How to write content for Google featured snippets
At Ashworth Creative, we’re pros at creating SEO-friendly content, and evidently content that Google loves for featured snippets. If you want to improve your chances of being a Google featured snippet, here are some tips on how to structure your content:
1. Format for featured snippets
Google uses several different formats for featured snippets:
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- Ordered lists (1, 2, 3…) and Unordered lists (bullets)
- Tables
- Definitions and paragraphs
- Video
Creating your content in a way that follows these formats makes it easier for Google to pull important information from your site. If your content answers a specific question, use clear headings and be sure to give a succinct bite of information 40-60 words.
Source: SEMRush
2. Use images
Including relevant images that enhance the content of your page helps Google pull together a rich result, especially if you’re writing a ‘how-to’ style article. Include screenshots of your process, photos of a location, or any other visual aid to complement what you’re writing about. Make sure you include alt image text that is accurate and descriptive to improve image searchability and accessibility. Check if your site is eligible for rich results using Google’s rich results test.
3. Answer a question
How do I do this? When did that happen? What does this mean? Structuring your content to answer questions is a great way to tell Google you have an answer to a search query. Not all search queries result in a featured snippet, so do some keyword research and test some terms in Google to see which ones result in a snippet to give you some insight on how you may want to organize and write your content.
4. Create unique meta descriptions for each page
To increase your chances of your content being a featured snippet on Google, make sure each page on your site has a unique meta description with relevant, quality information.
Why you should optimize your content for featured snippets
Google’s featured snippet position gives marketers a chance to increase conversions and drive traffic to their site. HubSpot has found that content with a featured snippet gets a 2X higher click-through rate. Optimizing for featured snippets and making small adjustments to your content can boost your site to the top of search results.
Featured snippets are closely tied to voice search, which is why it is so important to structure your content to rank for the featured snippet position. Long-tail queries are more likely to be pulled for snippets as the number of words in featured snippets has increased over the past two years. According to Statista, the number of mobile search users in the United States reached 221 million in 2020, and 20% of those searches were done using voice search. That means if you want to rank for more snippets and target searchers using digital assistants, you need to tailor your keyword list with long-tail, natural-sounding terms to track and optimize for.
See our previous post in our Featured Snippet SEO series here. Contact us to learn more about Ashworth Creative’s SEO services.