Long, long ago, people only did their business in physical, brick-and-mortar stores. Or garage sales.
Then came the internet with its search engines. Those people who owned brick-and-mortar stores began to worry that all business would be done online, and there would be no place for them. They would come to learn, however, that e-commerce would not replace physical stores. Huzzah! In fact, many store owners (and garage sellers) are the beneficiaries of business getting done both in-person and online.
Now, almost 60 percent of Google searches end without a click, in large part thanks to the increased prevalence of SERP (search engine results page) features. So, many business owners who get much of their business through Google are feeling much like those brick-and-mortar store owners of olde.
We’re here to put you at ease. Just as the internet didn’t replace physical stores, Google SERP features are not going to destroy your organic search traffic. Things have not gotten definitively better or worse for businesses on Google—just different.
Ever the optimists, we see this new iteration of the ever-changing SEO landscape as an opportunity to rise above other organic search results by optimizing for SERP features which have higher clickthrough rates.
What Is a SERP Feature?
“SERP” is just a fancy way of describing the page that shows up when you type something into Google. You’ve seen it a million times, even if you didn’t know its name, but now you do.
Google SERP features have become increasingly important for search visibility as search results evolve. These search engine results that are featured prominently on these search results pages don’t just mean being the top result—SERP features actually have a dedicated UI that makes the result stand out.
Why Do SERP Features Matter?
Understanding how to optimize for SERP features is crucial for business visibility in search engines today. Learning the different Google SERP features lets you optimize your content effectively, which could be the difference between reaching your customers or your website collecting internet tumbleweeds. You don’t need to look it up, they’re a thing. Trust us. We’re geniuses.
AI Overview
The newest SERP feature, Google’s AI overviews, provides AI-generated answers to queries while providing links to the original source. Added in May 2024, Google began integrating AI features powered by Gemini, their chatbot that they developed in-house. Google has said they want to “let Google do the searching for you,” to which many responded, “What does that even mean?”
This feature was generally unpopular when first rolled out due to a series of obviously incorrect answers to prompts. These are called hallucinations, which is where an AI chatbot more or less makes things up. Some of the more publicized examples include the AI overview suggesting users should use glue to get cheese to stick to their pizza, and to run with scissors as a form of exercise. Google quickly snuffed out these more publicized gaffes, removing the AI overview feature for queries that triggered these responses, and users got used to them in the months since.
The reason this SERP feature in particular is so important is that organic click-through rates on results pages that feature an AI overview plummet to 0.84 percent when they would otherwise be 2.94 percent. One way to look at that statistic is that businesses publishing content to try to rank on Google are in trouble. But it’s essential to remember that AI overviews link to their sources, and getting featured in an AI overview increases organic click-through rates from 0.6 percent to 1.08 percent. In short, this feature is a boon to sites that are featured at the expense of those that aren’t.
How to Be Featured in AI Overviews
AI overviews are largely responses to specific queries, rather than short-tail keywords. The average query that leads to an AI overview is longer than four words. You can use tools like SEMRush to find out exactly what questions people are searching for the most, and write blog content that answers those questions. Be sure to answer users’ questions as high up on your page or post as possible.
Featured Snippet
Featured snippets are the gold standard of SERP features. They display copy from a website at the top of a search results page while prominently displaying a link to the site as the source of that information.
There are a couple of benefits to being included in a featured snippet rather than an AI overview. For one, your SEO title (the blue link), URL, name, and logo are all visible even without the user interacting with the feature in any way. That makes impressions from featured snippets much more valuable than those from AI overviews because users would never see your branding in an AI overview unless they clicked the link icon and went to your site. Second, the text is taken verbatim from your website, removing the risk of AI hallucinations.
Yes, earlier we mentioned that Google got rid of many of those more notable hallucinations, but they still happen. In fact, a Mad Genius employee was recently Googling a commercial we made, and an AI overview said that Ewan McGregor starred in that commercial. That is, of course, ridiculous. Mr. McGregor hasn’t been in any of our commercials since our highly publicized falling out.
How to Be Featured in Featured Snippets
Provide expertise. More than once in the past year, Google has alluded to prioritizing “quality content.” Vague as that may be, they’re cutting down on spam and AI-generated content (unless it’s their overviews), in favor of primary sources.
Image
These are largely self-explanatory. An image SERP feature displays images from a given page next to the organic result. These are especially useful for businesses that heavily rely on e-commerce. Selling a physical product online can often come with its challenges, and the sooner you can show off your product through imagery instead of text, the better.
How to Be Featured in Featured Snippets
Include a featured image in your content. Especially for blog posts, make use of the featured image tool on WordPress. Search engines categorize these differently than just adding an image at the top of the page in whatever editor you’re using.
Image Pack
An image pack is similar to the image SERP feature, but includes more, and links directly to the images tab of a search engine. The layout is almost identical to that of Google images, but it appears in the “All” tab, where most searches happen.
How to Be Featured in Image Packs
Include alternate text in your website’s images. Alternate text is a bare-bones, simply written description of the image’s contents. They improve accessibility, as visually impaired users can use text-to-voice tools to listen to descriptions of your site’s images, but they’re also very much in search engines’ favor. If you have an imagery-heavy site or an ecommerce site full of product images, try to add alternate text to as many images as possible and watch your number of image SERPs improve.
People Also Ask
These are in response to, specifically, queries that are phrased as a question. They’re a way of providing users with information in the form of a dropdown menu that has a relevant question that opens into an answer and link from a given site. When a user clicks on a “people also ask” feature, a few more relevant queries will appear at the bottom of the list, presenting users with more opportunities to find increasingly specific information, which leads to higher click-through rates. The average clickthrough rate on Google is 1.91 percent, but on the “people also ask” feature, it’s three percent.
How to Be Featured in People Also Ask
Same as with rich snippets and AI overviews, answer the question in the first paragraph. Or better yet, have an FAQ page (or at least a section of a page) on your website. This SERP feature is meant to mirror the typical FAQ accordion format that we all know and love. Have some FAQs and try adding some FAQ structured data (if you’re bold).
Sitelink
A sitelink featured snippet includes not just the SEO title, URL, and meta description, like typical organic search results, but also links to any relevant internal pages.
How to Be Featured in Sitelink
Make page titles search terms and try to improve domain authority. Make sure your sitemap is indexed, which you can check using Google Search Console.
Local Pack
The local pack, of course, applies primarily to local search queries. The example below was a feature for the Google search “lawyers near me.” It includes business names, addresses, images, price ranges, reviews, and their location on Google Maps.
How to be Featured in Local Packs
Create a Google Business Profile (if you don’t have one already). Without a Google Business Profile, you’re not going to show up on Google Maps, and you won’t show up in local packs. Getting your Google Business Profile verified can be a tedious process, but well worth it. You might have to be on a video call with a Google representative and then walk outside to show that you are running the business that you say you are (yes, seriously). Especially if you are heavily reliant on in-person business, appearing in local packs is a must. So hold your nose and set up your Google business profile.
Knowledge Panel
Knowledge panels are pieces of information that appear on the right-hand side of the search engine results page.
How to Be Featured in Featured Snippets
You’ll most likely see these when looking up public figures like athletes, celebrities, or successful business people. But it’s not exclusive to famous people. If you’re a freelancer or an artist with an individual portfolio site, it may be a heavy lift, but it is possible if you add some structured data to your site, and build up enough domain authority through backlinks.
SERP Features Are Your Friend
Having your site included in SERP features is a lofty goal, but a worthwhile endeavor. Being positioned higher on the page and having higher clickthrough rates than typical organic results are both great reasons to optimize your content for SERP features.
SERP isn’t just a fun word to say aloud, it’s how businesses are getting seen online. Whether you’re targeting featured snippets, knowledge panels, or other Google SERP features, optimizing your content can mean a massive boost to your search traffic. Want to learn more about implementing these optimization strategies? Of course, you do. Fill the form below to connect with a genius today to learn how Mad Genius can help.