Google Discover has been a mystery since it was launched in 2018 so much so that even websites that are highly SEO optimized struggle to get high traction on Google Discover. This is because SEO and Discover optimizations are very different than each other.
For this, we are diving deep into the SEO knowledge of Das SEO and the Google Discover guide by Lily Ray.
Why Was Google Discover Launched?
Google Discover was launched in 2018 as a method to suggest topics to the reader that might interest them. The topics are curated based on the search history, app usage, browsing habits, locations, and predominant niches visited by the user.
Through this data, Google tries to pre-empt your likes and presents you with information that you are likely to enjoy more. In the words of Lily Ray, it can be called a “queryless search“.
So yes, it makes a lot of difference between the optimizations for Google SEO and Google Discover. Google SEO is a response to the already present searchers who want some specific information. However, Google Discover readers are likely to be those who do not have a clue that the topic exists.
SEO Optimized Pages Are Less Likely To Work on Google Discover
Meta Title
Google Discover’s titles are usually longer and more descriptive than Google SEO meta titles. This is because both serve quite different needs.
SEO Titles are more oriented to give the users the information that are actively searching for. Hence, the presence of Keywords in Google SEO meta titles is critical.
Further, in Google SEO the Meta Title must maintain a limit of 55 to 65 characters so that they are not truncated like the one shown below.
However, in the case of Google Discover, we found that the best results were brought by longer titles. Further, the click-through rate was also higher for titles that included some kind of clickbait (enough to not attract any penalty).
Please note that Google highly discourages clickbait in all of its channels: News, SEO, and Discover. Too much clickbait might even attract a manual penalty.
Yet, they have many things in common too.
Image Sizes – Featured and In-Article
All kinds of images in Google Discover must be above 1200 px (on the longer side). Further, this Image must be unique and not one that is already available to Google.
The first reason is to ensure that the images displayed attract the user’s attention. A featured image is typically the first thing anyone notices on Google Discover and Google News.
The second reason is why we find all the news websites sharing different images of the same event while they can still buy them from a common agency like Reuters or ANI.
Focus on Top Entities
Top entities are more likely to stay on the news than others. Though it is a little difficult to rank for them initially as soon as you gain that topical authority (later explained), you can easily rank for top entities on Google Discover, Search, and Google News.
Content Distribution Channels
Common Optimizations Between SEO and Discover
Article Must Use AMP
AMP stands for Accelerated Mobile Pages and is a very critical thing that no SEO or Website owner should miss. This is because the majority of users who use the Google search do so from a mobile phone.
This is the exact reason why Google has made it mandatory to pass the AMP test to rank on Google.
This is also the reason why we prefer to work with WordPress websites because we can implement AMP within a minute with the AMP plugin.
EEAT Compliance
EEAT is the sum of all factors that affect your Google Rankings.
They are focused on the following four things: Experience, Expertise, Authority, and Trust.
Experience
Experience refers to whether the writer has a first-hand experience with the things that they write about.
This is critical because Google prefers real-world inputs to improve the information it serves to the readers. This is also the reason why AI content does not rank well in most cases. Most AI content just spins already present information on Google.
To ensure that Google knows about your experience well, make sure that you mention it either in the text or in your author box.
Expertise
Expertise refers to the qualification of the writer of the article. The better qualified they are, the more they will be considered an expert.
Expertise is generally sourced by Google from the Author Box or About the Author section.
Authority
Authority simply refers to the authority that your website has on that topic. It is the same as the Knowledge Graph entity mentioned above.
To build the authority of the website, make sure that you cover all the subtopics under a given topic and do it in a comprehensive way (use skyscraper content).
Trust
Trust here simply refers to the industry-related backlinks that you have on your website.
Stress is to be put on the term “industry-related backlinks”. Backlinks from other niches and websites do not have the same “link juice” as websites in the same niche. The reason is websites in the same niche would know the topics more closely and are more likely to judge whether the information is high quality or not. A backlink is like a trust vote in most cases.
But make sure of two things when you are getting backlinks besides the one mentioned above.
- Make sure they are from websites that have low spam scores.
- Make sure they put your brand name or the keyword to get the highest link juice flow.
- Make sure you are not getting a link from a website that usually sells them. If you do you will be considered a link buyer in Google’s eyes and will be penalized even if you got that backlink organically.
Knowledge Graph Entity
Knowledge Graph entities are those who possess considerable knowledge of a certain topic. In SEO, this is known as topical authority.
For websites, topical authority is shown in two ways.
- Through posting a wide range of articles covering almost every subtopic under the given topic. This must be accompanied by “Internal Backlinks” which people often ignore but are critical to build topical authority.
- Through getting industry-related backlinks. This shows that your peers within the same industry have shown confidence in your work.
The easiest way that we use to build topical authority in a niche is by answering Quora questions on your site and also posting the answers in Quora for dual benefits.
We also use long-tail keywords and keywords from the People Also Ask section on Google.
Before we end this section, it is critical to mention that internal backlinks cannot be ignored while building a Knowledge Graph Entity. This is because internal links are used by Google crawlers to identify the total posts on your website under a certain topic. The better your internal linking is, the better your topical authority will be.
Refresh Your Content Periodically
The easiest way to maintain rankings and even improve them is to refresh the content periodically. This is because no content is ever-green.
In my experience as a content provider since 2018 and after having supplied SEO content for over 100 websites now, I know that even definitions change. For example in 2020 Blockchain Trilemma referred to the balance between speed, decentralization, and security. Now, it refers to product(s), customers, and regulations.
YouTube Embeds and Videos
We rarely see SEOs doing this because it requires a lot of effort initially. However, videos make it easy for users to consume your content and hence Google loves it.
But, there are a few do’s and don’ts that Google does not tell you, neither do most SEO but I can tell you from my experience.
- Always upload a video if you have created it on your own.
- Only embed an YouTube video if it is created by some expert.
Do not embed or upload any other video, it will disrupt your website’s visibility.
Web Stories
WebStories are a great way to tell a news in a short and interesting way and hence, Google loves them too.
I personally prefer WebStories because in my company, we have seen our clients getting featured on Google Discover or Google News and in most cases, it was a web story that got a boost.
These web stories are so preferred for Google that for publisher accounts, Google has a webstory indexing section on the Seach Console.
Avoid Them to Stop Manual Actions
Your website will not get featured in Google Discover or News if it has the following content.
- Adult
- Dangerous
- Gore
- Harassing
- Hateful
- Lacks Transparency on Authors/Owners
- Manipulated (edited) media
- Medical content (without expertise)
- Misleading
- Profanity
- Terror
- Violence
- Vulgarism
Even if you do this in a website that ranks well on Google News or Discover, you will be at a high risk of losing discover and news visibility of your website.