When Google and the other search engines started automating indexation, there was a consistent approach to displaying results. The most valuable and relevant links would appear first. However, the order was the only ranking factor. The amount of information, layout and number of words were equal for every result. However, this changes with time when these companies invest more in the user experience.
They also realized that to ease the effort of the user to find the information they want, it was necessary to give more context to the SERPs. Hence, it became essential to organize them in a way that is more accessible and objective.
This is what resulted in the formation of snippets. The results are displayed first when the user searches for something. It also gave detailed information like direct answers and definitions and showed images and other extra content.
Thus, the rich snippets are exceptional results with additional data displayed.
Are rich snippets good for SEO?
It is hard to imagine that having your web page featured with rich snippets results in consistent gains for organic traffic. Studies regularly show this, pointing to the overall growth in most kinds of content. Rich snippets are the kind of snippets which help SEO from a more direct approach and for a more significant role in building proper authority and making any brand well known.
What is the strategic effect of rich snippets on SEO?
When a page has a rich snippet, it gets more organic traffic. When any company is consistently presented as valuable and relevant to the public’s queries, it becomes recognized as a brand that the customers can trust. With time and with more and more rich snippets, you can build a solid presence on SERP based on the relevant keywords to your business.
Types of rich snippets
The main appeal of a rich snippet is to be more elaborate and richer in information than a regular snippet. These rich snippets might not be a ranking factor in the search engine ranking. However, they play a crucial role in generating more clicks. The results also stand out in a long list of search results. Following are the types of rich snippets-
1. Reviews.
You can display the customer reviews of the services or products in the snippet to capture the user’s attention.
2. Recipes.
Displaying a brief overview of the recipe within the snippets can present the viewer with relevant information for all the food-related content.
3. Organization.
The key points of information about an organization, such as its address, services and contact details, can be added to the snippet to give the viewer a brief overview of the organization.
4. Music.
A music-rich snippet is the type of snippet which displays additional information about the song, such as the artist, genre and record label.
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What is the major difference between rich results and rich snippets?
Rich snippets are the ones which are often used interchangeably, and the two are almost the same. The only major difference is that the rich results can be lengthy than the rich snippets, Thus, the rich snippets can always be the rich results. Both, the rich snippets as well as the rich results are pulled from the structured data found in a webpage’s HTML code.
When do the rich snippets appear?
The rich snippet appears when the search engine results pages finish crawling your webpage, understand your content and also find it relevant for the users. It takes on an average two to twelve weeks for a rich snippet to appear.
How do rich snippets and Google rich snippets boost SEO?
The rich snippets have a very positive impact on boosting SEO and SEO page results. The more relevant your structured data and rich snippet is to the target user, the higher are the chances of the search engine recognizing it as useful and pushing up its rankings. SERPs like Google value structured and concise descriptions of the content you have created and recognize it faster. If the content you have created is text-heavy, then the search engine has a very hard time figuring out the crux of the data. In this situation, the search engine pulls bits of data from the entire content and turns portions it finds relevant into a snippet which looks plain. However, on the other hand, if your snippet is rich and has items like thumbnails and ratings, the chances of it getting noticed by the viewers is way higher.
How to get the rich snippets?
Identify the right kind of rich snippet from your content to display.
The very first step in creating a rich snippet is identifying the rich snippet in the first place. Its category should match with your content. You should also check to see if your content is eligible for a search result enhancement. You can also make use of Google’s structured data Markup Helper which is a tool that defines your webpage content. It helps you understand the data type your content falls into.
Structure the snippets and also make them eye catching.
Once you have identified the snippet category which makes complete sense for your content, it is time to start structuring the data and adding the appropriate markup to your webpage. The structured data adhere to a predefined data format. It will make it easier for the search engine’s algorithm to crawl and interpret its relevance. The data that has a definite structure is also very eye-catching.
For creating a rich snippet, you can make use of Google’s trusted applications such as schema.org for insight into vocabularies that the search engine recognizes faster.
Verify the mark-up
After you have developed the structured markup, you should verify whether or not Google can recognize and read your marked-up data. You can make use of the search engine’s testing tool that will help you understand whether your structured data markup is eligible to appear in the rich snippet or not.