Case: News sitemap window fix restored Top Stories
A publisher's Google News sitemap listed articles older than 48 hours and exceeded 1,000 URLs. It got rejected.
What we did:
— Limited the news sitemap to articles from the last 48 hours
— Capped at 1,000 URLs; trimmed oldest first
— Added required <news:publication_date> in correct W3C format
Measured outcome over 3 weeks:
— News sitemap accepted: yes (was being skipped)
— Articles appearing in Top Stories: 0 → 40+ per week
Checklist:
✅ Only articles under 48h old
✅ Max 1,000 URLs in the news sitemap
✅ Valid W3C publication_date per entry
Definition of done: every entry is under 48h old with a valid publication_date, file under 1,000 URLs.
The Sitemap SOP
@SitemapSOP
Case: News sitemap window fix restored Top Stories
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