Research on the search results of 150,000 apparel-related keywords shows that Google SERP features 95% of the time, reflecting the opportunities available to online retailers who want to sell more through Google.
The results suggest that search rankings today have evolved beyond the traditional organically focused SEO needs to keep up with today’s reality.
seoClarity has listed the various SERP features, ordered by popularity in the SERPs:
Contents
The research, conducted by AI-driven SEO and content optimization platform seoClarity, focused on apparel-related search queries.
Although it was already understood that the organic search results with the ten blue links are essentially a thing of the past, they were still surprised to see how far the organic search results have disappeared significantly under various search functions.
They discovered that 95% of keywords result in a SERP feature on the first page of search engine results pages (SERPs).
Of those SERP features, 85% were popular products search features.
The Popular Products feature was featured in the top three search results 48% of the time.
According to seoClarity, the dominance of popular products in the SERPs was most evident in the mobile search results.
“… in mobile, 75% of the SERPs of the queries contain 4 or more occurrences within the Popular Products Packs in the same SERP.”
About Popular Products
The Google Popular Products search feature was introduced in 2020 to show popular products for clothing.
Being listed in these types of search results is free.
Since Popular Products was originally rolled out for clothing-related searches, it’s not surprising that researching clothing-related search queries results in a high percentage of Popular Products search results, as this is what Google announced would happen.
I reached out to seoClarity and asked if these types of results are comparable in other verticals and they confirmed that they also see similar SERP features across other keyword categories.
Search Evolves
Google search has always changed.
But the idea of ten blue links as representative of what search results should look like continues. This is evident in the exclamations of anger when the search results are anything but ten blue links.
Images are shown in search results for recipes.
Search results for the cast of a TV show or movie are displayed with pictures of the actors.
When you search for products on Amazon or another online store, the search results are ordered by images.
So it makes sense for Google to also use the paradigm of images in search results for shopping-related search queries, especially for those related to clothing.
According to Google’s 2020 announcement of the new Popular Products feature:
“When you’re shopping online for something to wear, like a down jacket for winter or dress shoes to match a new outfit, it can be useful to see style options in many different stores.
But with the number of options online, it’s not always easy to know what’s out there, find inspiration, compare your choices and decide what and where to buy.
Search has always allowed you to find links to various products and stores, but starting today and rolling out in English in the US this week, you’ll start seeing clothes, shoes and accessories from around the web in one place on Search on your phone. device, so you can easily browse many different stores and brands at once.
The goal of SERP features is to provide search results in an engaging way that helps users according to the intent of their search.
seoClarity’s research drives home the message that search has evolved and therefore SEO must evolve with it.
SEO Must Evolve
In order for SEO to remain effective, it is necessary to think about all the search functions that are available for a given search query and make sure that the site is optimized to rank in these types of SERPs.
“If you don’t optimize for Google Shopping, your organic search traffic and visibility will suffer.”
This new way of displaying search results is likely to affect apparel-related searches at a higher rate than they do for searches in other verticals.
These situations may be indicative of a search feature such as the Popular Products search feature dominating the top of search results.
Of utmost importance is that all businesses that sell products should consider participating in Google’s free listing program.
Google’s Merchant Center has published documentation on how to get products listed in these top of page search results where it advises:
“Free listings allow customers to see product results from your store through Google, such as on the Shopping tab, YouTube, Google Search (.com), Google Images and Google Lens.
Just as we do not charge websites to be part of the Google Search Index to organize and display relevant information, participating merchants are also entitled to organize and display their product information through Google for free.
The takeaway from this research is that for some vertical SEO is no longer just about ranking in the old fashioned top ten search results with ten mere links.
Search results for shopping-related queries are now more image-rich to help shoppers find the products they’re looking for.
The most important takeaway from seoClarity’s research is that SEO is needed now more than ever to help businesses more effectively build their sites and products.
Citation
Read the original research:
Google dominates apparel search results
An analysis of ~150,000 apparel related keywords