WebProNews

Google News had a record week in the UK last week. Hitwise attributes this largely to a big week for celebrity news.

"Last week was a bumper week for celebrity news stories (unfortunately for sad reasons in many cases), and Google News UK was a top recipient for many of the most popular terms," says Hitwises's Robin Goad. "The site was the second biggest recipient of UK searches for ‘patrick swayze’ and ‘kanye west’ (picking up 8.25% and 8.26% of traffic respectively), third for ‘katie price’ (9.29%) and fourth for ‘keith floyd’ (5.28%)."

According to Hitwise, last week was Google News UK's busiest week ever, with visits increasing 71% and the site ranking 28th most popular overall (up from 46th the previous week).

Google News also got a good deal of attention last week when Google formally announced Google Fast Flip, a new way for users to read the news in a more visual, magazine-like way. This feature is still in "lab" status, and is not a full-fledged feature of Google News yet, but it has received mixed reviews.

Another piece of Google News-related news is that Google has recently started distinguishing between blogs and other news sources in a new way. I would have to say this system is a bit flawed though. More on that here.

As Google News reaches new heights in popularity in the UK, UK publishers may want to consider some SEO tips for ranking on the site. In addition, Google News has recently added real-time suggestions.