There are several Google search engine features that content marketers should include in their strategy to get web pages higher visibility in search results. There are AI Overviews, People Also Ask (PAA), featured snippets, local listings and knowledge panels. There is also Google Discover, which has been featured on mobile devices for awhile, but is now coming to desktop computers, which is good news for all news publishers, but also those B2B/SaaS companies who mainly get visitors from desktop devices. Content marketing planners should include this in their overall strategy. In this article, we’ll show you how to optimize for Google Discover. But first, let’s go over what it is and where it’s going.
What Is Google Discover?
Google Discover is a personalized feed of news and content that’s based on search history, location, app usage and interaction with web pages. Google also applies its machine learning algorithms to determine the topics and content to display to a user. It’s been a feature on mobile devices for a couple of years now. Users can go to the settings on their mobile devices to customize what they want to see in their feed. Recently at Search Central Live in Madrid Spain (April 2025) Google announced it will add Discover to desktop devices.
[Example Of A Google Discover Feed]
If you’re a B2B provider, especially for SaaS and other products and services that your prospects use a desktop device to find your solutions, this is another way to generate more traffic to your web pages.
(Hint: if you have GA4 setup, go to Reports ->User ->Tech->Tech Details to see the device categories for your web pages).
Videos, news articles, blog posts, and product recommendations are examples of the content types on Google Discover. In addition, there are paid Discovery ads in a user’s feed that you could invest in.
The benefits of getting your content in Google Discover are:
- Increased opportunities for search engine visibility and traffic to your website
- Encouraging users to follow your content to increase loyalty and returning readers
- More ways to build brand awareness and trust
Now that you know what Google Discover is, and the potential benefits, here’s how to optimize your content to get featured in Google Discover.
Google Discover Optimization Techniques and Steps
First, your classic on-page SEO should be done. Select a relevant keyword phrase to develop useful, unique content. Use the focus keyword phrase in these page elements:
- Page title
- Page description
- H1 – H6 tags
- Image alt text tags
- First paragraph of the article or post
Images are critical for getting your content in Google Discovery. According to the search engine:
“Include compelling, high-quality images in your content, especially large images that are more likely to generate visits from Discover. Large images need to be at least 1200 px wide and enabled by the max-image-preview:large”
Create compelling, interesting headlines – use questions, numbers, etc. to encourage readers to click through to your content.
If you are a news organization, be sure you have the this information for articles, author pages and your company:
- Clear dates and bylines
- Information about the authors, publication, and publisher
- Information about the company or network behind the content
- Contact information
A quick note about authors – creating a dedicated author page along with their credentials and other verifications to demonstrate their E-E-A-T (Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, Trust) is another way to get your content published on Google Discover.
Benson SEO can help you develop your company’s author E-E-A-T.
There are also technical SEO considerations that will help your content get featured on Google Discover.
Other Google Discover SEO Steps
Not only is on-page SEO important, but there are technical SEO tasks that should be done to get your pages on Google Discover.
Use structured data markup (schema.org) to help search engine crawlers to better understand your content. This markup language goes into the page source code. Here is an example of NewsArticle schema:
<script type="application/ld+json">
{
"@context": "https://schema.org",
"@type": "NewsArticle",
"headline": "Article Headline Here",
"description": "Article Description Here",
"url": "https://www.yoursite.com/articles/article-name",
"mainEntityOfPage": {
"@type": "WebPage",
"@id": "https://www.yoursite.com/articles/article-name"
},
"datePublished": "2024-06-04T12:00:00+00:00",
"dateModified": "2024-06-04T12:00:00+00:00",
"author": {
"@type": "Person",
"name": "First, MI, Last Name",
"url": "https://www.yoursite.com/authors/author-name"
},
"publisher": {
"@type": "Organization",
"name": "Your Business Name",
"url": "https://www.yoursite.com",
"logo": {
"@type": "ImageObject",
"url": "https://www.yoursite.com/image-url",
"width": 600,
"height": 60
}
},
"image": {
"@type": "ImageObject",
"url": "https://www.yoursite.com/sites/default/files/image-file-name.jpg",
"width": 650,
"height": 363
},
"keywords": ["article keyword", "article keyword", "article keyword"],
"articleSection": "Name of your article section",
"wordCount": number of word in article
}
</script>
Next, have your web developer measure and analyze each article page load speed and fix any issues that would slow the content loading on a user’s device screen. Use a responsive web design template to ensure your pages are mobile optimized.
Once you’ve done this, get your site registered and verified on Google Publisher Center. Follow the steps on the page to complete this action.
[Google Publisher Center]
By completing this step, your Google Search Console dashboard will be able to track your page’s performance on Google Discover and show the data for impressions, clicks and average click through rates. Google recently changed the requirements for the Publisher Center, stating that they have automated inclusion in Discover, but the steps are so easy, you might as well still register your site.
NOTE: Only the owner of the Google Search Console account can set this up. Here is what the performance data for Google Discover will look like. This is under Performance -> Discover.
[Google Discovery Search Console Data]
Google Discover has been only on mobile devices since its inception. The search engine recently announced that it will also enable this content feature on desktop devices. If your business receives web visitors mainly from desktops, now is the time to prepare your content to get featured on those devices.
Getting your web pages on Google Discover can increase your site’s overall visibility on the web and drive more traffic to your pages that are on Discover.
If you need help getting your site ready for Google Discover, Benson SEO can help you with SEO and content strategy.
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