Google dominates the search engine scope, capturing over 90% of the market share. To put that in perspective that means that at any given second, Google is processing over 60,000 search queries. With that kind of traffic, getting to the top of the SERP (search engine results page) is essential for any business.

SEO, or search engine optimisation, is a set of best practices that allow for a website to fully take advantage of SERP. These best practices range from onsite to offsite SEO, to research processes like keyword mapping.

SERP AND TODAY’S FEATURES
Going back ten years ago, Google’s search results page looked a lot simpler. You’d see the top responses for a given query. Over the last couple of years, however, the SERP has greatly evolved to make the results clearer and more comprehensive. For example, if you searched the word iPhone ten years ago, you’d get some links to Apple’s website and then a few other related retailers.

Now when you enter that search, you’ll be given searches based on your location as well as your search history behavior. A lot has changed, but it basically boils down to users being able to see from the SERP what information a link will provide them making the experience efficient.

SERP FEATURES AND COMPANIES
So what does this mean for companies? Once you understand how Google is operating, you can take advantage of it to allow the search engine to better crawl your site and pull the right information for your target audience.

There are three main types of features for you to be aware of: Paragraph, table and table snippet. Snippets are the boxes of information Google provides. For some of these such as answers to “who was the twenty-fifth president?” you won’t be able to do much with that. But, on other queries that are many ways to take advantage of keyword mapping to boost your company’s visibility. It all comes down to the right keyword implementation.

keyword mapping

HOW TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THESE FEATURES
Begin with old-school keyword research. The first thing you want to do is create a list of all the related keywords to your business. Our brains are only able to handle so much so you may want to use one of the research tools from an SEO company like Moz or Serpstat. Then, you can start asking questions. For example, if you are selling hats you can ask “What kind of hats are worn in Ireland?” From here, you can trace the results and then take advantage of the other top questions and check out the results they receive.

You can then check back on your analytics and see which keywords are working, where you are receiving traffic from and other key figures like the click-through rate and bounce rate. What you are doing overall is seeing where you might have new potentials for different keywords as well as which ones are not working. This will give you the best clues for how to optimise your platform.

PUTTING SERP FEATURES INTO YOUR KEYWORD MAPPING FEATURES
These days, there are more tools than ever at our disposal for figuring out how to reach our target audience. Beginning with an SEO audit and then utilising refined keyword mapping that takes advantage of the latest SERP features, you’ll be able to get not only higher traffic rates, but also conversion and that’s how you truly make the most out of the latest tech trends. Be sure to check out our blog on search engine optimisation and other amazing tips.