Abstract
In the current media world, there is a huge debate about the importance of the visibility of a news website in order to secure its existence. Thus, search engine optimization (SEO) practices have emerged in the news media systems around the world. This study aimed to expand the current literature about the SEO practices by focusing on examining, via the walkthrough method, the ways that news companies allow the users to comment on their online news articles. The comments on the news websites are related to the notions of social influence, information diffusion, and play an essential role as a SEO practice, for instance, by providing content and engagement. The examined sample was collected by the most visited news websites’ rankings of alexa.com for a global scale and for the countries Greece and Cyprus. The findings reveal that the news websites throughout the globe use similar features and ways to support the comments of the users. In the meantime, though, a high number of the news websites did not allow the users to use their social media accounts in order to comment the provided news articles, or provided multiple comment platforms. This trend goes against the SEO practices. It is believed that this finding is associated with the difficulty of the news organizations to regulate and protect themselves by the users’ comments that promote, in some case harmful rhetoric and polarization.
Highlights
The developments of technology, one of which is the Internet, have made a plethora of scholars focus their research on these transformations
The search engine optimization (SEO) practices of the news websites regarding the comments on the websites are supposed to be an essential factor for the popularity of the websites
The users provide free of charge, fresh and robust content, which, in some cases, provokes interactions, further engagement, and the users spend more time on the website
Summary
The developments of technology, one of which is the Internet, have made a plethora of scholars focus their research on these transformations. Some studies proved that social influence could be more essential for women at the beginning of the information process It may be essential in mandatory settings and it seemed to be more influential on old-aged workers. It was clear from the early stages of the research that social influences can change beliefs, ideas, behaviors, etc. The use of the Internet became the main research topic of several studies, as there was a need to explore in depth, its capabilities, and to try to predict what changes it would bring in the future for the fields of information, communication, and the social capital in a broader sense. The more people obtain information regarding political affairs via online networks, application, tools, etc., the more their participation in relation to political and social issues is increased [18]
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