How can you get more clicks with your current rankings?

At Searchmachine optimalisation it's all about being found in the search results. And yet, most people tend to think of this as the only real strategy: increasing your website's organic rankings. When Google started, that was perhaps the only method to increase organic search traffic. At the very beginning of the era, only blue links were shown in search results: the higher it was, the more it was clicked. Nowadays, search results are completely different because they are visual and interactive. It is now possible to generate more clicks without investing in a higher ranking. We give 4 tips to deal with your current one rankings generate more clicks.

1. Rich snippets

Rich snippets are the first. These are normal search results in Google, to which extra information is added, in addition to the meta title, meta description and the URL. The result is ''enriched'' with information chosen by the website owner.

To provide that additional data, website owners should use structured data, preferably Schema. Google provides a whole list of schema types they support. In general, these are the most commonly used Schema types:

• Product schedule that will include the price and availability of your product in the search snippet. If you collect product reviews from the , this may also be included.
• FAQ schedule you can add to any page. These questions appear as a snippet below the normal search result and you can expand the answer. It is possible to include internal links in the answer, so that you can entice users to click through.

There are also plenty of other types that will work for more specific purposes. These include events, recipes, courses and much more. Make sure you can implement this on your website, because with rich snippets you can make the search result stand out even more. You generate a large area of ​​visibility, with which you can significantly increase the number of clicks.

2. Title & H1 headings

The title of a search result is traditionally the most visible part of the search results. It is therefore important to pay an above-average amount of attention to this. A good title not only attracts attention, but ensures that users click through to your website.

It used to be simpler: Google took the title of the page and used it as the title of the search result. In recent years, Google has started rewriting those titles and automatically generating something different.

It seems that Google wants their users to see the same text when they click through to the page from the search result. So it can help to adapt the H1 to the title. Google says this is better for user-friendliness and prevents deception.

Make sure your H1 heading contains the same content as the title, so that you convince Google to use it in the search result.

3. Images

Search results have become extremely visual. Mobile search results in particular almost always show an image or video next to the search result. Google uses images from the page in question and places them next to the search result, making them easier and more attractive to click on. If you don't have any images on the page, Google won't have an image to pull, so your search result will get lost in the crowd of other – often more visual – search results, impacting clicks.

There are no specific recommendations from Google on how to flag these images. It looks like Google is using a random image from the page in question. So we recommend using an image on the page so that Google can use this image in the search results. The search result will stand out more, be more attractive to click on and significantly increase the CTR.

4. Publication date

The date the content was created (or updated) often appears in search results. Obviously this could impact click-through. People will be more likely to click on a new result than an old one. If you want to learn more about rich snippets and you can choose from the results below, which one would you click?

Very likely on the latest result, because the information from the other results may already be outdated or the latest developments are not discussed in that article. So it's always a good idea to keep the content up to date!

Conclusion

If you want to receive more clicks with the current rankings, you can consider implementing one or more of the methods discussed. You can also apply all methods. The advantage is that in this way you command a large area of ​​visibility in the search results and thus increase the chance of a click.

There are also other practices that play a role in generating the number of clicks. It's a good idea to know the basic rules regarding SEO such as loading speed, site structure, keywords and backlinks, so that you increase your chance of ranking higher in Google. A number 1 search result automatically receives many more clicks than a search result in position 5. Scoring higher in Google alone is a battle in itself and is separate from the recommendations in this article.

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