As such, giving Featured Snippet scorings an integral role in your SEO strategy, is, in general, sound. What it does mean is that Google is not shying away from using the SERP feature. This does not mean that Google isn't swapping URLs for a keyword, or even changing which keywords result in or don't result in a Featured Snippet. Meaning, fluctuations in 2016 have the added quality of being normalized (to a degree) as the feature was on an upward trajectory, whereas this was not the case in 2017.ĭespite the general perception that Featured Snippets are in a constant state of flux, the feature overall is quite stable, and has been for some time. What is important to consider is that 2016 was less volatile, despite the feature showing huge gains. There were some significant changes with the biggest coming at the end of the year between December 1st and January 1st (2018) where the feature went from showing on 13.5% of all Page One SERPs (desktop) to 11.33%, a 2.17 point drop. What is amazing to note is that Featured Snippets gained nearly 7.5 percentage points in 2016, it just did so very gradually.Ģ016 Featured Snippet fluctuations comparing data from both the 1st and 15th of each monthĢ017 was slightly more volatile, but not by much.
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However, this was offset by a series of months with almost no volatility. When looking at October 1st relative to November 1st (considered October 1st data), the feature spiked 1.87 percentage points.
In 2016, there were a few moments where the feature fluctuated somewhat substantially. The results show this feature to be highly stable.
In fact, of all of the SERP features I analyzed, Featured Snippets were the most stable feature in 2016 and in 2017. But what does the data say? Are Featured Snippets volatile? Is your SERP strategy in jeopardy? Are zero-ranking wins harder than ever to come by? No, no, no, and no. A lot of this caution came as there was a change in Feature Snippet data patterns back in November of 2017, just as more Knowledge Panels hit the SERP. Besides for being seen as the Nirvana of SERP features, there was speculation that Google was limiting the feature. So of course I'm going to start off with Featured Snippets.
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=> Find out how to deal with SERP Volatilityįeatured Snippet Volatility - Not What You'd Expect However, it is not an exhaustive set, and of course has its limitations. In a nutshell, there is a pretty decent amount of data that was analyzed. I used the standard deviation to determine if a feature was more or less stable and how the 2017 figures compared to 2016 (except in the case of AMP). In regards to AMP, only data from 2017 is included in this study (since AMP in organic results was only introduced once 2016 was well underway).Īfter collecting this data, I simply determined the average fluctuation and calculated the standard deviation.
I did this for both 20 for Featured Snippets, Knowledge Panels, and Local Packs. In the case of January 15th's data versus February 15th's data, I simply refer to this as January's mid-month data on the graphs below. The same goes when I looked at the data on the 15th of one month compared to the 15th of the next. Now, the question is, which month does this data belong to, January or February? Since most of the data came during January, and because doing otherwise would be confusing, I called this data "January's" data. This was recorded as a 5 percentage point loss. Just for example, say that SERP feature "A" appeared on 45% of all Page One SERPs on January 1st, but only 40% on February 1st. For the sake of having a more complete picture, I looked at the 1st of one month in relation to the 1st of the next month, as well as the 15th of one month relative to the 15th of the month that followed (since I wrote this post before January 15th, the latter dataset has one less point of analysis). I then looked at the next month's data and recorded how many percentage points where gained or lost. What I did was take a SERP feature and see what percentage of Page One SERPs the feature appeared on. These near-constant SERP feature gains and losses piqued my curiosity and made me wonder, just how stable are some of the most important features on the SERP? Is the perception that many features undergo significant fluctuations accurate? Just how volatile are SERP features likes Featured Snippets, Knowledge Panels, Local Packs, and AMP?īefore proceeding, let me just walk you through the data I'm about to present. Throughout 2017 we reported on what must have been nearly a dozen major SERP feature increases or decreases.
If you keep track of the news within the SEO industry, you'll notice that Google constantly changes the data patterns of its SERP features.
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