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Google Search Features Impact Organic Search CTRs

A study released Thursday from Perficient Digital analyzes how Google search features impact user click-through rate behavior. The features include related searches, People Also Ask boxes, video carousels, and knowledge graph.

The data looks at how search features impact user click-through rate behavior, with features like related searches, People Also Ask boxes, video carousels, and knowledge graph generating the highest clicks.

To analyze the impact of organic click-through rates on Google search features and consumer behavior, Perficient Digital partnered with AuthorityLabs Data Services to identify and track 2 million queries evenly divided into five categories: auto, beauty, finance, retail, and travel. Rankings were tracked daily for thirty days. The data included traditional ranking information, as well as detailed data sets showing which search features were present in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) in each daily snapshot.

The tracked search features for the study included ads, featured snippets, image carousels, job packs, knowledge graph results, local packs, news carousels, ask boxes, related searches, shopping, sitelinks, and video carousels.

As an example, the Sitelinks results at 47% suggests that searches are mostly navigational queries, helping consumers to navigate through the web. The report also cites as “interesting” the large percentage of knowledge graph results, People Also Ask boxes, and video carousels.

In aggregate, the total CTR for the top 10 results include brands at 71% and non-brands at 38%.  

Results with Featured Snippets actually get slightly higher CTR than those without them. The exact numbers are 39.6% CTR for results with featured snippets and 37.7% for results without them.

Position 1 and Position 2 have notably lower click-through rates than the average of 35.74%, but the remaining Positions 3 through Positions 10 are much higher.

Eric Enge, GM at Perficient Digital, specifically points to the differences between branded and non-branded queries.

In the report he wrote that aggregate click-through rates (CTRs) for the top 10 branded query results came in at 71.36%. Non-branded queries came in at 37.88%. As Google implements search features, the chance to obtain organic search traffic may well decline, he writes, suggesting a few options to offset the decline.

For starters, it is a good idea to learn how to modify and write content to earn featured snippets. Another opportunity is the People Also Ask boxes. The process for modifying the content is the same as in earning featured snippets. Google also is making moves toward becoming more visual.

If search professionals are trying to get job listings to show up in Google's results, Job Postings Schema should be implemented, which makes the post eligible to serve up.

For those with a physical location, optimize for local search and get the company’s name, address, and phone number accurately used across the web.

 

 

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