Tag Archive for: Digital marketing agency Chicago

3 Steps for a Successful Holiday SEO

A holiday season simply wouldn’t be complete without frantic shopping, especially online shopping. Regardless of if people are shopping on Black Friday, Cyber Monday or completely throughout the holiday shopping season, millions of customers rush to get their hands on gifts for friends and loved ones. That means retailers must be well prepared for your holiday SEO strategy.

One way to really stand out for e-commerce business owners and marketers is a top notch holiday SEO strategy. If your brand is looking to optimize for holiday-specific website traffic, here are the three main steps to take to make sure you’re ready.

A good indication of where to start for keyword research is with trends from 2020. You can find this in the Search Terms report in Google Search Console. First ask yourself:

  • Which pages generated the most traffic last year and likely to gain lots of traffic this year as well?
  • Which search queries were the most used to discover your products and deals?

After you’ve gathered this information, analyze data from other channels that your company is active on. In particular, definitely research the top referral sources — affiliates, social media websites, email campaigns. Determine which channels drove you the most conversions and prioritize them for this year’s strategy.

Google Search Console is much more suited for providing you with technical website data versus Google Analytics. Long explanation short, this tool reports how search crawlers ‘view’ your website and interact with it to explore and attempt to determine its value for users.

Identify keywords relevant for holidays

In order to have a successful SEO strategy, keyword research is an absolute must. Irrelevant keyword targeting or those with no purchase/product research intention translates to budget waste. Going after overly-competitive keywords that every other online store is after means low chances for success. To create your holiday keyword plan, we again recommend to search into historic data from last year. Did you see any interesting keywords that shoppers used to find you? A great place to look is the Google Search Console for these specific queries.

When it comes to holiday keyword research, make sure you are careful about which keywords you want to battle and win. During the holiday season, you’d need to rank fast. So don’t go after overly-competitive broach keywords such as “buy cosmetics online.” Why’s that you ask? The reason is because your company would be competing for shopper attention with carousel ad results, Amazon product listings and category pages from other national retailers.

Create landing pages for special launches

This will give you a significant leg up on SEO holiday queries. To increase your chances of showing up during the time of your holiday offers such as Black Friday and Cyber Monday-related search queries, it’s important to create pages that target relevant keywords. (That you’ve discovered during the previous step). In order to discover the best prices available for their query, users will often search for keyword combinations with “[brand name] or [product] deals, discounts, promos”.

You can research which options are trending in your product vertical using historical results from Google Trends. Depending on the industry your business is in, it may be beneficial to create a Black Friday or Cyber Monday page for each product you plan on offering at a discount.

Final thoughts

In addition to holiday SEO strategies and other digital marketing updates, we will continue to share case studies and the latest SEO updates to help you drive your business. Our goal is to ensure we help improve your marketing and drive success.

At Onimod Global, we have endless experience and expertise when it comes to all things SEO, general social media advertising, and digital marketing. Got questions about how to make the most of your SEO during the holidays or want to learn more about us? Contact us here today.

 

Google Ads Will Combine Smart and Standard Display Campaigns

As your trusted Google news source, here’s the latest update: Google is set to combine smart and standard display campaigns into a single option, announced yesterday Wednesday September 15th. And to add another change into the mix, Google also announced they will be introducing optimized targeting to Display campaigns.

 

Smart and Standard Display campaigns 101

Smart campaigns were unveiled four years ago, and they were created to help users have a simpler way to reach your audience across millions of sites and apps. Smart Display campaigns are set apart from other forms of campaigns through using automation to find new and existing customers, tailor your creative and set optimal bids.

Following up Smart campaigns, the standard Display campaigns have beneficial features such as responsive display ads and automated bidding. The point of combining the two types of campaigns means that advertisers will have the opportunity to test even more types of ads.

The new Display campaign overview

Bonnie Pericolosi, the director of product management for Google Ads says, “In this new Display campaign experience, you’ll have all of the reach and performance you’re used to, with the ability to choose the level of automation you prefer in bidding, creatives and audiences.” Now while setting up campaigns, advertisers will have the ability to choose what to automate or control manually, and they can change their automation choices at any time without having to create a new campaign.

Ginny Marvin, Google’s ads product liaison, discussed the update on Twitter, “No action is needed: Existing Smart & Standard Display campaigns aren’t affected by this change at this time. Once this update is rolled out in your account, you’ll see the new Display campaign type option and workflow when you create a new campaign.” 

 Targeting update for Google Ads Display campaigns

In addition to this change, Google Ads will also introduce optimized targeting, which treats audience settings as signals to find audience segments that may improve campaign performance, to Display campaigns. Previously, this option was only available on Smart Display campaigns.

Why advertisers should care

There will be just one option to create Google Ads Display campaigns very soon. The new Display campaign type will have the same controls for bidding, ads and audiences that standard Display campaigns currently offer. And, as Marvin stated, existing Smart and standard Display campaigns aren’t affected by this change at this time.

More From Onimod Global

As certified Google experts, our team is here to assist your business with holistic digital marketing strategies including SEO and Google Ads, because our goal is to make you more sucessful. To get in contact for an audit on your digital presence, get in touch with us here.

 

 

The Benefits of Webinars for Business

Webinars and virtual events have become a turning point for meetings and business in general, exploding during the pandemic. Let’s explore everything business professionals need to know about the benefits of hosting these successful virtual seminars.

During the pandemic, live events were canceled across the globe and businesses were forced to use the internet and wireless communication systems to replace in-person meetings. While there’s no substitute for the excitement of live events, in many cases it’s more practical for people to attend remotely. Did you know that webinars are some of the highest converting forms of marketing? 

Webinars are the next best thing to replace face-to-face interaction with customers and employees. There are very few if any besides webinars that can replace the connection that in-person interaction holds. More and more companies are realizing that without that internet presence it is hard to grow because of the easy access, each business has a complete capability of doing it. 

What is a Webinar?

Just like a seminar or convention, a webinar helps businesses bring together a wide and varied group of people, albeit over the internet. To host a webinar, you will need to find a webinar platform that will help you share your presentation with others online. This webinar software will let you create your own virtual online meeting rooms that you and your attendees will use to view and follow the presentation. Presenters can also share their desktop screens, files, and any open applications on their computer or mobile device, with their audience during the presentation.

It is worth mentioning that webinars are quite different from simple marketing videos, in that the audience follows your presentation in real time. Furthermore, the presenter and audience can engage with each other, leading to the sharing of highly insightful information.

Why Create a Virtual Event?

If you’re involved in a field such as education or public speaking, webinars and online events are probably already part of your marketing strategy. However, there are many ways that other types of businesses can benefit from webinars. Some of the key benefits for driving business include:

1. Virtual Events are Built for Engagement

Your attendees are looking for education and connection, and a webinar can provide both. can help you create that sense of connection and engagement that you miss by not being in person. Virtual events and the platforms that power them are optimized to keep conversations, ideas, and engagement flowing constantly. Webinars are truly unlike anything else; if done right, you can keep your audience engaged for hours on end and that’s something that videos put simply, struggle to do. Not only that, but your audience can also ask questions and get real-time feedback on the training.

2. Reach a Larger Audience

When it comes to trade shows, geographical location is everything. After all, you can only reach out to an audience where a particular show is happening. But that’s not the case with webinars.

One of the biggest benefits of a webinar is that it enables you to reach out to participants and sponsors anywhere in the world. There are no geographical barriers because you’re online. You can be sitting in the US while your audience is viewing you from Australia.

Anyone with an internet connection can join your webinar.

2. They Position you as an Expert in your Field

It’s a free webinar… Who cares? Well, your audience does. And just because it’s “free” doesn’t mean they’re not exchanging anything for the content.

Audiences join webinars because they want to learn. Learn more about the topic and challenges you are speaking about and learn more about the solutions to these challenges. To attend a webinar, your prospect has to register, put the date in her calendar, set aside time for the event, show up at the right time, and then give you around 1-hours of their time. They’re essentially jumping through these hoops just to listen to you talk about a certain subject; this positions you as an expert before you even start teaching the content.

3. Webinars Generate Leads

As mentioned earlier, webinars are some of the highest converting forms of marketing. One of the best reasons to create a webinar or other online event is to generate leads for your business. Webinar attendees provide information to attend your webinar. You can also have virtually unlimited attendees at a single webinar. From a bare-minimum standpoint, that’s like collecting a bunch of quality business cards.

4. Saves Time & Money

Webinars can be a great option for businesses dealing with shrinking budgets. In fact, virtual events are about 75% less expensive than in-person experiences, as hosts typically save money on staff, venue, setup and takedown, accommodations, meals, travel costs, and more. At a minimum, the only thing planners have to worry about paying for is the cost of their virtual meeting platform. Although virtual events do require some setup time (e.g. event website, registration, event marketing, and promotion, etc.) and some extra coordinating with presenters, it’s tremendously less than that of an in-person event.

To organize and host a successful webinar, you don’t need much more than a list of invitees, a webcam, some scripted content that you want to share with said audience, and a broadband connection to stream high-quality footage directly to your audience. Hiring a digital marketing expert that specializes in webinar hosting is also an invaluable tool to make sure you’re getting it right.

Host a Webinar with the experts at Onimod Global

If you want to reach out to a broad audience, and boost your engagement and conversion rate, webinars are the way forward.

If done right, webinars can be better than visiting a prospects personally or jumping on a call with them. The biggest benefit here is that it provides an online space to nurture your seasoned, quality leads. On the other hand, you can also leverage webinars to form a great first impression.

Onimod Global has helped hundreds of our clients across the United States and globe plan, set up and execute webinars to generate business in an unbeatable fashion.

Ready to take the plunge? Contact us here today. 

3 Post-Pandemic Marketing Strategies

Even though the majority of the world is still in the thick of COVID-19, it is crucial to consider what the post-COVID world is going to mean for our customers, our businesses, and the way we go about advertising and marketing. The speed at which we are “going digital” has been fully accelerated during the pandemic and has given brand new or additional power to many online industries. This past year has introduced a lot of firsts for us as a society, for example being very reliant on Amazon or Zoom to simply get through the day. This means that as digital marketers, we want to make decisions that use this new reliance on technology to our advantage. Experts at Onimod Global have formulated 3 top strategies that you can put into place to market successfully in a post-pandemic world.

1. Move everything online

If you haven’t already, this is an absolute must for post-pandemic times. Now is the time to increase your online presence. You likely already have some of your business functions online, but the pandemic has shown us just how much more we can do online. For example, moving order opportunities and implementing automated emails could be a great first step to going digital.

A couple of ideas on what this might look like:

  • Hosting webinars to maintain current customer relationships and attract new customers.
  • Investing in a good customer relationship management (CRM) software.

No matter what industry you’re in, there is always a way to take your business online, and having those capabilities will help to set you apart from your competitors and stand out to potential customers.

2. Invest in social media ads

The ROI on PPC ads in many industries has skyrocketed as more and more people had to stay at home and focused heavily on social media. This is a good way to remind people that your business is alive and well and that you aim to be a very significant part of the ‘new normal’.

If you have a strict marketing budget, a great place to start would be Facebook ads. Facebook ads in are quite affordable by PPC compared to other social media advertising—even for local businesses—and can help you showcase any changes you have made to your business or any COVID-19-exclusive discounts or promotions you might be offering.

With Facebook’s granular audience targeting capabilities, you can reach customers on a variety of different demographics. They can be based on gender, location, hobbies and interest, marital status, profession, and the list goes on.

3. Focus in on main paid advertising channels post-pandemic

As mentioned above, PPC ads are going to be very beneficial and cost effective. However, focusing on Google Ads, LinkedIn ads, Twitter ads, Facebook ads, and Instagram ads all at once is most likely going to you spread you too thin. It is best to determine where your target audience is spending their time and then focus most of your PPC efforts on those channels.

More from Onimod Global

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on all Google updates and other top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

Onimod Global is looking forward to the future and helping your business reach your full digital potential. Interested in growing your digital presence for your company? Reach out to us here!

Top 3 Google Ads Features

Google released new smart features and ways to buy ads on its different channels. Much like all other updates to Google Ads features, there will be learning curve with the new tools. Here is how you can make them work for you.

1. Get listed for free on Google Shopping

Google is still operating as a paid PPC channel, but you can also enjoy its free traffic. Once Google had introduced the shopping channel to their platform, Google completely beat most of the other price comparison websites from its SERP (Shopping.com, Shopzilla, BizRate). Following this very significant move that occurred in 2017, the European Commission fined Google €2.42 billion (~$3 billion) for breaching EU antitrust rules by “giving an illegal advantage to another Google product, its comparison shopping service.” This claim is still going through appeal, Google has made changes to ensure other options are present on its services and SERP than its own.

How should you make it work for you? Number one priority is optimizing your Shopping Ads and understand what products click and convert the most. For example, you can use SEISO Google Shopping Analyzer (Free to try) to get shopping reports. From there you can adapt your product feed and product pages to ensure you focus on products that are margin positive.

2. Get impressions on Goolge Ads for free.. only pay  your sales

When it comes to online acquisiton of new formats, video and display formats are not the first type of format you think of They are more popular for brand awareness and influence targets. Google now is trying to convince you otherwise. Google has so much data on users’ profiles and their intents that they can predict what they will buy. Google knows the users very well: from the search queries, from the media they consume (Videos, AMP pages…), and its past purchases thanks to receipts received in Gmail.

Thanks to this treasure trove of data points, the algorithm identifies which new video game console the user wants. And it only shows him the relevant ads when the customer is ready to buy. The ad will be more likely to convert and Google will get a higher revenue per page by only showing converting ads to users: win/win.

You can now run performance-based targeting for Youtube Ads and on the Display network. It usually means a lower reach than a CPM or a Trueview campaign but you will get incremental conversions while controlling your budget.

How to keep tracks of offline conversions

Nowadays, it is very simple to forget that most of the business still happens offline and that zoom calls and online shopping are not all there is to life. Yet offline conversions tracking are not always taken into account. According to Google, 30% of mobile queries are local searches and it is the fastest-growing segment. And 75% of users making a local search will go to a store within 24 hours. This is a lot of conversion lost to online tracking.

In order to be successful tracking these conversions for Google Ads, you will need to set up an omnichannel tracking that integrates offline elements. From there you will be able to measure different types of conversion. You should create a set of conversion actions for each campaign:

  • In-store visits: Google automatically tracks walk-in traffic from user’s location captured from their Apps and OS). You will need to register all your points of sales addresses or GPS coordinates.
  • Offline purchase thanks to offline the Conversions API or bulksheets upload.
  • Online purchase through your regular tracking pixel.

More from Onimod Global

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on all Google updates and other top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

Onimod Global is looking forward to the future and helping your business reach your full digital potential. Interested in growing your digital presence for your company? Reach out to us here!

Google Will End Behavioral Targeting – What’s The Impact

We’re officially in full swing of 2021, and that has come with tighter privacy and data regulations across the board. Google, who is up against high pressure from regulators around antitrust and data privacy, announced that they will cease the permission of cross-site tracking and targeting of individuals outside its own properties. This would include properties such as in inventory they sell through video ad exchange and Google Ad display.

 David Temkin, director of product management and ads privacy wrote in a blog post, “Today, we’re making explicit that once third-party cookies are phased out, we will not build alternate identifiers to track individuals as they browse across the web, nor will we use them in our products.”

Google’s move comes directly after the recent decision of Apple to give users the choice to block the IDFA identifier at the app level, which means apps will be required to ask users for permission to collect and share data.

“This is yet another confirmation the web is shifting to a consent-oriented framework,” said Nii Ahene, Chief Strategy Officer at Tinuiti. “It’s going to be all about opt-in, not opt-out initiatives.”

It is very evident that many of the behavioral targeting capabilities marketers have heavily depended on will fade out or disappear completely, however it is not yet confirmed the exact implications of how this will affect each of Google’s Ad products. The changes are slated to take place at the end of the year and only impact the open web, not mobile app ads purchased and sold using Google’s ad tech.

Important highlights from Google

At this exact stage, here is what we know for sure:

  • Google will be completely stopping to build user-level profiles within its ad systems. They will also not use such data to enable targeting on non-Google sites. That means Google’s AdX ad exchange and other services that target ads to web inventory outside Google properties will no longer support any cookie replacement identifiers.
  • Google’s ad targeting changes are focused solely on the open web. At this time, the changes will not apply to the mobile app ads bought and sold using Google’s ad tech.
  • Google’s targeting changes only will go into effect after the company officially stops recognizing third-party cookies in its Chrome browser. In January 2020, the company said it would do that within two years.
  • Advertisers will still be allowed to target their own databases of consumers through their own first-party data on Google properties, such as Google’s search results pages and YouTube.

More from Onimod Global

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on all Google updates and other top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

Onimod Global is looking forward to the future and helping your business reach your full digital potential. Interested in growing your digital presence for your company? Reach out to us here!

 

Top 4 Digital Marketing Trends For 2021

Many businesses have completely altered the way they operate in 2020. More and more products and services move online and many employees will continue to work remotely or in a hybrid setting for much of next year. What are the most relevant digital marketing trends for 2021 that your business should keep in mind to build customer loyalty and generate more traffic, leads, and revenue? Check out the top 4 areas Onimod Global experts recommend to invest your time and resources into next year. If you’re not sure where to begin, this list is the perfect starting point.

Businesses must embrace the digital transformation

The post-COVID world we will hopefully experience in 2021 will make a digital presence for companies almost mandatory. “Digital transformation” has become a popular buzzword since March 2020, and all types of companies are investing heavily in the migration to digital platforms. This includes platforms such as e-commerce, chatbots, email, apps, artificial intelligence, predictive analytics, omnichannel marketing and augmented and virtual reality.

Google listings and local SEO will be a top priority for small businesses

If you own a small business, one of the most important things you can do is ensure your local listings are verified and kept current on various search platforms. For B2C businesses that draw in primarily local traffic, the Google My Business listing provides valuable information about your hours and whether or not they are affectd by COVID, services, and geographical location. It’s one of the key factors in search and business owners are often blown away to learn how many directories there are out there.

One tip you can easily implement today: make sure that you have a geographically-defined service area in your local listings. Doing this will help your business show up in “near me” searches. That’s because Google and other search engines will prioritize relevance in their search algorithms.

Voice search and its power

Voice search queries will often populate different results than if the user had typed in a text-based search. Even though voice search is not a part of Google’s algorithm, it still dictates current search results. This means that businesses should be up to date on voice search components for their consumers who are adapting and switching over to that medium.

Content must be specifically optimized for voice searches, according to experts in voice search. The content needs to be more direct and conversational, and by doing so it will accurately sync with search queries. This will help boost traffic by staying relevant and more visible to consumers.

Influencer marketing a key pillar of marketing for consumer brands

Consumer brands have historically used social media influencers to present authentic unbiased advertising to appeal to prospects and customers. The pandemic amplified the impact influencers have on the purchase of products, due to a limited ability to shop at stores and increased online shopping traffic.

A recent study found that 40% of people reported that they purchased a product online after seeing it used by an influencer on YouTube, Instagram or Twitter. Influencers and their impact are expected to gain even more popularity and followers and businesses to use influencers more than ever before.

More from Onimod Global

Onimod Global is looking forward to the future and helping your business reach your full digital potential. Interested in growing your digital presence for your company? Reach out to us here!

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

How To Create An Effective Facebook Lead Form Campaign

Have you been interested in generating more leads from Facebook? Facebook lead forms and their capabilities are a big part of why so many businesses rely on the social platform for their advertising. Rightfully so, these campaigns have increased potential for thousands of brands to acquire new customers.

In this article, you will learn how to not only set up your Facebook lead form campaigns, but also make sure they are effective in generating quality leads for your business.

How to create a Facebook lead generation campaign

To start, you will set up a campaign as normal in the Facebook Business Manager or any other campaign management platform tool you use. Since we’re focused on customer acquisition, choose “Lead generation” from the list of objectives.

Facebook lead generation

 

When choosing audiences for this campaign, we recommend choosing custom or lookalike audiences. This way you can ensure the audience is highly relevant, therefore increasing the quality of your leads as well. After you complete setting up your campaign with audiences, budget, and creatives, it’s time to move onto creating your lead form.

Creating a Facebook lead form

To create the form is simple, however to optimize for best results is in small details that can make a huge difference.

First, you will need to choose which type of form you want to use for the campaign.

Your options are:

  • More Volume, which is a form that’s quite simple to fill out and optimized specifically for mobile
  • Higher Intent, which takes the customer through that one extra step to confirm their information which indicates higher level of intent from generated leads

Facebook lead generation

Fill out the other information listed, including a privacy policy, and more or less you are finished with the form. But what about optimization and making sure you are getting the absolute maximum potential from your lead form?

Optimization tips for your lead ads

  1. Ask the right amount of questions. In an experiment done by Adespresso, they found that the more questions you ask on your lead form, the higher your cost per lead will be. The other important finding is that removing too many barriers between the customer and the conversion will put your campaign at risk for generating very low quality leads.
    lead ad performance in correlation to the number of questions asked
    According to this chart from Adespresso, the most significant data to pay attention to is the difference in CPL at 5 versus 6 questions. The cost more than doubles per lead. We would advise you on including 5 or fewer questions for your customers on lead forms.
  2. Present an enticing offer. Who doesn’t love free stuff? Use it as a way to introduce a product or service to your audience that is very low-effort from the customer’s side. Lead forms are also growing in popularity to use during busy seasons such as Black Friday week to sign up for “exclusive deals” or subscribe to a newsletter for early access. This is where your lead form will come in handy to collect their information to nurture the relationship to an eventual conversion.
  3. Make your questions sales-oriented. High numbers of lead generation from a campaign may look good on paper, but they are essentially useless if the quality is not relevant. The best leads are qualified leads. These are the people most likely to buy something. To find these people, use your instant form to ask qualifying questions. Another way to make sure your campaigns are relevant is to be very specific with audience targeting, utilizing several custom and lookalike audiences based on website visits, past leads, or anything else relevant for your company.

More from Onimod Global

Looking for an agency to help you with your paid social media strategy and Facebook lead generation campaign performance? Reach out to us here!

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

 

Google Search Results: Page Experience Update Coming 2021

Roughly a full year after the first announcement, Google confirms a new page experience update is coming to Google search results May 2021. This gives us all another 6 months to ensure pages are optimized to full user experience potential.

But what exactly does the new page experience update entail and how can you start prepping early? Onimod Global experts are here to dish all there is to know and prepare for.

What exactly is page experience?

Google will evaluate a set of signals that are meant to understand how a user will perceive the experience of a specific web page. These signals will cover topics such as how quickly a page loads, mobile-friendliness, runs on HTTPS, has invasive interstitials and whether content jumps around as the page loads.

A great resource for more information on this topic is Search Engine Land’s Guide to Core Web Vitals for a deeper dive into what you need to know about these vital user experience metrics.

Google page experience update: What you need to know

With user experience gaining ever-increasing importance for brands and consumers, it’s only natural that the world’s dominating search engine takes into consideration this element. Another area Google wants to experiment with is testing a “visual indicator that highlights pages in search results that have great page experience,” and how they will perform, according to Google.

“We believe that providing information about the quality of a web page’s experience can be helpful to users in choosing the search result that they want to visit,” Google wrote. “On results, the snippet or image preview helps provide topical context for users to know what information a page can provide. Visual indicators on the results are another way to do the same, and we are working on one that identifies pages that have met all of the page experience criteria.”

Google Webmaster Blog

Google plans to measure a website’s performance based on user experience by using Core Web Values. The metrics’ role is to identify how a user would rate their experience on a given page. Some of the factors that will be looked at include loading speed, mobile-friendliness, if the page is HTTPS-based, use of advertising, content structure, and more.

How You Can Prepare

It’s likely that even with the 6 month buffer period to prepare, several companies will fall far behind in SEO and quickly.  In fact, research from August revealed that no more than 15% of websites could pass the assessment of Core Web Vitals due to poor optimization.

According to Search Engine Land, The Core Web Vitals report in Google Search Console is a great place to get started with understanding your initial benchmark and get a good sense of how your site is performing in these page experience areas.

Contact Onimod Global

Still need help to prepare for this new page experience update and to be part of the top 15% of websites that will pass Google’s user experience assessment? Reach out to us here!

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.

The Guide To Optimizing For Featured Snippets

Rising to the top of Google’s search results is no simple feat, but definitely doesn’t mean you can’t win. Even if you aren’t in position 1 you’re still able to outrank it. How so? The holy grail of SEO: featured snippets.

In this post from Onimod Global’s experts, we’ll discuss what are featured snippets, what are their benefits for SEO, and how to optimize for them.

What is a featured snippet?

A featured snippet shows up as a block that contains the exact answer to your query. It’s a two to three sentence summary of text that appears at the top of Google. Featured snippets provide a fast and straightforward answer for a user’s query directly in the search results. Receiving a featured snippet is shown to result in more traffic for a given page.

The featured snippet appears to work on a more simplistic algorithm than Google’s “primary” one. This search result is significantly more influenced by simple on-page adjustments that very clearly define the topic to users and their search queries. See a simple example of a featured snippet below, allowing for users to get a fast answer to their question and also an opportunity to receive more traffic to their page.

featured snippet example

How to optimize for the featured snippet

  1. Add a “what is” heading.
    To start your featured snippet optimizations, you’ll want to look for a place in your content to add a “What Is [Keyword]” heading tag. This is a clear signal for Google that you have a fast and efficient information to share with a user with a specific search query. You will even notice at the top of this article, the first headline contains a “What is” statement, queuing Google to recognize information to include and what they can pull into the featured snippet.
  2. Use sentence structure “is”
    It is very important to use an “is” statement when optimizing for featured snippets. Structuring content this way appears to act as a trigger that allows Google to easily find the text that’s relevant for the featured snippet.
  3. The topic must be fully explained in 2-3 sentences
    Being concise is key. Feature snippets are meant to give users as much information about the topic as possible in a short amount of time.
    Here are some general guidelines from Search Engine Land to follow while concisely defining featured snippets:
    – The first sentence should define the topic
    – The second and third sentences should describe 2-3 must-know facts about the topic
    – Try to avoid using any extraneous phrasing in your definition

Contact Onimod Global

Looking for an agency to increase your SEO and optimize your website content? Reach out to us here!

Onimod Global releases the latest digital marketing news and essential marketing tips every Tuesday and Thursday! To catch up on the top digital marketing news and trends, click here. To find out more about who we are and what we do, click here.