How Google SERP Features Negatively Impact Business?

If you want to improve your website's visibility on Google, you'll want to pay close attention to Google SERP features. Over the past few years, Google has made strides to provide users with a more efficient and user-friendly search experience. 

As a result, they've been incorporating more SERP features into their search results pages. In this article, seobase explores the different types of Google SERP features and how you can use them to boost your rankings and attract more users to your brand.

SERP Enemy #1: Google Shopping and Popular Products

Google SERP features have become increasingly prominent in recent years, and in 2022, they're more pervasive than ever. For businesses focused on transactional search queries, the SERP can look like a marketplace with a range of Google-controlled features, from above-the-fold PPC and Google Shopping ads to organic results for Google Shopping and Popular Products. To compete in this environment, businesses must understand how to boost their rankings using these SERP features. While they're influenced by ad spend and algorithmic signals, there are strategies companies can use to improve their visibility and attract more users to their brand.

How can Google Shopping and Popular Products negatively impact your business?

The rise of Google SERP features like organic and paid Shopping results has had a negative impact on traditional browsing behavior. Previously, users would click through to various websites to browse products, allowing site owners to curate offerings, build brand awareness, gather valuable user data, and re-engage non-converting users through remarketing campaigns.  However, with more users staying on the SERP to browse products, businesses may see lower click-through rates from organic users with high purchase intent. To combat this, businesses must understand how to leverage these SERP features to boost their rankings and attract more site users. 

How to adapt your SEO strategy for Google Shopping and Popular Products?

To boost your rankings and take advantage of Google SERP features like Popular Products, business can ensure their products are listed in these features. If you're already advertising through Google Shopping with a product feed, your listing can appear in both the paid and organic Shopping features.  However, even if you're not advertising through Google Shopping, you can still upload your product feed to show up in the organic results. This strategy can help improve your visibility and attract more users to your site, ultimately driving sales and revenue. A simple and effective tactic for businesses looking to boost their rankings through Google SERP features is to ensure their organic listing has compelling thumbnails.  With more desktop results featuring images and product imagery playing a vital role in transactional SERPs, it's crucial to have eye catching thumbnails that stand out.  Factors like image, quality, alt text, and more should be considered to optimize your pages and images for organic thumbnails. Businesses can improve their visibility and attract more clicks by taking these steps, driving traffic and sales.

SERP Enemy #2: Featured Snippets and People Also Ask (PAA)

For lead-generation brands, Google's emphasis on product feeds in its SERPs may not be a significant concern. However, for brands with complex sales cycles. In addition, to the need to build trust through robust content strategies, there's another category of SERP features to consider.  These strategies rely on effectively answering questions and solving problems for qualified audiences, which is where Google comes in. By leveraging Google's SERP features, brands can boost their rankings and attract more qualified leads by providing valuable information and solutions to their target audience.

How can Featured Snippets and PAA negatively impact your business?

Featured snippets are a key Google SERP feature impacting your organic search rankings. They appear above the fold when Google identifies a question and answer intent related to the searcher query. Featured snippets often appear for queries with who - what - where - when - why - how. In addition, they can displace and push down the "true" #1 organic result.  This means that your site's most relevant, authoritative, and helpful content may be supplanted by a snippet that more concisely and directly answers a specific question related to the search. Also, you'll need to optimize your content to answer common questions and provide helpful solutions. Featured snippets have a few potential negative impacts on search results. For instance, users might not click through to further search results since the featured snippet provides a sufficient answer to their query. This leads to zero click searches, which could make up a quarter of all searches on Google.  Alternatively, users may only be partially satisfied with the answer provided by the featured snippet and click through to the result, bypassing potentially more relevant results further down the SERP. Google's FAQ feature, People Also Ask, can have similar negative impacts by answering questions directly in Google that could otherwise be answered on a website. 

How to adapt your SEO strategy for Featured Snippets and PPA

• First, pay attention to featured snippets and PPAs. 

Focus on featured snippets, and People Also Ask (PPA) results to enhance your SEO strategy. Utilize tools. For example, SEMrush and Ahrefs track the presence of these SERP features on specific keywords. Analyze the keyword profiles of your critical website pages to determine the number of SERPs featuring featured snippets and PPAs. Evaluate whether your content is winning these placements or whether competitors with less relevant content outperform you.

• Second,  pay close attention to your brand searches.

It's vital to closely monitor brand related search queries. For example, "How does your brand solution work?", "How much does your brand solution cost?" and "[Your brand solution] reviews."  Surprisingly, some clients overlook these keywords, leading to third-party sites featuring incorrect or unfavorable information through featured snippets and PPA.  This opportunity can be quickly seized by optimizing your pages and intentionally focusing on these queries. It's the lowest-hanging fruit, so don't miss out on the chance to win those positions.

• Finally, create your own PPA through FAQ schema. 

In May 2019, Google introduced FAQ schema-driven rich snippets. This feature lets you display two or three FAQ results beneath your organic listing.  Utilizing this feature can make your result more prominent and highlight specific, relevant questions your audience is most interested in. This is an excellent opportunity to stand out from the competition and present your content in a more targeted and effective way.  Additionally, with your expertise, you can potentially provide better and more informative answers than the Google algorithm. 

Google SERP Features: Conclusion

In conclusion, Google SERP features can make or break your SEO performance. Still, the proper optimization strategies can also help boost your rankings and drive breakthrough results for your business.  At seobase, our SEO strategists have extensive experience developing and deploying meaningful SERP feature optimizations for clients across multiple industries.  So, if you want to improve your SERP features google performance and know how to boost rankings with SERP features, feel free to contact us today. Whether you prefer to call us, use our online form, or leave a comment below, we'd love to help you take your SEO game to the next level.