Back in 2018, Google revamped Google Feed and called it Google Discover.
A place that lists articles based on a user’s Google Search history.
Right now, one can spot it on the homepage of Chrome Browser on smartphones.
Here is how its feed looks like.
With Google Discover, we can keep track of fresh and interesting content about the topic we like.
It gives us the choice to choose our favourite topics. Here is how you can do so.
How to choose your topic of interest on Google Discover?
Via Google Chrome Browser
Step 1: Open your Google Chrome browser on your Android or iOS device.
Step 2: Tap on the gear ⚙️ icon present on the homepage and then tap on the Manage Interests option.
Step 3: A new page opens where you have to tap on the Your Interests option.
Step 4: Scroll down and you will see that, based on your activity (that is basically your search history), Google Discover sorts some topics for you.
Step 5: Tap on the plus icon present in front of the topics to follow them on Google Discover.
Via Google App
In addition to the Chrome Browser, you can also choose your topic of interest for Google Discover from the official Google App.
To choose your favourite topics for Google Discover from Google App,
Step 1: Open the Google App and tap on the customize icon present beside the articles in the feed.
Step 2: Tap on Manage Channels and Interests option.
Step 3: Tap on the Channels and Interests option.
Step 4: Repeat from Step 3 to 5 as explained in the earlier section.
How Google Discover is Different from Google Search?
Google Search provides us with the best content for the query we feed in Google Search Engine.
Google Discover, on the other hand, is an automated system.
First of all, we don’t feed any query inside it, Second, it presents us with the content related to our Google search history.
Some of you might believe, Google Discover only sorts new and fresh content. That is not true.
Google Discover always sorts the best content that could be old but will always be related to our Google Search history.
How to rank your content in Google Discover?
In order to rank your content in Google Discover, you don’t need any special structured data.
Make sure your content follows the content policies and is getting indexed in Google search.
Websites who firmly follow the E-A-T Principals are the most likely to rank in Google Discover. E-A-T stands for Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
Below are some more things to consider that improves a website’s chances of ranking in Google Discover.
- Use a page title that explains about the content but make sure not to write it like a click bait.
- Use a large image as the featured image of the content. The size of the image must be at least 1200px wide and is enabled by the
max-image-preview: largesetting. - Avoid misleading the user by mentioning inappropriate details in Title, Snippet, and Images in your content.
- Create content that beautifully tells a story.
Google Discover might become a great RSS Reader
Right now, we use different mediums (for example, subscribing to the mailing list, push notification, and RSS) to keep track of the latest content from our favourite website.
A common user can’t cope up with these many mediums to keep track of the latest content from their favourite websites.
Seeing the same, this year in May, the Chrome team introduced a feature called Follow (which is currently in beta) that lets users follow a website and get the website’s latest content in the Following Tab within Discover in Chrome. Just like any RSS Feed Reader.
The Follow feature works on the open RSS web standard.
Right now, it is available to select users in the US who are using Chrome Android Beta. However, eventually it will be available to everyone. So, in that case you must have perfected your website for it.
How to optimize your website for Google Discover Follow Feature?
In order to enable the Follow feature for your website in Chrome, make sure your site has an active RSS or Atom feed.
Even if your site doesn’t have an active RSS or Atom feed, Google automatically generates a feed for your website after analysing and understanding the structure of your website.
However, if your website does have an RSS feed make sure it is readable by Google. Don’t block it with your robots.txt file.
Some webmasters host their website’s RSS feed outside their domain. Google said, it is okay to do so.
Make sure the RSS feed of your website is up to date, just like your site’s sitemap files.
That’s it. That is how you can optimize your website for Google Discover Follow feature.
Let’s learn now, how to check the performance of a content appeared on Google Discover.
How to monitor your Google Discover Content performance?
Once you optimize your website content to appear on Google Discover and as soon as it starts appearing on it, you may want to monitor its performance.
Well, you can monitor the performance of your content indexed in Google Discover using the performance report for Discover in your search console account.
Conclusion
Google Discover is a reliable source to unlock extra traffic to your website.
All you need is to make sure your website content:
- Is getting indexed on Google Search
- Follows E-A-T Principals and Google Discover Content Policies.
- Have great titles that don’t promote click-bait.
- Have at least 1200 px wide featured images.
Google Discover is beneficial to both the publishers as well as the readers. On one hand, publishers unlock extra traffic to their site while on the other hand readers get a dashboard to see the sorted content of their interest.
What’s your opinion about Google Discover? What do you think, how far will it go? Will Google Discover be the favourite dashboard of users to consume online content? Do let us know about the same in the comments down below.
