Google Search may not be showing news boxes, like top stories, for some election types of queries. So if you search for [iowa caucus] or [2024 United States primary elections] and others don't seem to trigger news boxes.
Will Flannigan and Shalom Goodman posted about this on X, both said that this is the first time Google is not showing news boxes for these types of queries. Will and Shalom would know, they work in the SEO department at the Wall Street Journal.
This is what I see:
Here is what they posted on X:
@Will_Flannigan flagged this https://t.co/EOi3oSQw6M
— Shalom Goodman (@ShalomGood) January 15, 2024
This might be a big deal for some news publishers over the coming months during, as the election season heats up.
One more note on this... According to @NewsDashboard data, news boxes stopped appearing on the "Iowa Caucus" desktop and mobile SERPs after Jan. 12, three days before the election took place. pic.twitter.com/6Shd6DvDBT
— Will Flannigan 🌵 (@Will_Flannigan) January 17, 2024
Forum discussion at X.
Update: A week or so later, some are now seeing top stories for these queries. Maybe it was a bug?
Unlike the Iowa caucuses, a search for the NH primary results now shows Top Stories under the AP functionality that Google is using now. Top Stories was not present last week when searching for the Iowa results. Today I searched for both "primary results" and "NH primary results"… pic.twitter.com/ZJFozXcVMr
— Glenn Gabe (@glenngabe) January 23, 2024
