US news publishers monitoring the search visibility of their political content on Google ahead of the Nov. 5 elections should be aware of a few concerning trends. These changes are impacting News Box ranking opportunities on Google’s mobile and desktop SERPs, and may require a newsroom to adjust their SEO strategy for political content.

News Dashboard SERP analysis: August 2024 findings

Using the Trisolute News Dashboard, we were able to confirm a few stark changes to the Top Stories News Box structure on Google in the month of August. These changes took place around August 9 on both mobile and desktop and led to a steep decline in Top Stories News Box rankings for several major US news publishers. The SERP changes occurred before Google’s core update that began rolling out on August 15.

In the graphs below, we analyzed US Google SERP data to compare the nation and entertainment categories for the Top Stories News Boxes in August 2024. Nation captures the political keywords that are the focus of this analysis.

• It appears that Google stopped using descriptive headers in the Top Stories News Box for political keywords after August 9, 2024. Since then, we’re only seeing “Top stories” and “Also in the news” headers associated with political keywords.

• It appears that Google is restricting Top Stories News Boxes to a maximum of 4 entries for political keywords on the desktop SERP. On the mobile SERP, a Top Stories carousel with up to 12 slots that requires a manual scroll after the first 2 articles. This change in the News Box structure occurred in August around the same time as the News Box header change.
• In addition to shrinking the News Box, the variety of related News Boxes that used to nestle directly underneath a Top Stories News Box have mostly disappeared for political keywords. “Also in the news” is the lone exception. Common News Box headers such as For Context and Perspectives are instead appearing further down the Google SERP for political keywords, separate from the Top Stories News Box. 
• We tested a variety of political keywords on the US mobile and desktop SERPs, not just keywords related to the US election. Gaza, Israel, Ukraine and Russia produced similar limited Top Stories News Box configurations. However, a similar trend was not identified for UK and German news publishers.
• The Google Knowledge Panels tend to play a prominent role on the SERPs when searching for politicians. Sometimes the Knowledge Panel will be at the very top of the SERP, other times directly below the smaller Top Stories News Box.

• Non-political topics, such as entertainment, sports, and business are not impacted.

Tracking Google visibility changes in the Trisolute News Dashboard

The Trisolute News Dashboard has several helpful reports to track visibility changes to the mobile and desktop SERPs. The Mobile Ranking Types Visibility report allows news publishers to monitor their visibility in News Boxes, Video Boxes, Publisher Carousel, Visual Digest (Knowledge Panel), Featured Snippet and Web Story visibility rankings across a custom date range.

Publishers seeking to monitor the impact of SERP changes in real time can review the Action View 2.0 report, which provides a live snapshot of the Top stories News Box on both mobile and desktop. To analyze a longer time frame, the KPI Dashboard reports allow users to track their News Box visibility on both mobile and desktop across a custom time range, as well as track their competitors’ performance.

Impact on newsrooms

Do these Google SERP changes sound familiar? During the 2024 Iowa caucus, the Google SERP didn’t show any Top Stories News Boxes for keyword searches related to the caucus. The SERP didn’t remain in that restricted view throughout the primary season and we are now seeing improvement in the amount of Top Stories News Box rankings for US publishers. The Google SERP is constantly evolving and new features and configurations are tested on a regular basis.

Still, it’s clear that Google is experimenting with the configuration of Top Stories News Boxes and related content on the SERP for political keywords. Google also appears to be opting for generic News Box headers for political keywords, perhaps to avoid any accusation of bias and contributing to divisive political rhetoric.

Newsrooms should be prepared to adjust to a SERP with reduced Top Stories News Box real estate through the election season.

If News Boxes for political topics remain in their current form, a newsroom’s explainer and related content strategy may need to be revisited. With limited ranking opportunities within the Top Stories News Box itself and at best an equally small “Also in the news” box underneath, explainers and related content may appear far down the SERP where the “For context” or “Perspectives” boxes have been buried. Prior to the changes, news publishers could compete for up to a dozen-plus slots in the various Top Stories News Box configurations. Now, the amount of available slots may be cut in half. 

Publishers are encouraged to diversify the distribution of explainers via other publishing channels such as apps and newsletters and not solely rely on Google. This is always a good practice, but especially critical when one distribution method has the potential for disruption.

Live blogs during debates and election day could be competing for an even smaller amount of Top Stories News Box real estate on the Google SERP if the current SERP configuration remains through the US election period. Large publishers may not be as impacted, but for midsize and smaller publishers who relished in the extra exposure of an occasional top stories News Box placement, it’s time to think outside of the box, pun intended.

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