Google tests many things and not all of them end up working or being rolled out worldwide. In this case, it has been reported that they are testing in the United States and India a new feature that allows for a bit of personalization in the Google Search Top Stories module, one that traditionally stood out for sending a lot of traffic to media outlets, but which nowadays is also affected by AI Overviews.
Anyone who uses this new feature and customizes the sites they prefer for receiving information will see more content from those outlets in the aforementioned section, Top Stories.
In the article published by Google, the steps to set our preferences are explained. In this case, it is enough to click on the icon that appears next to the “Top Stories” text in Google Search.
This will allow users to search for their preferred newspapers and select them. As a final step, all that’s needed is to click the button to save preferences and refresh the Top Stories results.
There is no limit to the number of information sources you can highlight. Media outlets may encourage their users to set them as preferred with a deeplink that would look like this:https://google.com/preferences/source?q=<your website URL>
Without a doubt, this is an innovation that could significantly affect traffic for media outlets and that is why it is important to pay attention to the results in the pioneering countries and to find out whether this feature will eventually reach Spain. This personalization offers users more control over the news they see and may reward sites with stronger brand image and credibility.
If this innovation proves successful, nothing would prevent Google from expanding it to areas beyond news modules. This is also beneficial for Google, as it turns everyone into its promoter, given that websites have the resources to encourage users to set them as favorites in Top Stories.
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