How Google Rich Snippets improve Website Organic Click-Through Rate?

SEOs and companies are finding it increasingly difficult to position themselves well in search results on Google & Co. or to prevail against the competition.

Rich snippets are a relatively easy way to gain advantages over the majority. But why are rich snippets so interesting? This article clarifies this.

What are rich snippets?

Presumably, every user of Google has already noticed them more or less consciously. Rich snippets are search results that are more visually appealing or contain additional information. Whether products where the rating is shown with small asterisks or information about the author of an article with a profile picture from Google +, there are plenty of options for labelling its content.

These rich snippets usually achieved by providing headings, texts or information with certain HTML5 microdata, which are specified. for example, by schema.org.

Schema.org has created markup opportunities for countless content types. Browsers, search engines and all other services that want to use them are thus easier to find out what the content of a website is. Google uses these tenders to enrich its own search results. Schema markup is a piece of code that you place on your website to help search engines to deliver more useful results to users. This is part of On-Page SEO. Check out the guide about On Page SEO for Ecommerce Website.

What is the positive effect of rich snippets for SEO?

Rich snippets ensure that the content that is displayed in the search results receives more attention. As a rule, this increases the click rate (i.e. the click-through rate CTR). An increased click rate in turn ensures that the ranking may be improved. So, all in all exactly what SEOs want to achieve. Higher rankings combined with more clicks.

What types of rich snippets are there?

Even though schema.org has created numerous awards, Google currently only uses a small selection of awards for its search results:

Reviews

The rich snippet for reviews optimizes the presentation of products or anything that could be rated by users. This happens either by displaying asterisks or by simply entering numbers such as “Rating: 3.5 out of 5”.

Breadcrumbs

A breadcrumb is a small navigation aid over the content of a website. As a rule, this “common thread” looks like this: Home-> Category Page-> Subpage of the category. This breadcrumb can be made known to Google so that it may be shown in the search results.

Events

Event information can also be provided with markup so that the date and location of this event are shown as additional information in the SERPs. Instructions for this can be found on Google.

Music

Anyone who offers music tracks to listen to on their website can label them as music. If you are lucky, Google’s search results will contain a selection of the songs offered with a direct link and a small icon of a clef.

Organizations

Operators of an organization or owners of a restaurant can also optimize their website for Google. Google would like to thank you with the description of how to get there, the address and, if necessary, even with the display of ratings, if the organization can also come up with a Google Places or Google+ account.

People

If you own a Google+ account, you can brand your articles with your identity. A small version of the profile picture is then displayed next to the article in the SERPs. It should be ensured here that the profile photo is clearly visible at this size.

Recipes

There are too many recipe pages, but only a few uses the opportunity to display their own recipes with pictures in the search results. That’s exactly what the rich snippet does for recipes.

Testimonials

With rich snippets for testimonials, the user is shown information such as user reviews and also reviews of a product or service. If you stand behind your offer and have mostly positive customer feedback, you can’t go wrong with this.

Products

As a retailer of a certain product, the average customer rating can also be displayed in the search results in addition to the price. The rating is then displayed with the help of rating stars.

Schema.org markup for videos

Videos are difficult for Google to capture. With a special schema.org markup, videos can be described and marked on your website, so that a picture preview of the video may be displayed in the SERPs.

Software apps

Apps for tablets and other app-compatible devices can also be distinguished for the nicer SERP display. In addition to a small thumbnail of the app, the price and user rating are then displayed.

How can I test whether the rich snippets have been installed correctly?

The installation of the awards required for rich snippets can be checked particularly easily with the Rich Snippet Testing Tool (test tool for structured data). Entering a URL shows what the search result for this URL could look like. If nothing is displayed here that deviates from the standard snippets, you have probably done something wrong. If you see the desired result, you are almost done with the installation.

How long will it consider made snippets to appear?

The search results are not displayed immediately. Google will probably have to revisit the pages to seek out regarding the modification. Then it usually takes a few days to see results.

Why am I not seeing the rich snippets?

Unfortunately, there is no guarantee that the rich snippets will be shown. And, it cannot really be said why rich snippets are not displayed. Some are straightforward, others take a while. Unfortunately, it never works for others.

Conclusion

It is very easy to pimp up search results with the help of rich snippets and thus to more clicks and if you are lucky you can achieve better rankings in the long term. But unfortunately, only if they are installed correctly and Google is gracious to actually use them. Due to the manageable efforts, there is no reason not to try your luck.

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