How to Improve Your Clients’ Position on SERP

BY Kathy Crosett
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If your clients are obsessed with their position on SERP (search engine results pages), that’s great. Just make sure they are focusing on the search-​related features that are most likely to improve outcomes. Your clients know that the higher position they achieve on the SERP, the more likely they will be to score a click and, possibly, a sale.

All businesses face challenges in figuring out how to drive up their position on the SERP. At the same time, Google, where most search activity occurs, is constantly changing its algorithm to grow its own business. Analysts say the following factors are increasingly important in Google’s search realm.

Increasing Number of No-​Click Searches

In it search study of 250 million clicks, Perficient Digital reported the following outcomes:

  • 134 million organic clicks 53.6%
  • 11.3 million paid clicks 4.5%
  • 102 million no clicks 41.9%

That no-​click number in this study is dishearteningly high. And it doesn’t help to know that analysts found that mobile-​only no-​clicks made up nearly 55% of search outcomes in the study.

Outcomes are a bit different for branded searches. Here, we’re talking about a search string that includes a brand name, like Apple. When consumers search using a brand name, and the SERP puts that brand’s site in the first position on the list, the CTR is 70%.

While that number’s a bit better, marketers and analysts both want to know why so many people are searching and then not clicking. It turns out that some of what shows up in a Google search may give people the information they want. For example, a featured snippet often answers the searcher's question.

Understanding the Position on SERP

When a marketer has the right content in place, they’ll achieve top ranking by Google. Search results no longer appear only as a list of links. These days, Google displays marketer content in a number of ways on SERP. As consumers check out the results of their search terms, they’ll click on the following types of search assets that Google calls out on its pages:

  • Related searches 95%
  • People also ask 85%
  • Knowledge graph 65%
  • Video carousel 65%
  • Ads 25%

To tap into the high interest being shown for video carousels, analysts recommend that your client gets their videos traction by featuring them in blogs and getting third parties to embed it in their sites. This kind of activity attract Google’s attention and drives your videos higher up on the results lists. There’s also no substitute for high quality content. When your clients prove their authority on a specific subject, that content might show up on featured snippets and “People Also Ask Boxes.” The only detail we know for sure is that quality content is one factor that the Google algorithm considers when it feature a business site on a knowledge graph or any of its other types of search results.

The bottom line is that consumers who read a specific piece of content are “131% more likely to buy from a brand” than those that don’t. Work with your clients to develop high quality and unique content on their sites. To learn more about consumers who take action as a result of their search findings, check out the AudienceSCAN profiles available at AdMall by SalesFuel.


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