Keywords Research

A good keyword research strategy should consider both keyword volume and user experience. Obviously, you want your page to perform well. You also want to give your audience information that they actually value.

How To Research Featured Snippet Keywords

A featured snippet, otherwise known as an answer box, is an answer to a user’s online search query. It appears as text pulled from a URL and displays at the top of the search results.

Since featured snippets are the first results a user will see in the search engine result pages (SERPs), they’re pretty darn important.

1. Identify Competitors’ Featured Snippets

Stealing competitors’ featured snippets is not easy. Put the competitors’ URL in Semrush or other keyword research tool and look for the keyword groups that own featured snippets.

Now, you want to:

• Export the list.
• Categorize them into different types of featured snippets.
• Sort them by higher search volume.
• Highlight the low Keyword Difficulty score.
• And gather them to initiate planning.

Use content calendar template to start planning, implementing, and optimizing your content to rank.

2. Gather The Keywords For Each FS-owned Content

Identify the keywords present on the content currently owning featured snippets.

See the expanded information on the keywords ranking on featured snippets.

Collect the related as well as question keywords and add them to your content calendar.

3. Understand Searcher Intent

One of the most important considerations is understanding the search intent behind each triggering query.

Three types of people search for your keywords:

• Potential customers.
• Influencers who persuade your potential customers to buy from you.
• And your competitors.

You’re going to write the content for the first two. Each will have different intents while searching, but it will always be informational (and navigational when users want to click through them).

Classify them further into four categories depending on whether they want:

1. A specific answer

Here, a user search query is a question that requires a specific answer and typically do not want or need to read further.

2. A brief answer

The user expects a paragraph or listicle type of featured snippet. This type of search query assists in both CTR and brand reputation.

3. A comparison

This type of search query comes up with a table type of featured snippet. The table content is larger than what Google Featured Snippets can show. So, this type of search intent is most likely to boost the CTR.

4. A video

If users are looking for “how-to” answers and a video attached to those answers, it will get the maximum CTR.

Understanding the different types of informational search intent behind the search query can help you plan and optimize your content.

5. Run A Competitive Analysis

Go back to keyword research tool, input your keyword or content topic, select the targeted location and click to view SEO recommendations for your content to plan the content optimization.

If you use SEMrush tool it allows you to see recommendations from them:

Suggestions on how competitors using target keywords so you can use them better.

Basic SEO recommendations to make your content search-friendly.

6. Validate The Content

Once you have the content ready, double-check that it meets your needs for:

• Your target audience.
• Defined user search intent.
• Targeted keywords.
• Suggestions listed.

7. Add Question Keywords In Heading Tags

Pick up the relevant question keywords with high search volume and put them in your heading tags. Most of the featured snippets you see on Google start right after a heading tag.

Look at an example below:

8. Implement SEO Tactics

Now you need to help Google understand what the page is all about.

Here are some SEO tactics that work for featured snippets:

• Perfect URL structure: Keep your URLs short, ideally three to four words.
• Title tag: Use Coschedule Headline Analyzer and the SEOmofo snippet optimization tool to create a catchy title tag that fits the pixel requirements.
• Meta description tag: Use SEOmofo to make the most of the pixels available and write user-centric and keyword-specific meta descriptions to drive the highest clicks.
• Heading tags: Use question keywords, as discussed above.
• Image Alt attributes: For all graphics, make sure you use descriptive alt text to help Google understand what the image is all about. Most of the best-performing content has images with alt attributes.
• Internal links: Help Google identify your site’s most important pages. If you achieve a featured snippet, you want to support the rankings of your best pages with it.
• External links: Let Google know which external sites you trust and demonstrate credibility with your citations.
• Schema markup tags: Help Google understand what your page is about and recognize elements like tables.
• Link building: Build links to help Google understand your website’s authoritativeness.

Keyword research resources

SEMrush. SEMrush has a particularly useful feature that allows you to see which of your keywords are delivering featured snippets. An even better route is to use SEMrush to see which of your competitors’ keywords are delivering featured snippets and try to steal those.

Ahrefs. Ahrefs has the ability to find featured snippets too. Type in a competitor URL, look at their organic keywords, then filter by Featured Snippets. Easy!

Answer the Public. This is an awesome tool that you can use to see what types of questions people are asking about your keywords, giving you more opportunities to win a featured snippet.

Google Search Console. Look in Google Search Console to find out which keywords of yours are driving the most impressions, then optimize your content to trigger a featured snippet for those keywords.

Quora and Yahoo Answers are also excellent resources for featured snippet keyword ideas.

Moz.com. If you have a Moz Pro account, set up a campaign for your website along with your top keywords. In the Insights section of your campaign, you’ll find tips on how you can improve your site, including featured snippet opportunities.