If you’ve been browsing the internet for any length of time, you’ve probably seen a number of web pages that featured Google’s Featured Snippets. These box-like snippets show up in response to searches and exist to offer helpful information quickly.
This article is a guide to optimizing your site for the Featured Snippets.
The featured snippets are a new addition to the SERPs (search engine results pages), which are pages that display search engine results. They complement the organic listings that you see on the first page of Google Search, and exist to provide helpful information fast.
You may have noticed featured snippets appear in places like inboxes and mobile search results, but they can also show up as clickable spots where you don’t intend them to be. For instance, if you type “Denver restaurants” into Google Maps, a Featured Snippet appears on the map.
What Are Featured Snippets?
While featured snippets differ in some ways, they share a lot of similarities. They are generally:
Short: They are short and to the point, often including just one answer or fact.
High quality: They exist to provide high-quality information in an easy-to-find way.
Specific: They don’t give a lot of room for interpretation, since they aim to help people by providing facts that directly answer the question at hand.
We can sort featured snippets into two categories – generic snippets and entity snippets. Entity snippets show up for questions about things like restaurants or movies, and are usually just a few lines long.
Generic Snippets: Generic snippets are the bread-and-butter of featured snippets. They usually show up as Q&A snippets or answer boxes. They provide straightforward answers that you can see when you type in a search question. You should make sure to target these snippets since they are likely to be the most common.
Entity Snippets: Entity snippets are short phrases that pertain to an entity (a thing, place, organization, company, or person.) Google has expanded its featured snippets quite a bit in recent years and has started showing up for more entity types than just restaurant and movie queries.
How to rank for more featured snippets
There are certain things you can do to help your website rank for more featured snippets.
Identify the most common queries that potential customers perform and make sure you have the best answer for them. Make sure your content is detailed enough to be helpful but not so much that it turns away readers who may be looking for a quick answer.
Be sure to keep contact information up-to-date on your website, as featured snippets often feature people in a role, such as a photographer or a restaurant owner, who might need additional information. You can also contact Google directly to see if they can help with search ratings such as star ratings, which could increase your chances of getting featured snippets in this instance.
Types Of Featured Snippets You Can Target
There are three major types of featured snippets:
*Paragraph
*List
*Table
Paragraph: These snippets are some of the most straightforward. They provide a paragraph-style answer to your question.
For example, if you type in “how to lose weight fast” this is what you would see:
List: These types of snippets give a list of answers. The answers can be arranged in order by importance, alphabetically or numerically. Here is what happens when I type “what to donate to charity” into Google:
Table: These snippets provide information in table format and incorporate images as well.
How featured snippets influence search and SEO
Featured snippets, the 24/7 real-time response to users’ search queries that appear on their search results pages and in some other places, are great indicators of customer satisfaction. As Google has expanded its use of them, it is clear that webmasters must focus on optimizing their websites for them.
Google has reported that featured snippets were responsible for 66% of the growth in organic search traffic from 2013–2014. Since most people don’t interact with the organic listings on the top page of Google’s results page, snackers are helping to draw new customers to your website without having to click through an advertisement.
What should be your strategy while choosing keywords for your content?
So, What Should Be Your Strategy While Choosing Keywords For Your Content? In its latest update for the Mobile-first Index, Google has announced its new ranking algorithm.
What this means is that mobile content will have a 50% weightage in Google’s new ranking algorithm while desktop content will have a 50% weightage in it. However, the mobile content and the desktop content will be considered separately. What this means is that your mobile content may rank higher than your desktop client if the latter fails to match the former by 50%. This can be a great boon for small businesses that invest in local SEO.
How do I find good Google keywords?
Having a good understanding of the vital aspects of search engine optimization is crucial for making your website more visible on Google. There are certain things you need to look for when selecting relevant keywords for your website and making pages that people will want to share.
There are several different methods available for finding keywords.
You can either use a keyword suggestion tool to generate relevant keywords or follow some steps outlined below:
1) Google Trends: Google Trends is one of the most important tools in your arsenal when it comes to webmaster tools and analytics. You can use this tool to examine what people type into the Google search engines every day, along with their location, time, and more.
2) Google AdWords Keyword Planner: This is a free tool that comes with the Google AdWords toolbar, which allows you to run keyword searches and generate a keywords list
3) Local Search Console: In addition to keyword suggestions, the Local Search Console will suggest potential search phrases and phrases to target. It will also track your click-through rate and other data on your website so that you can see how many people are actually visiting your website from these keywords.
4) Google Trends: This tool can provide you with a vast array of relevant data, including trends in the types of stuff looked for on the web. The only downside about this article is that it can cost up to $100 per month to use Google Trends.
Conclusion:
With the new, constantly-updating algorithm, it has become important for the website owner to be aware of what people type into search engines and how these changes impact their rankings. You should use these keyword suggestions from the Local Search Console as a guide for making content that appeals to your potential customers.
For web users, featured snippets can appear when they’re looking for something specific. Snippets help “answer” questions like how to tie a bow tie or if smallpox has ever been eradicated. Featured snippets are shown on the search results page along with traditional organic results, on Google images, and in Google news.
