Ask any SEO professional about their biggest concerns today, and there is one aspect that will invariably appear on everyone’s list. The evolving page # 1 of Google is posing new challenges, keeping content specialists on their toes, and pushing them to continually rethink their SEO strategies. In the past, the focus was on being ranked at the top in organic search results. Today, the battle for eyeballs features several additional players, such as knowledge panels, paid ads, featured snippets, maps, videos and more. With the search engine result pages (SERPs) becoming more competitive than ever, it’s time to adopt an integrated approach to SERP marketing and On-SERP SEO.
Here’s what you need to know about on-SERP SEO. Essentially, it is a holistic approach to:
- Dominate page #1 digital real estate
- Optimize, control and influence any or all content on SERPs
- Increase search appearance, brand awareness and CTR
- Overall, generate more organic traffic
Achieving this is no easy task, especially when you have to coordinate with all types of media sources to dominate relevant aspects of page #1. Moreover, the traditional mindset of reviewing search terms, search volumes and keyword difficulties needs to be tweaked. Today, when you design an integrated on-SERP SEO strategy, you have to factor in decreasing organic search CTRs and the growing presence of featured snippets, as well as other media elements.
Top 5 Tactics for a Winning On-SERP SEO Strategy
1- Optimize your Content to Win Featured Snippets: One of the foremost aspects of a powerful on-SERP strategy is to win as many featured snippets as possible. So, let’s understand—what are featured snippets?
- They are knowledge panels that feature on ‘position-zero’, even before the page #1 organic SERP.
- Google auto populates and beautifies the snippets by pulling content out of the current top 10 ranked pages.
- They appear in the form of text, lists, tables, or video format, enabling the zero-click phenomenon, where searchers find answers to their queries, without clicking on organic search sites.
- To win the most featured snippets, you need to identify high-potential opportunity keywords. Your current organic rankings will throw light on the keywords that already display featured snippets, and help you identify other high potential target keywords or pages that you can optimize. Once you know the type of snippet you are aiming for:
- Add a compelling headline or question
- Create a precise or factual answer in approximately 50 – 60 words.
- Increase credibility and CTR for your business in organic SERPs by adding schema markup when appropriate.
- Include images on a page where the headline and URL match the image target keyword. Be strategic in choosing the appropriate file size, file names, alt tags and captions.
2-Optimize for Sitelinks: Own critical digital real estate and get the most important pages of your website displayed directly in the search results by:
- Creating a clear navigation structure
- Including strong links to core pages
- Adding descriptive anchors and alt tags
3- Optimize Social Media Channels: Google’s knowledge panels help you to have all the relevant information about your business nestled into one compact spot. Connecting all your social media channels will allow you to own and control multiple search elements, and increase your chances of appearing in the knowledge panels.
4–Win Space for Branded Searches: Sign up for Google My Business, complete all fields, and verify your listing with Google. This will not only help your presence in Google Maps, but also allow you to own a longer listing that displays the key features and important details of your business.
5- Maximize Your Chances of Converting Search to Click: Run at least a basic branded pay-per click (PPC) Google Ads campaign for your brand name terms to support your organic search and CTR. This is also about ensuring that someone else does not occupy your valuable ad space.
Stay on Top of the Competitive SERPs Landscape
As an SEO professional, you will notice that the importance of Page #1 presence and ranking has not diminished in any manner. However, adopting an integrated on-SERP SEO approach means accepting that SEO success will be measured by new performance metrics. Instead of relying on the classic approach of ‘organic ranks’, you may have to refocus on ‘organic traffic’, no matter which page #1 elements help you achieve that.
Looking for professional support to win back your SERP presence and dominate page # on Google? The Ottawa SEO experts at WSI eStrategies can help you create a winning on-SERP SEO strategy. Get in touch to book a no-obligation consultation and learn more.
