Get to the Top of Google – 5 Ways to Optimize for Featured Snippets
Understanding how to optimize for featured snippets is a crucial aspect of SEO in 2022 and beyond. These short snippets of text at the top of Google results are the first thing seen by most people and are a great way to get your content ranked as high as it can be.
Table of contents:
- What are Featured Snippets?
- Reach Position Zero! 5 Ways To Optimize For Featured Snippets
- Featured Snippets are Powerful Tools
Once you learn how to get featured snippets for your content, you’re well on your way to boosting your traffic as high as you want! This article will show you the most effective ways to optimize types of featured snippets and get your content to the top of the list.
What are Featured Snippets?
Simply put, Featured Snippets are the informative boxes that appear at the very top of a Google search in order to get an immediate answer. This featured snippet content is pulled from the highest-ranking websites in the index and often includes things like definitions, lists, tables, steps, and more.
This is also known as “position zero” since it appears above the actual search results themselves. Understanding how to obtain featured snippets will ensure that your content will be seen more often!
4 Types of Featured Snippets
1. Definition Box
Aptly named, the definition box displays whenever you ask Google to define a word or phrase. It gives immediate information and links to the dictionary it pulled from. This provides a simple, easy to comprehend box that gives an immediate answer for anyone.
2. Table
The table appears when Google shows you specific information in a table or graph form, like the female tennis player ranking example below. This is often useful for a variety of different data-based searches.
3. List
Any how-to or progression-based process typed into Google will typically have a list generated, explaining exactly how to perform whatever you asked of Google. This means that making your content in the form of lists is often a very simple and effective way to increase your chances of getting a featured snippet!
4. Video
All kinds of content can display relevant videos. These videos will be immediately apparent when you make a search that has one! Videos are one of the best ways to learn how to rank for featured snippets.
How Do Featured Snippets Help My Business?
Featured Snippets have a great potential for expanding the traffic and SEO ranking of a given website. By getting your content in a featured snippet, you all but ensure that you will become the last word for that particular search!
There are a variety of reasons you should concern yourself with getting a featured snippet, if possible:
• An increase in your Click-Through-Rate (CTR)
• An increased rate of traffic to your site
• An increase in brand recognition due to the exposure
• An increase in credibility since the featured snippet contains trustworthy, relevant information.
Get to the top of Google search results with the best long tail SEO strategy!
Reach Position Zero! 5 Ways to Optimize for Featured Snippets
The highly-coveted ‘position zero’ is something that will be a massive impact on the fundamental power of your website and business as a whole. As such, securing a position zero is incredibly desirable for businesses of all kinds!
1. Research Keywords
Keywords will always be the backbone of proper SEO techniques. Researching the best keywords for your business and for the situation at hand is absolutely essential, and attempting to get a featured snippet is no different. Researching keywords that typically appear inside snippets is a great way to increase your chances of success.
While you can do this manually, using SEO tools such as Ahrefs and SEMrush will increase your precision and power in your research process. SEMrush, for instance, has an exceptional guide on featured snippets that will greatly help this process.
With SEMrush, the data you are looking for will be on the dashboard, after you have input a domain to search. You will immediately see the total keywords which have featured snippets:
By keeping up with your competition in this way, you will maximize the chances your content sees the featured snippet position! Be sure to focus as much as you can on long tail keywords and questions that involve the keywords at hand.
2. Check the Type of Featured Snippet
Google is always trying to see which type of snippet is most appropriate for the content at hand. It will usually tailor its snippet type depending on the keyword, so learning which keywords generate which snippets is crucial to the overall effectiveness of your strategy.
If Google prefers one type of keyword or phrase for one type of snippet, you should tailor your content to the snippet you are trying to get access to.
3. Create Content for Chosen Keywords
Another universal SEO strategy also applies here: by creating content specifically for the selected keywords, you maximize your chances of getting the desired effects of your strategy.
Write content that answers the queries that your customers have. The EAT principle (Expertise, Authority, Trustworthiness) has a major effect on the way Google sees your content!
Find out more about creating content in 2022!
Another important consideration is the length of featured snippets. Google will only show so much of your content, so optimizing that small window is important. Averaging 54-58 words of text total (but often smaller), featured snippets are short and to the point.
4. Structure and Optimize Your Content
Once again mostly a general SEO best practice, having your content optimized properly makes it much more favorable for Google to work its magic. Using your keywords scattered across your text is simply the beginning – utilizing proper headings and subheadings, maintaining short, dynamic paragraphs, and using lists and bullet points are all ways to improve the readability of your content.
User experience is key, so never forget that easy to read and consumer-friendly articles will always generate more traffic and interest.
Find out more about creating content that both users and Google will love –https://delante.co/how-to-write-user-oriented-content/
Don’t neglect your images as well: optimized images using proper tags (and keywords within the tags) are another key way to get Google on your side.
5. Add Structured Data
Structured Data and schema markups are other essential aspects of proper SEO management.
Schema Markups are microdata that you can add to your website which helps search engines read and improve your content and the way it’s displayed to users. This will allow Google to better recognize and understand your content in order for it to give your material the best chance to create Featured Snippets.
Featured Snippets are Powerful Tools
To rank for featured snippets you need to optimize your website’s content in a certain way. If you manage to achieve the zero position you are giving yourself a high boost in traffic and click-through rates.
Featured snippets are the first thing anyone sees (position zero, after all!) and they are usually the conclusion to any given search for most people. Getting your content featured in as many snippets as possible will dramatically increase your site’s web presence and increase your ranking greatly!
Would you like to see your website at the top of Google search? Contact us and we can make it happen!
