Stories will appear on sites like Instagram – all thanks to the new WordPress plugin

Last year Google introduced a new format for promoting content – Web Stories and released tools for creating stories that can be added to sites. The search giant has now updated its official WordPress plugin to include the ability to embed this kind of content on web pages.

Since its launch, the Web Stories plugin has offered storytelling tools, but when it comes to embedding the content they’ve created, you have to figure it out yourself. Now WordPress site administrators can create web stories and embed them using the same tool. The plugin update also includes the ability to import stories from other sites. Besides the fact that this process has been greatly simplified, Web Stories allows you to integrate stories with the classic editor and make them match the site design settings.

In order to add stories to WordPress pages, you need to start by inserting a block that gives you three story options to choose from: Recent, Featured, and Individual. The site owner is then asked to choose how they would like to display their stories: carousel, grid, or list. This content will appear wherever blocks can be used.

The Web Stories plugin provides built-in integration for all core WordPress themes by default. It’s worth noting that some third-party themes also offer web stories integration. Among them are Astra, Neve and Newspack. This may encourage site administrators to use such content more frequently, which is an effective way to diversify traffic sources. Web Stories appear in search results and more recently on Google Discover in the US, India and Brazil. If this Google initiative pays off, Web Stories will be launched in other countries as well. But the company immediately warned that they should not be abused to promote other content, because the stories will not rank in search results.

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