Google partners with local publishers to bring Web Stories to Discover feed in India

Among many new features, Google is slated to bring a dedicated Web Story carousel as a part of its Discover feed. The feature is currently being launched in the US, Brazil, and India and other countries will be added in future. This will help news publishers to create their own stories with the help of free features from Google. What’s more interesting is that they will also be able to monetise these posts as well. Notably, Web Stories are similar to how “stories” at other platforms are visible and in a likely format. The only difference is that stories will not be limited to just one app and they will be found on the Web through browser. The feature can be accessed by visiting stories.google. It also includes the Web Stories Editor.

Earlier known as AMP stories, Google had launched Web Stories back in 2018 which brough Instagram and Snapchat like content and stories. For this also, the only catch for stories was that they were open on the Web and not restricted to a particular application. Companies like CNN, Conde Nast, The Washington Post, and Wired initially contributed to the content for the stories in the United States. The company said that while surfing the web on mobile devices, users do browse articles but in-depth engagement is less. Thus, inculcation of images, videos, and graphics can lead in grabbing readers’ attention in a faster way. This is also expected to keep the users engaged via immersive visual information that can be consumed easily.

Now, Google has expanded this Web Stories concept internationally and this includes India. Since stories are open, they can be viewed by anyone browsing the web. Google has recommended users to upload vertical video along with captions instead of voice overs. The text is supposed to be short- within 30 words on a single page. The stories will be available when Google Search and Google Images are used. Now, they will also be visible through Google Discover.