Google News contains stories from thousands of news sources from around the globe. It takes the stories and arranges them based on relevancy. Updates are done every 15 minutes by the Newsbot and there is no human intervention.

Algorithms decide on headline placement based on a number of factors including how often stories appear and on what sites, titles and publication times.

Optimizing for Google News - Isn't it just SEO?

I was intrigued to find that optimizing for Google News is slightly different than the SEO approach for general search. While most of the guidelines apply there are some nuances that are handy to know to get news stories indexed in Google News.

As with anything SEO search engines do not publish what to do but, what not to do. So based on a bit of research and "majority rules" I have come up with a few ways in which you can have news stories appear in Google News.

Lessons in Optimizing for Google News

Lesson #1

The source of the news must be good and of high quality and already be known to Google News for inclusion.

There are a number of ways this can be done. One is to submit your article or press release to a source that is syndicated by Google News. Try PRweb, Business Wire or PRNewswire. Alternatively you can contact news agencies to garner interest in your article.

Another way is to create a news section on your website featuring quality newsworthy information. You should add something at least weekly when optimizing for Google News. Once there is content in your news area you do need to ask Google to include it. Use the News Contact page and fill in the form.

Lesson #2

Keywords! As with general SEO, keywords prove to be important when optimizing for Google News. Optimize story titles and content using targeted keywords and phrases and ensure that there is a fair amount of text.

Lesson #3

Timing is everything. Send stories out so that they are submitted to Google News in the morning as opposed to the evening to the region of your target audience. This is particularly true if the story you have is in a highly competitive area.

Lesson #4

The Google News optimization clincher: numbers.

The Google News crawler expects to see numbers in the URL. Numbers, it seems, is how this is accomplished. The recommendation is to use between three and six numbers. However, there are some very important rules.

1. Do not re-use the URL's - these should be static and unique

2. Do not start filenames with a year or include an ID that begins with a year

These URL's will not be crawled by Google News www.seofever.com/press/mynewarticle.htm

www.seofever.com/press/article2.htm www.seofever.com/press/2006news.htm

These URL's will be crawled by Google News www.seofever.com/2006/press/77364/myarticle.htm www.seofever.com/2006/33345/400059697,299485,00.html

So, you see, optimizing for Google News may be just a bit tricky but it can be done!