An email to Google News publishers prompted the original show. It discussed inaccurate article titles in search results and the way publishers structured their pages.

The useful lesson wasn’t a secret ranking formula. Make it clear what the page is about. A customer should not have to reconcile three different promises in the search result, the main heading and the content.

Make the title specific to the page

Write a concise, descriptive title that distinguishes the page from others on your site. Avoid vague labels and repeated keyword lists. Google’s title-link guidance recommends descriptive titles and explains that it can use several sources to generate the displayed search title.

That displayed title is not entirely under your control. If it differs from your title element, inspect the page’s visible heading, prominent text and other signals before assuming a penalty or technical fault.

Make the heading structure useful

Give the page a clear main heading and use subheadings to organise the explanation. Choose heading levels for the document structure, not just because a particular tag looks large in the theme.

The title and heading should describe the same subject, but they do not need to be identical word for word. Neither does the URL need to repeat the full title. Changing an established address merely to make those strings match creates migration work without establishing a benefit.

Don’t turn a historical checklist into a universal rule

The recording applied old publisher guidance too broadly. A historical word-count range is not a universal title limit, and linked headings are not inherently wrong. A linked heading in an article listing can be useful navigation. Judge it by its purpose and whether the destination is clear.

Likewise, write image alternatives to describe the image’s relevant meaning, rather than inserting a target phrase regardless of what the image shows.

This article is not a current Google News eligibility or submission guide. Google confirmed in March 2025 that publication pages became automatically generated and eligible content is considered automatically, so old approval steps, publishing quotas and publisher-account requirements should not be treated as current instructions. See Google’s current Publisher Center transition guidance (checked 10 September 2026).

Check the page that customers actually see

Review the rendered title and headings, not just the fields in your CMS. Then check that the content fulfils their promise. If a template repeats the same title across different pages, fix the template and inspect representative results.

For a broader review, use our SEO audit checklist or discuss the site through our SEO service.