You’ve already got a great news site. Now all you need is more readers for those informative and topical articles you and your writers regularly put out. Getting your news site listed on Google News is great way to attract readers, but how do you get into their database?

The good news is, being included on Google News is totally free. Just send them your URL, cross your fingers, and hope they like what they see when they review your blog or website. If you aren’t sure your site will pass muster with Google News, there are some ways to ensure that it will.

Before being considered, there are a number of formatting issues your site must adhere to. Google News uses a crawler to search through their source sites, and thus they have specific URL formatting requirements.. You can see all of the technical requirements here, but below are the most basic points.

Google News requires that your URLS must:

• Contain just one story per html page
• Be permanent
• Have a display number of at least 3 digits at the end of each URL. For example: www.thesocialrobot.com/news359.html, or www.thesocialrobot.com/news2353253 would work, but www.thesocialrobot.com/news34 would not. (This rule does not apply to new site maps.)

[Editor's Note: The Wordpress URL structure as seen on this site is also fine.]

While Google News does a great job of explaining all of the technical specifications you must stick to, they don’t give any guidance on what type of content will improve your site’s chances for inclusion in their directory. The best advice is to strive to have newsworthy stories, quality images, and a neat site layout.

Below are not requirements for inclusion in Google News, but they will certainly help your chances. Google news values sites with content that is:

Current and Original. Articles should contain up-to-date information, which doesn’t merely repeat what the other news sources are saying.

Linkable. If other sites start linking to a story you broke, Google News will consider your article more credible and newsworthy.

Written by Multiple Authors. One lone writer won’t get the attention of Google News as a viable source. If you’re currently a loner, consider asking other writers to help you with your content.

Before applying to Google News, try to optimize your site by doing the above. And once your site is accepted for inclusion, the work isn’t over! There’s a whole slew of things you can do to increase your story’s chances of rising to the coveted Google News top spot.

Sources:

How to Get Your Site into Google News

Google News Tips For Publishers

Aaron Couch is a freelance writer and musician from Kansas City. He has experience writing and designing press releases, as well as planning publicity campaigns.