What if you could connect with an online audience of millions of readers—who currently don’t know you and your writing exist? At Web Design Relief, our tech experts are always on the lookout for new ways to increase online engagement for the writing community. One very effective way to help your blog posts reach a larger audience is to catch the attention of Google Discover, which has over 800 million active users and counting. Here’s how you can make it easier for Google Discover to boost traffic to your author blog.
Connect With Google Discover And Boost Blog Traffic
Unlike Google Search, Google Discover resources the user’s unique interests. If you’ve ever used Google on a mobile device, you’ve probably noticed the recommended content offered beneath the Google search function. This is Google Discover at work: It automatically suggests content based on your previous activity. It also allows Google users to follow certain authors or media outlets to receive additional recommended content that aligns with their interests. In this way, Google Discover provides a steady stream of new content to keep users engaged while online. But keep in mind, Google Discover can be unpredictable: You might see lots of traffic one day and get zero hits the next.
How To Get Google Discover To Recommend Your Blog Posts
Consistently Post New Content
The more content you have on the Internet, the more chances you have for engagement. The frequency of your posts and the number of comments and shares will factor into whether or not Google promotes your content via the Discover tool.
However, you shouldn’t churn out lots of meaningless blog posts simply to increase your content output. Content that is stale or spammy will not be promoted by Google Discover. Instead, create a blog calendar and craft meaningful content that is published frequently and reliably.
Use Best SEO Practices
The most effective way to succeed on any Google metric is to use best SEO (search engine optimization) practices. This involves using keywords: words and phrases that descriptively pinpoint what your content is about. Having internal and external links to relevant posts on your blog or other reputable blogs is also a best practice.
For everything else you need to know about SEO, check out our guide to writing SEO that gets results.
Keep Your Blog Posts Relevant
You may have strong opinions about John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath and plan to post a book review on your blog. But, while Steinbeck’s works will always remain in the canon of great American literature, his writing may not be as relevant for a blog topic as a newer, contemporary novel (unless one of Steinbeck’s stories is suddenly getting a Netflix adaptation). Current, timely blog topics will boost your online visibility and increase the odds of your post being recommended on Google Discover.
Include Quality Visuals
Take a moment to scroll through your own Google Discover feed: You’ll notice that each recommendation is paired with an image or video. Google Discover is a very visual feature, so be sure to include interesting, high-quality visuals. Images should be at least 1200 px wide and enabled by the “max-image-preview: large setting” inserted into the <head> of every page you wish to include in Google Discover. Only one featured image on the article must meet this minimum requirement.
Test Your Author Website Pages
Google also offers A/B testing, which allows you to compare results before and after making any changes to your author website or content. The better you know how your author website is performing, the more you can capitalize on its success and improve your odds of landing on someone’s Discover feed.
Analytics is another helpful feature from Google that lets users track all traffic and referrals into and out of their websites. This can help you discover the content that is most popular with your visitors so you can create more of what users want to see.
It will take time to catch Google’s attention and potentially be added to the Discover feed. However, with a carefully curated author website, you can boost your odds of being featured on Google Discover and increase your website traffic.
The first step to getting Google’s attention is to have a well-designed, up-to-date author website. Web Design Relief can help you with designing and maintaining a professional, budget-friendly author website—check out our portfolio and schedule a free consultation today!
Along with designing professional, affordable author websites, we’ve also been providing traditional publishing and self-publishing options for writers since 1994. Call or email us to learn more!
Question: What articles do you find most interesting in Google Discover?
0 Comments