You want to make it big? Get yourself in the news. Google News presents a marvellous opportunity for most sites’ off-page SEO plans. SEO experts have worked hard on strategies to get their clients on the Google News pages, as you will discover if you talk to us at SEO Consult. The recent release of some patent details may have given some of Google’s game away.

The patent, linked to Google News’ methods of ranking articles, was originally applied for in 2003. When the approval finally came through in late August 2009, its details provided some very interesting reading for those in the search engine optimisation industry.

News site selection revealed

Google News is considerably different from the main search engine, with the object being to restrict rather than extend access. Selection of news sites is a big part of Google News and knowledge of how this works is handy to any site wanting to be approved. What the patent revealed is that article length, traffic, number of staff, regions covered and number of articles published in a time period are all important when a news source is first considered. News sources are also assessed for their reaction to important breaking news, which is decided by the number of articles they feature on topics that are popular on other news sites.

Another interesting factor in the assessment of news sources is that the number of people, places and things named within any individual article can count toward news source credibility. This indicates that a well-researched article that quotes many sources is more likely to impress Google News, something to keep in mind when submitting articles to news sources.

Other important factors

It’s interesting to note that Google talks about ‘human opinion’ being used as a factor when ranking news sources and individual articles. It’s long been suspected in the SEO industry that human opinion counts, although how Google discovers it is a mystery.

‘Quality’ is the watchword within the patent. The patent’s abstract discusses the meaning of ranking for a system and sets out that the main driving factor for Google News is the quality of the news sources.

Don’t get too excited

As the patent is for plans that are more than six years old, the value of the information is obviously limited. The fact that it regards the improvement of ranking news articles, however, indicates that a lot of the systems may still be in place or have been built upon. In any case, the patent details are an indication of how the brains of Google think when developing ranking methods. That indication is invaluable to the SEO industry.

The release of these details is interesting on more than the one level. Examination of the information within the patent gives the SEO community a lot more insight into how to optimise for Google News, which is a decidedly tricky area for off-page SEO. The fact that so much detail was revealed in the patent is also interesting. Many people will certainly be looking out for future patent-related developments.

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