How to Optimize Your Content for Google’s Featured Snippets

How to Optimize Your Content for Google’s Featured Snippets?

Most websites on the webspace compete to rank on the first page of Google. That’s how these sites can get organic traffic to their website. But, getting to the #1 spot is certainly not easy.

You need to constantly work on your SEO strategies and marketing tactics. But, what if we tell you that there is a simple way to outrank the number one position even if you are not ranking at the top?

Do you want to know how you can do that?

Well, the answer is simple, by creating a featured snippet that is a block of information that ranks at position #0.

What Are Featured Snippets?

Google picks selected search results and displays it when someone types in a search query to answer the user’s question right away.

Featured snippets are also known as small answer boxes that you see when you type a question. When you get featured in snippets, your brand or site gets added brand exposure in the search result.

Featured snippets are also called position zero snippets.

For instance, when you type, ‘why the sky is blue’, you will get a Para featured snippet at the top along with an image. However, the image source can be different from the actual source of the answer.

Featured snippets make online search simple as the user gets the answer at the top position. Google, by default, picks the best answer from third-party websites as snippets. They provide a good option to improve the click-through-rate of a new website. Also, if the snippets are well-optimized, they’ll drive traffic to the site.

Tips For Optimizing Content For Google’s Featured Snippets

1] Paragraph

Paragraph snippet is the precise answer to the query of the user (searcher). When you enter any question on Google and see the exact para at the top of the page; that is the formatted version of the snippet.

It is the most popular form of snippets that encompasses more than 50% of results. These kinds of snippets answer questions like when, what, and where and plays an important role in ranking if you optimize it correctly. Also, Google includes a source text along with the answer.

2] Table

This kind of snippet considers a comparison chart or table. It shows content that is created in tabular form. If the content is created with different years and price list, then Google values the structure of the written tabular form.

It also takes into consideration different kinds of numerical data. The best part about the snippet is Google optimizes it for the query.

So, you don’t have to manually optimize it for the snippet. There isn’t a particular way to optimize for table snippet apart from creating the data in a tabular form. You can also start with a great heading to make it more engaging.

3] List

List content appears in numbers or bulleted form that answers a searcher’s query. It shows up in a step-by-step or process-driven intend. Most recipes fall under this category.

It is a common type of snippet that encompasses more than 37% of the snippet results. If you type rules or any content related to it, you’ll get to see a list of rules displayed at the top.

Numbered featured snippet is more organized, and most DIY queries fall under this category.

Bullet featured snippet is used to optimize specific content pages on your website. For optimizing such type of content, you need to include a question in the heading and summarize it in a list form.

4] Accordion

These kinds of snippets appear in hidden tabs. You need to click on this to retrieve the content. It provides answers to the searcher’s query and is presented with additional information. The user can choose to expand the option to get more details about the topic searched for.

5] Video

Videos have become a popular form of featured snippet today. Most search results show videos at the top of the page. They always show up at position zero. The reach of videos has grown as most people prefer watching a video than reading a text.

When you optimize a video for ranking in SERP, it will also help to boost traffic on your website. When a user searches for a query on Google, it searches for all the relevant clips and displays at the top of the search results.

A video could also be a possible answer to the searcher’s query. For optimizing video, you need to upload the relevant scripts. You also need to add a description along with long-tail keywords.

5] Answer (Rich)

Rich answer featured snippet is a short call out in which the possible answer is featured with added information. It offers a specific answer to the user’s query that is often highlighted in a bold font.

This possibly manifests for all the questions that have a metric based answer. Dictionary definitions are a common type of answer snippets. If you type any word for meaning, you’ll get the exact answer for the word. It also features other factual based questions that a user asks about miles or distance.

6] Tools

Tools provide output user specific answers to the searcher’s query. It often appears as a high level and concrete queries. The questions are related to calculators, conversions, weather, and time zones.

To Sum up,

You can optimize your content for featured snippets by optimizing the target question-based queries. You don’t have to use schema for it. You need to organise the structure of your content by focusing on para, headings, and tags.

Take a definitive style approach for all the non-question-based keywords. When it is applicable, it is important to include the problem-solving steps.

The content should be precise and should have a dynamic approach. Along with focusing on backlinks, you need to pay attention to complete optimization to boost your ranking.