Google Direct Answers

Mark Traphagen | Stone Temple Consulting

@marktraphagen

Google’s mission is to organize the world’sweb sites and make them universally accessible and useful.

Get this deck: stonet.co/googleanswersraleigh

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.

Get this deck: stonet.co/googleanswersraleigh

In the beginning…

moz.com/blog/the-incredible-shrinking-

serp

Tabbed results

Table

Sliders

With Knowledge Panel

Form

Chart

Carousel

Image

Related items

Lists

Directly in search suggest!

Spoiler alert result

Slawski: Possible sources

• Tabular data (example: a Wikipedia info box alongside a Wiki article)

• Relational tables that display related data in tabular format (such as a list of U.S. Presidents and basic facts about each)

• Colon-delimited pairs (such as “Check In Time: 3:00 PM; Check Out Time: 12 Noon” for a hotel)

• Structured snippets• Knowledge bases• Query stream data merged with knowledge bases and

web documents (Biperpedia)

stonet.co/RichAnswers

Mostly public domain info

But notable exceptions…

Slawski: Possible sources

• Tabular data (example: a Wikipedia info box alongside a Wiki article)

• Relational tables that display related data in tabular format (such as a list of U.S. Presidents and basic facts about each)

• Colon-delimited pairs (such as “Check In Time: 3:00 PM; Check Out Time: 12 Noon” for a hotel)

• Structured snippets• Knowledge bases• Query stream data merged with knowledge bases and

web documents (Biperpedia)

stonet.co/AnswerBoxTraffic

Definitely NOT

List with linked ellipses

List with more items

Looks like it shouldn’t, but did!

1. Complex topic

2. Brilliant title tag

Megasnippet!

Takeaway 1

Make sure you have clear, natural language in your articles that directly answers the most likely questions about any factual information.

Takeaway 2

Every direct answer follows a formula. If you look carefully at the pages that get into direct answers for information your site provides, you’ll see the pattern. Find it for your pages and structure your content accordingly.

Takeaway 3

Create large or exhaustive lists that Google can’t fit completely in an answer box.

Takeaway 4

Provide teaser text right after your direct answer that hints there is more the reader would want to know. Chances are that text will get included in the direct answer, thereby enticing a click through.

Warning!

Answer boxes throw off rank checking software!

Let’s Connect!• www.stonetemple.com• +MarkTraphagen• @MarkTraphagen

Get this deck: stonet.co/googleanswersraleigh

THANKS!