le: The Strategic Search Revolution is Here! How to Better Engage Your Audience by Merkle

SERP complexity has never been higher, and user engagement has never been greater. The number of no-click searches is at an all-time-high, the above-the fold visibility is fleeting, and SERP compositions have never been more complicated. The real question is: Will your brand be able to stand out amongst competitors or will it fall victim of complacency? It’s never been more true that the old saying “grow or you die” is still relevant.

What are the results of our SERP data?

Our data shows that blue links will have a visibility of around 18% above the fold in Q1 2023.

In 2022, the premium above-thefold position favored paid listings, and SERP features that were intent-driven. Our data showed a 156% increase in People Also Search SERP, a 22% increase in text ads, and a 14% rise for shopping ads. In 2023, intent-driven SERPs still seem to be gaining ground. However, paid listings are losing out.

In B2B industries and the insurance industry, Q1 2023 preferred text ads, and people also ask, which appeared above the fold approximately 60% and 85% respectively.

The appearance of text advertisements above the fold in financial services has decreased by 10% over the past quarter. This allows more space for People Also Search.

Retail and ecommerce saw the number of text ads in SERPs nearly halved, while shopping ads dropped by 6% and organic blue links were down by 8%. The SERP changes appear to be allowing for more product listings. Merchant listings increased by 16%, and now make up 45% of all SERP elements. We can safely say that 2023 is the year of product listings: If we look at all types of product listings, approximately 50% of retail SERP elements will be products.

With the integration of AI in the search experience, we are also facing the unknown. Google’s Bard and Search Generative Experience(SGE) and Bing’s Open AI partnership have already begun, adding yet another layer of complexity and difficulty to an algorithm that is already complex.

How can you make sure that you are always visible and in the lead?

Data is the key to a search strategy revolution that breaks down the barriers between paid and organic results. A successful search strategy is dependent on the quality of data, its accessibility across teams, and your ability to interpret it into actionable insights.

It’s not as difficult as it sounds. The data is key, but that’s just half of the battle. Here’s a five-step guide to success in a constantly changing SERP landscape.

1. Research your audience
2. Segment consumer insights
3. Understanding your competitors
4. Find out your brand’s niche
5. Activate

1. Research your audience

Nobody knows their audience better than themselves. The keyword is your most powerful audience research tool. This step, therefore, is often undervalued when crafting strategies. To identify the “why”, it is important to ensure that your keyword research covers the entire target landscape. The bigger the list of keywords, the more insights you will get.

Each keyword represents your users searching for you. Understanding the composition and usage of keywords will help you to understand where your users are.

2. Segment consumer insights

What are they saying to you now that you know their search terms? What do they look for repeatedly? How many times do they ask the same question?

This step is primarily focused on determining what the user wants to achieve when they use their search bar.

Search is a series unanswered queries. Understanding patterns and similarities across the multitude of search data can give us important insights into how users enter the market. The data also tells us, as a company, how to connect with users at their moment of need.

3. Understanding your competitors

It is better to stand out than to fit in. But to do this in an appropriate way, you must understand the environment where your audience lives. This requires competitive data. There are two types of data that you need to understand how to be successful:

• The SERP’s composition is made up of organic and paid formats.
• The SERP’s competitor composition is the list of domains that are competing.

The SERP composition helps you understand the environment where you are looking for representation. Is it a space dominated by paid ads? What are the different listing types and features? What can be seen above the fold of a page?

Understanding the competitive composition will help you understand what formats are available for representation in a given environment. Do informational competitors have an advantage over sellers? What are the top page types?

4. Find out your brand’s niche

It’s now time to answer the most important question: What is your brand doing that limits visibility in this SERP world? Here are some things to consider:

• Are you answering your users’ questions?
  • You really?
• Answering questions from your users in the same way they asked them is important.
• Answering your users’ queries in a way that is appealing to them?
• Answering your users’ queries in the visible channel (organic or paid) is important.

Understanding your brand voice and visibility gaps will help you identify key areas that require strategic activation to engage your audience.

5. Activate

After you have outlined your key learnings from the four previous steps, your brand will need to apply these lessons to its current search program.

It is important to keep in mind that SERPs are no longer organic or paid. This is a battlefield of mixed-intent listings and channel-independent listings. It’s high time that your visibility strategy was integrated directly into the SERP.

What to do for your brand

Knowing what to accomplish is one thing. But knowing how to execute it to benefit your brand is another. Consider these key factors when planning your execution:

• Data management: There are a LOT of numbers involved. Data management and processing are essential to extracting insights that can lead to a profitable initiative.
• Planning SEO/SEM: By managing SEO and SEM under the same roof, you can easily share data and create a cohesive plan that leads to effective strategies. Integration works best when everyone is on the same page, has a good understanding of their craft, and knows that success in search doesn’t just mean a particular keyword or position.
• Implementation: The ability to implement data insights at scale will determine the quality of your results.

It’s not always about the best partnership. Working with an agency can be key due to the lack of resources and expertise in-house.

Total search becomes more important than ever as AI continues to permeate the search space. Will your brand be prepared?

Kacie Gaudiose is the SEO content strategy leader at Merkle. She wrote this article.

The post Search Engine Land : The Strategic Search Revolution is Here: How to Better Engage Your Audience first appeared on Search Engineland .