Featured snippets are snippets that are visually highlighted in Google search results, making them immediately apparent to the user. These are usually definitions, short text passages, tables, or lists. The text snippets are often accompanied by an image or graphic, which attracts even more attention.
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Super snippets and SERPs
For several years now, Google has been displaying these special snippets for certain search queries, causing quite a stir among website operators and SEOs. That's why it's worth taking a closer look at the influence that featured snippets have on SERPs.
First of all, a featured snippet seems to be the jackpot among Google rankings: The snippet is extremely eye-catching and appears at the top of the SERPs (directly below the paid ads). It is displayed even before position 1 of the organic hits, which is why it is often referred to as position 0. If an eye-catching image or graphic is also displayed, the user can't help but click, right? Not necessarily.
The danger is that users will find the answer to their question directly in the featured snippet and therefore see no need to click on the result, which in turn will naturally lead to less traffic to the site and thus achieve the exact opposite of what we are actually optimizing for.
The challenge, then, is to reveal just enough information in the featured snippet that the user still clicks on the result. This is because the featured snippet has the decisive advantage of allowing you to position yourself ahead of the competition, and it also increases the likelihood of clicks.
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How do I get a featured snippet?
Unfortunately, you cannot apply for featured snippets on Google, but there are, of course, a few tricks you can use to potentially achieve a top position. A basic requirement for a featured snippet is already having a good ranking for the respective term. A 2017 study by Ahrefs showed that 99.58% of websites that receive a featured snippet already ranked in the top 10 for the same search term. You can find out how to optimize your website so that you land on the first page of the SERPs in the new Search Engine Optimization White Paper from eology .
There are also a few things to keep in mind. Here is an overview of best practices:
- Formulate accurate definitions
Google's goal is to always provide users with the best and most relevant answer to a search query. So if Google finds the best possible description or definition on your website, that's already an advantage in the battle for the featured snippet. It's therefore hardly surprising that for many informational search queries aimed at explaining a term, the featured snippet goes to Wikipedia.
Figure 1: Featured snippet for "VDSL" from Wikipedia in Google search results
Source: Google
- Using tables and lists
But definitions aren't the only things suitable for optimization; tables and lists are also frequently used by Google as featured snippets. Cooking or baking recipes are a prime example. In these cases, Google extracts the individual list items from the page's HTML. It doesn't matter whether it's an ordered list or an unordered list.
Figure 2: Featured snippet as a list for "chocolate cake recipe"
Source: Google
- Use search phrases
Since Google often displays highlighted snippets for definitions, the most classic of all W questions, "What is...?" and the corresponding concise answer, are particularly suitable for optimization. After all, featured snippets are also often used as answers to voice search queries. So if you want to be at the forefront of voice-based search results, you'll have no choice but to take a closer look at optimizing for featured snippets.
Tip: Here you can make excellent use of the Google Suggest function to research relevant W-questions on a topic.
- Use trigger words to signal relevance and accuracy for a specific topic area. For definitions, it is advisable to use the words "definition" or "explanation" and "description."
- It has been found that Google often displays snippets based on specific words. Depending on the type of snippet, different "trigger words" are suitable for giving Google a high ranking. For recipes or other instructions, words such as "instructions" or "step-by-step" and similar terms should appear.
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Okay, Google: What is the connection between featured snippets and voice search?
One thing is certain: if you have a featured snippet in the SERPs, you have a good chance of achieving a decent click-through rate. But that's not all: anyone who frequently uses a voice assistant will have noticed that Google generates its direct answers for voice search from the answer boxes of featured snippets. After all, they provide an accurate and concise answer to the user's question and are therefore ideal for spoken answers. By , you may also benefit from traditional SERPs.optimizing your website for voice search
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Featured snippets – what's next, Google?
Since Google's inception, the search engine has undergone continuous development. At the end of the 1990s, Google returned a list of results for a search query that consisted solely of text snippets at that time. The snippets contained only an excerpt of the sentence in which the respective keyword appeared, as well as the corresponding URL, and were not very appealing from today's perspective.
Figure 3: Google SERPs in 1998
Today, SERPs look significantly different. Google's artificial intelligence constantly strives to provide users with the best results directly in the SERPs—meaning no more clicking on URLs, but rather comprehensive results in text, image, and video form.
Experts suspect that Google will refer to holistic entities, known as fraggles, rather than individual websites or URLs in its future results. Essentially, Google is attempting to compile a unit from various sub-aspects of a topic and deliver these aspects directly to the user in the search results. These fragments may also originate from different websites.
When you enter "FC Bayern Munich," Google displays comprehensive information about past games, news, and the current league table, including logos, images, and videos on the search results page. This pushes the organic hits further and further into the background.
Figure 4: Fraggle on "FC Bayern Munich"
Source: Google
In concrete terms, this means that in many cases, the user's intention is already satisfied on Google's results page, and the desired click on the website itself does not occur. So-called zero-click searches will therefore pose considerable challenges for website operators and SEOs in the future.
The goal must therefore be to present content in such a way that it is perceived by search engines as an entity, thereby establishing oneself as an authority in a particular field and also increasing reach on other channels. In the future, search engine operators will have to move away from a mindset that focuses solely on clicks.
While CTR is currently the most important metric for measuring optimization success, zero-click searches will mean that metrics measuring the ratio of clicks per search (CPS) will become more relevant. Structured data markup will not be the only factor playing a major role here. In order to be able to influence the design of SERPs in the future and ultimately appear in search results with a fragle or as part of the knowledge graph, excellent content that establishes meaningful relationships between individual entities is essential.
With this in mind, website operators and SEOs will have to focus even more on optimizing their content for featured snippets and dealing with zero-click searches.
