The dream of every SEO expert is that their pages appear in the first position of Google … or at least it was until very recently. And it is that Google has introduced a novelty that turns the competition around for the best search engine site: the zero position or “featured snippet”. Let’s see what it is and how to get hold of it!
What is Google’s zero position?
The zero position of Google or featured snippet is a novelty introduced by the search engine to answer users’ questions as quickly as possible. This response is displayed in the form of an extract of the information sought, the title of the page where it is located, a URL and optionally an image.
Google’s zero position information can be displayed in three different formats :
- Paragraph type : According to a study by MOZ, 81% of Google’s featured snippets are in this format. It appears especially when the query to the search engine is a question (what, when, who, which …).
- List type : present in 7% of cases. It is more common when the search engine query includes the terms “has” or “how”.
- Table type : this format appears in the remaining 12% of searches and occurs especially when the search includes the term “which”.
Appearing in this position is highly coveted, as it implies a large increase in the number of visits a website receives. According to a Hubspot study, being in Google’s zero position contributes 114% more visits than being in the “traditional” first position.
5 SEO tips to reach Google’s zero position
- Choose the right opportunity . Not all Google searches include zero position, and some types are more likely to do so than others. In general, featured snippets are displayed more in response to frequently asked questions and in the areas of health, requirements, status, transitional and time, mathematics and finance.
- Answer user questions . The most successful strategy to appear in the position zero of Google is to answer a frequent question from users. To get an idea of what users are asking about your industry, you can take a look at the Answer the Public tool.
- Research the most interesting keywords . Keyword research is part of all SEO strategies, but if your goal is zero position, my recommendation is to focus above all on keyword questions. Here is the list of questions that attract featured snippets based on data from the SEMrush study .
- Get to the point . The grace of featured snippets is that they give a quick answer to the user’s question, so it is important to resolve it as directly as possible.
- Write longer content . Although this seems to be a contradiction with the previous point, the truth is that Google continues to value the content that deals with a topic in depth. Therefore, after answering the main question, you should continue developing the topic to fully inform your visitors.
