Do you know what Zero-Click Search is and how it’s impacting your business?
Tuesday, 22nd October 2024Do you know what Zero-Click Search is and how it’s impacting your business?
Written by Clare Moorhouse, Founder of Moorhouse Digital
One of the things that I’ve seen dramatically change on the internet recently is how Google’s Zero-Click Search is affecting many businesses. If you don’t know what Zero-Click Search is, it’s the AI generated snapshot that you see directly on the results page whenever you perform a search in Google.
I am now getting our clients to rethink and adapt their digital and content so they can stay visible and relevant in the era of these AI-powered search features.
I want to take some time to help you understand what Zero Click Search is, how it’s evolving, and give you actionable steps to help your business stay visible and competitive in this changing environment.
What is Zero-Click Search?
When you go to Google now and search for your favourite pizza toppings, you’ll notice that the content is being displayed directly in the search engine results, like this:
Have you noticed that you now don’t have to click into any website to know that black olives are a great combination with mushroom?
Like many other online platforms, Google is trying to keep people within their own eco-system, without them having to click through to your website to find the information they’re looking for.
Before we get into the numbers, there are a few things I want you to bear in mind.
Zero Click Search is not happening for all searches…YET.
Right now, they are mainly being displayed for informational, long-tail search queries. However, I am expecting Google to expand these in 2025 and beyond which is why you need to ACT NOW to stay ahead of the game.
Zero-Click Search might sound like a new development, but Google’s AI capabilities and natural language processing have been developing for some time. Featured snippets are nothing new, but the search engine giants are now taking further steps to enhance their search experience by making it easier for users to find information.
Between January and December 2020, 64.82% of searches conducted on Google, both desktop and mobile platforms, concluded without users clicking through to another website.
So, what do you as a business owner now need to do to get traffic to your website?
First up, you absolutely shouldn’t stop creating content!
Instead, you need to be agile and adapt accordingly so you can improve your visibility, traffic and brand awareness.
Let me show you how to position your business for success:
Create content using E-E-A-T
E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authority and Trust. It’s a framework that Google uses to determine the quality of a website’s content.
Your content should always demonstrate first-hand expertise and opinion in a way that offers real value and depth for your audience. That way, Google is more likely to use your content in its AI snippets and this increases the likelihood of readers clicking through to your website – leading to more leads and engagement.
It also positions your content as a trusted source of information, improving brand reputation and credibility. Optimise your content for Large Language Models (LLMs)
To get your content featured in the rich snippets and AI-generated snapshots, here’s what you need to do:
– Keep your blogs focused on a niche area and make them highly relevant for a specific audience.
– Structure your content to directly answer frequently asked questions.
– Use these questions as descriptive headers within your content H1, H2, H3, and H4 header tags.
– Use short, punchy sentences in your copy that Large Language Models can easily interpret and display in their snippets.
– Include user-generated content on your website to improve engagement and help signal to search engines that your content is authentic and credible.
Focus on Long-Tail Keywords
Long-tail keywords are more specific and targeted phrases that are longer and more detailed than generic keywords. They allow you to target a narrower audience who have a higher intent to purchase or learn. Long-tail keywords are less competitive, making it easier for you to rank higher in search engine results and attract more organic traffic.
We’ve had tremendous success creating this sort of content for our clients, quite often these are performing better in search engines than main pillar service pages.
Brand visibility
Make sure that your business is visible and influential on the channels where your ideal customers are. Trust me, this will be more important than ever in the era of Zero-Click Search.
Repurposing your content into different formats such as email, video, social posts etc. will help to reach a wider audience and give you a stronger impact. You can use AI to repurpose a high performing blog and ask it to create a video transcript or summarise it into an email. This will ‘feed’ the algorithms giving them exactly what they’re looking for and puts your brand front and centre across multiple platforms.
Next steps
It’s true to say that Zero-Click Search may present challenges in terms of less organic traffic and increased competition, but it does offer opportunities to enhance your brand’s visibility, improve user experience, and deliver relevant traffic.
If you want help adapting your digital strategy for this new era of Search and turn these changes into opportunities for your business, request a FREE Visibility Audit from us today.
About Moorhouse Digital
We help service-based businesses stay visible, attract their ideal customer and build a profitable business.
We work with growing businesses who need a trusted partner to maximise their online visibility so that your marketing efforts can be better targeted and more effective.
https://moorhousedigital.com