors.
You can use tools such as Google Analytics or Google Trends to check and optimize your content performance.
Step 3: Meet Google’s Quality Requirements
The third step to get your website into Google News is to make sure that your website meets Google’s quality requirements. These include:
• Having a clear and transparent editorial policy that states your mission, vision, values, standards, and practices as a news publisher.
• Having a clear and transparent authorship policy that states the names, biographies, photos, and contact details of your news writers and editors.
• Having a clear and transparent ownership policy that states the legal name, address, phone number, email address, and social media accounts of your news organization or company.
• Having a clear and transparent feedback policy that states how you handle comments, corrections, complaints, suggestions, or requests from your readers or users.
• Having a clear and transparent advertising policy that states how you display ads on your website and how you differentiate them from editorial content.
You can create separate pages on your website that display these policies clearly and prominently. You can also use tools such as Google Publisher Center or Google AdSense to manage and monetize your ads.
Step 4: Submit Your Website to Google News
The final step to get your website into Google News is to submit your website to Google News using the Google News Publisher Center. This is a tool that allows you to share your content with Google News by submitting RSS feeds, website URLs, or videos. To submit your website to Google News:
• Go to Google News Publisher Center and sign in with your Google account.
• Verify your website ownership in the Search Console.
• Send your request for inclusion by clicking on “Add publication” and filling out the required information about your website.
• Add site details and update news section URLs by clicking on “Edit” and providing information such as name, logo, description, language, region, category, etc. of your website.
• Click on “Submit”. The Google team will review your request within a few weeks and notify you of the status of your application.
You can check the status of your application by going to Google News Publisher Center and clicking on “View details” under your website name. You can also edit or update your website information at any time.
Conclusion
Getting your website into Google News can be a challenging but rewarding process. By following the steps and tips in this article, you can increase your chances of getting approved and listed in Google News. However, you should also keep in mind that Google News is constantly evolving and changing, so you should always stay updated and follow the latest news and guidelines from Google. You should also monitor and analyze your website’s performance and feedback in Google News and make improvements accordingly. By doing so, you can ensure that your website provides high-quality news content to your readers and users.
