Tag Archives: Google rankings

News

Tech News : Google Provides Insights Into Search Rankings

Google has announced that (US first) Google Search users can click into details that show how their search-result matched certain search-terms (context), thereby giving a further tantalising glimpse into how specific rankings/search engine results are arrived at.

‘About This Result’ Panel

Google says that clicking the three dots next to most of its search engine results will now take users to the  ‘About This Result’ panel where they can see “useful context” about how Google returned results for the query, and find “helpful tips to get more out of Google Search”.

Google says that useful displaying of context is a way of showing searchers some more information about some of the most important factors used by Google Search to connect results to their queries.

Help With SEO?

Although Google has announced this latest addition to its search results as being something of value from a search engine user’s perspective in terms of relevance to “evaluate whether a result might be the one they’re looking for”, the implication is, of course, that this could possibly be reverse engineered to feed into SEO efforts.

Which Contextual Factors Are Shown?

Google says that the search ‘context’ factors that users can see by visiting the ‘About This Result’ panel include:

– Matching keywords: Used by Google to determine whether information is relevant is when a webpage contains the same keywords as a search.

– Related terms: Google looks for terms that its systems suggest that are related to the words in a query.

– Looking at links: It appears that relevant incoming links are still important as Google decides that pages linking to a page using similar words as the query, is likely to make a page more relevant to a particular search. Google says that this can also be a helpful indicator of whether online content creators seem to regard the page as useful for a particular topic (i.e. the page appears to have authority and be trusted).

– Local relevance: Google’s systems (algorithms) and a user’s given country and location, plus the language used in a search help to guide the relevance of the content delivered in the search engine results for a user’s area, even if a user does not name their location/area in a query/question that is locally focused, e.g. ‘where is the nearest recycling centre?’.

Google has already stated that factors it considers in establishing a searcher’s location include the user’s device location, a user’s labelled places, the home address (set in the Google Home app for the user’s speaker, Smart Display, or Smart Clock), a user’s Location History, previous activity across Google products, and the IP address of the user’s Internet connection.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

Clearly, getting a better understanding of just how Google decides upon its search engine rankings is of value to businesses, suppliers of digital marketing services, and even SEO software suppliers because of how it could feed into the improvement of SEO efforts. Higher rankings tend to translate into more clicks. If Google’s assertion that these new contextual insights are related to relevant choices is correct, then a better understanding of how to create pages that are relevant to specific queries (keywords and questions) could lead to more clicks, a greater likelihood of enquiries (conversions), and even more chance of getting a page in the coveted featured snippets/answer boxes at the top of the search results. For Google, this is also a tantalising new way to engage users, and even help retain them by giving them insights that may appear to be of value, and show Google to acting fairly and taking into account factors that appear to stand up to logical questioning.

News

Tech Insight – What Are Zero-Click SERPs?

In this article, we look at what a zero-click searches (SERPs) are, how this has impacted SEO, and what measures can be taken to increase the likelihood of your pages achieving featured snippets.

Zero-Click SERPs

A zero-click search describes when the search engine query is answered by a snippet of text at the top of the search engine results page (SERP).  This means that the searcher has no need to scroll down or click on any of the other search engine results for the query because it has been answered at the top without any clicks. Google introduced the feature to enable users to get instant answers to queries.

Position One Degraded

In terms of natural, organic search engine results, the introduction of a zero-click search (featured snippets) has been another step in the degradation of what would have been position one, following the introduction of pay-per-click ads, Google local listings, maps, and more.

Types of Snippets

Google doesn’t just provide short paragraph snippets for zero-click searches.  It can also answer a question by providing (for example) a bullet point list, an answer involving a conversion (dollars to pounds / kilometres to miles) where the conversion engine calculation has already been done, and more.  Zero-click search snippets can, therefore, be displayed in several formats including a paragraph, a list, a table, or even a video. The “people also ask” (PAA) boxes i.e., the section of questions with dropdown boxes just below the featured snippet also provides ranking opportunities for snippets.

Google Decides

Google’s algorithms/automated system decides which (featured) snippet, taken from its web search listings, and is displayed as a zero-click result at the top of the SERPs.

Fewer Clicks

Displaying an instant, definitive, featured snippet answer at the top of the search results page may be very good news for the page that the snippet comes from but is likely to result in significantly fewer clicks for the other pages returned as results for that key phrase. For example, Wikipedia was reported to have lost more than 20 percent of its traffic after the launch of zero-click searches and SparkToro research from 2019 showed that half of all searches are zero-click searches.

Takes Clicks From #One

Research by Ahrefs shows that the zero-click featured snippet also appears to take clicks from the #1 ranking result. 

What Are The Implications For SEO

Having a definitive answer appear at the top of the search engine results means that searchers are less likely to scroll down and click on any other links.  This makes SEO more difficult, potentially less effective for most pages, and even more competitive.  This could also mean that businesses are more likely to opt for pay-per-click to at least feature prominently on the search page and perhaps be more inclined to make more use of Google’s other suite of tools (e.g. Google My Business).

Hrefs research (based on 112 million keywords) shows that 12.29 percent of search queries have featured snippets in their search results.

What To Do

Google’s featured snippets/zero-click search results come from pages that already rank in the top10 and are mostly triggered by long-tail keywords (i.e. more specific keywords and phrases). Google’s featured snippets are also governed by a set of policies which do not necessarily apply to normal web search listings.  These policies govern things like dangerous, harmful, or hateful content or content that contradicts consensus on public interest topics. With these points in mind, increasing the chances of getting a web page featured as a possible zero-click search result means:

– Use keyword research to target question-type searches, long-tail keywords and higher CTR opportunity keywords.

– Use high-quality information-rich content that is written to be informative for people and not just written for search engine appeal.

– Make sure that pages include relevant facts and stats as these may be given greater relevance by Google.

– Use heading tags and structure the content into concise paragraphs of the kind that could be returned as a featured snippet.

– Include an FAQ section to pick up on question keywords in snippets.

– Include plenty of relevant, high-quality images with relevant text in the alt tags.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

The degradation of what used to be the number one position in the search engines has posed challenges to businesses and has created the need to employ multiple means to get noticed and get clicks. This means having to use SEO alongside PPC, social media, Google Tools and more which all adds up to time, effort, and costs.  For a business to get a zero-click search placing (a featured snippet), involves creating high-ranking pages anyway, and paying particular attention to publishing high-quality content that is based on research into real queries and questions, and incorporate stats and information that are of real value and interest.