SEOs Share Thoughts On Google News Ranking Factors

By Matt McGee

Published: September 22, 2011 at 4:18 pm

Almost 20 SEOs have come together to take a stab at deciphering how Google News ranks articles. The result of their collaboration is a survey that’s now been published at GoogleNewsRankingFactors.com.

The survey tackles issues such as on-page factors (keyword usage in headlines, keyword usage in page titles, etc.), off-page factors like inbound links from other websites and social media exposure, time-based factors, publisher authority and much more. It’s quite comprehensive and anyone publishing news and looking for traffic from Google News should find plenty to think about in the survey results.

Here’s a peek at what the 17 contributors say are the top overall Google News ranking factors:

google-news-ranking-factors

The survey contributors have worked on some of the web’s largest and most well-known news sites, including the New York Times, ABC News, ESPN, CNN, Huffington Post and others.

The organizers say that their plan is to do the survey again next year, hopefully with a larger group of survey takers.

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Editorial disclosure

Contributing authors are chosen for their expertise and work under the oversight of the editorial staff. Search Engine Land is owned by Semrush. The contributor was not asked to mention Semrush; the opinions expressed are their own.

About the author

Matt McGee

Matt McGee joined Third Door Media as a writer/reporter/editor in September 2008. He served as Editor-In-Chief from January 2013 until his departure in July 2017. He can be found on Twitter at @MattMcGee.