How important is a page-one listing on Google, and should a top SERP-position always be marketers main priority?
Data from the US-leading SEO-consulting firm Ignite Visibility (2017) (Fig 1, below) report that a number one position on Google will result in a 20.5% click-through-rate (CTR), which then falls steadily down to a 7.95% for SERP-one position ten. According to this report, the total CTR for first-page organic listings is 99,88%.
While CTR-reports often show widely different stats (Fig 2, below), one firmly can conclude that first-page organic search listing will generate the majority of clicks:
Whereas data like this, at first glance, indicate that a top SERP-position always should be a main-priority; before jumping to any conclusion, let’s first look at some facts related to SERP-positioning and ctr-estimations:
The CTR for first-page SERP-listings is decreasing.
A study by Moz reports that over 34% of all searches will cause a “zero ctr” (2017). This is also confirmed by a similar study by Wordstream (2017) in which 17 queries and 24 related keywords searches were tracked for two years. As this study shows, there is a 39% decrease in first-page-ctr when comparing the years 2015 and 2017. According to these and similar studies, the decrease in first-page-ctr can partly be attributed to search engines now returning search queries directly in the SERP through features including ‘Featured snippets’, ‘Local Pack’, ‘Reviews’, ‘Knowledge panel’, ‘Instant answers’ and ‘Related Questions’ (Fig.3,4,5,6,78, below).
Cost
As noted by Enge, Spencer and Stricchiola (2015), Kingsnorth (2016) and Clarke (2016); top SERP-positions depends on many factors, including domain authority, content quality, backlinks, and technical factors including page-loading-speed. While arguably it is possible for an organization with unlimited resources to obtain top organic positions for most keywords and phrases; many segments have fierce SEO-competition (Hackney, 2017; Sharma, 2017) and where the top positions in the SERP are occupied by organisations whom have built their positions through years of SEO-work. Consequently the cost, efforts, and resulting ROI of trying to compete for a first-page SERP in such segments, might simply not be worth the efforts.
Broad keywords are getting less important.
As pointed out by Google (ThinkWithGoogle, 2017); people’s search-patterns, habits, and phrases have changed from broad phrases such as “shoes online,” to more complex questions and phrases such as “buying brown leather boots similar to Angeline Julie on Oscars 2017.” Google has responded to this by adapting its search algorithms with updates including Hummingbird, Pigeon, and Possum, which all focus on semantics, and to build an understanding of the indirect meaning of explicit search queries. Further; these updates also comprise metrics, such as user location and type-of-device when presenting search results (SearchEngineLand, 2017). Optimizing for broad queries, consequently, has become less important, and Google since a few years emphasize that SEO-work should be focused on answering—not to specific words—but to long-tail queries such as: Want-to-know…, Want-to-go…, Want-to-do… and Want-to-buy…, (Google, 2017).
A top position does not necessarily convert into profit.
What always should matter in SEO-work is that the words- and phrases with a top position in the SERP are grounded in organizational revenue- and/or business goals, and that an organisations SERP-results always should have pages directly corresponding to the phrases of the search result; including product pages, images, videos, and map-directions.
Conclusion
Page-one listings receive a great majority of clicks. With modern search-algorithms focusing on understanding the indirect meaning of explicit search queries; ranking for broad phrases has become less important. As of this, Google recommends that SEO-work should focus on answering explicit long-tail queries.
The key to build strong SEO-strategies is to understand the customer journey; what problems your product or brand are solving; and to anticipate how people currently find answers to these questions.
- References
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