Google has launched a brand new Google News Publisher Center tool designed to assist publishers in managing how their content appears throughout Google products.
Google’s new Publisher Center consolidates two old tools – Google News Producer and Google News Publisher Center. Along with combining the options of those tools, Google says the user experience and functionality can also be improved.
In the identical vein as the existing tools, Publisher Center is an interface that helps publishers submit, handle, and monetize their content in Google News.
The new Publisher Center has distinctive options that didn’t exist within the old tools. Publishers now have a better method to manage their identification, resembling including different logos depending on whether or not the user has their phone set to light or dark mode.
Another new function offers folks that handle multiple publications a more accessible option to organize and switch between them. This includes improved permission settings, which allows for more straightforward collaboration with colleagues.
Lastly, publishers no longer need to depend on RSS to configure sections in Google News – they will now point directly to URL. This means content material for Google News will come instantly from the web, much like how Google indexes content for search results.
The new Publisher Center is offered now in English, Spanish, French, and German. Google plans to broaden this tool to more languages “very soon.”
Overview of New Google News Publisher Center:
If you are new then you will have to create New Publication:
Appear in Google News Publisher Center
You can use Google News to help users stay up-to-date on the news that matters to them. With Google News, users can:
- Discover current events, world-wide news, and diverse content from different publishers
- Subscribe to specific news providers and topics
- Read content online or offline
- Bookmark and share articles
- Personalize content in the “For you” section
How it works
Through a diverse set of features, Google News lets users learn about and engage with you. The Google News experience always includes prominent branding where stories are surfaced, and monetization opportunities, like advertising and streamlined subscription sales, through Subscribe with Google.
To provide the best experience for readers, you can choose between direct control and traffic using Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), or custom styling of feed-backed content.
You can use the Publisher Center tool to share your content with Google News by submitting RSS feeds, website URLs, or videos.
Even if you don’t set up a publication in the Publisher Center, Google may find your site through our normal web crawl. If you do not want to surface in Google News, you can block access to content on your sites without affecting your continued indexing and ranking in Google Search.
A new Publisher Center experience
In 2019, Google launched a new Publisher Center that combines the features from the former Publisher Center and the Producer tool to create one single publisher interface. The new Publisher Center is available here.
If you already set up an edition through the previous Producer tool or were already part of Google News through the previous Publisher Center tool, your content will remain live. You should continue to update your content preferences in the new Publisher Center.
1. Publisher Center
You don’t need to sign up through the Publisher Center to be in Google News rankings, but it does provide certain benefits:
- Content and branding control: Design, brand, and customize your publication’s sections and content in Google News.
- Monetization opportunity: Run ads inside your content area in the app. Google News supports ad serving via Google Ad Manager, including premium solution ads. Publishers can use paywalls in Newsstand through Subscribe with Google.
- Placement eligibility: Publications with business terms are eligible to be in the Newsstand section of the app (in applicable countries/regions). We do not guarantee placement. Publications are independently selected for Newsstand by our merchandising team based on promotional timing, quality of user experience, and relevance to the promotional themes.
Submitting a feed or a URL through the Google News Publisher Center does not guarantee surfacing or ranking in Google News.
2. Eligibility in news
Publishers no longer need to submit their site to be eligible for the Google News app and website. Publishers are automatically considered for Top stories or the News tab of Search. They just need to produce high-quality content and comply with Google News content policies.
Appear on other News surfaces
Users can get an organized experience of top stories, articles, videos, and more from around the world with the News tab of Search. On Search, Google provides the following ways to help users access content from a broad range of publishers.
Learn more about how Google presents news across our products and surfaces.
Top stories
“Top stories” is a section that appears within Google Search when we detect that a search query is news-oriented. We match the search with relevant, quality news content to display. Top stories features articles related to the search, and a link to more related articles on the News tab. Content is automatically selected for this feature.
News tab of Search
When users look for news, the News tab of Search filters search results. Users get content related to events in the news. For broader context, the News tab displays more articles than a regular search query.
Appear in Top stories or News
Publishers are automatically considered for Top stories or the News tab of Search. They just need to produce high-quality content and comply with Google News content policies.
To be considered for the carousel section of Top stories on mobile, content needs to be published in AMP format with article-specific structured data. The AMP Status Report in Search Console can help publishers identify content with AMP issues.
Ranking within Google News
As a principle, submitting your content via feeds or content labels in the Publisher Center shouldn’t interfere with your site’s ranking in search engines. Participation in an advertising program like AdSense has no effect on ranking of your site in Google News, or on any other Google search engine.
Google News aims to promote original journalism and expose users to diverse perspectives. It does not accept payments to expedite or improve a site’s search appearance or ranking.
Ranking in Google News is determined algorithmically by these factors:
- Relevance of content
- Prominence
- Authoritativeness
- Freshness
- Location
- Language
Ranking in the “For you” tab is also determined by these factors:
- Interests
- Usability
User preferences for topics or publishers. Learn more about how Google News stories are selected and how to see stories you want on Google News.
Designated topical experiences in the Newsstand tab of the Google News app are created by Google News staff to help users discover new sources they might be interested in. News results you see within these experiences are selected and ranked by algorithms. Learn more about how News Experiences are created.
You can improve your site’s ranking by maintaining a Google-friendly website. Learn more about how Google ranks pages in Search.
While we’re happy to help you with technical issues in Google News, we can’t provide much feedback regarding ranking. We appreciate your understanding.
Measure the impact of Google News
Publishers can track their content’s performance based on how it appears in Google News.
Section-based content
If your content was provided through RSS feeds in the Publisher Center, you can track it through news.google.com or news.url.google.com referrers. You can set up tracking in Google News Publisher Center to provide more detail and track content that is rendered natively within the Google News Android and iOS apps.
Important: Do not add your feed analytic numbers coming from the Google News Publisher Center in addition to referrers, since they both measure the same behavior.
Learn more about analytics in the Publisher Center.
Web-crawled content
To differentiate the traffic from Google News and the rest of your traffic, you can look for the HTTP referrer. This is applicable if your content is:
- Crawled from your site or from the content labels you added in the Google News Publisher Center.
- Shown directly from your site on Google News, or linked out directly to your site.
Readers with the referrers “news.google.com” or “news.url.google.com” are incoming from the Google News App & web browser.
You can use your own on-page analytics for further analysis of your standard HTML and Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) articles.
Launching a new Publisher Center
For more information on Google News Publisher Center, you can simply ask us in the below comments, we would love to answer your queries.