First of all, what’s a featured snippet?

When you use Google Search, sometimes a white card pops up at the top of the page with an answer to your query. This is a featured snippet. The card may show a bulleted or numbered list, a table or graph, or a paragraph with about 100 words of information that directly answers your query.

What else is a featured snippet known as?

It’s sometimes called “zero spot” because a featured snippet is located at the top of a search engine results page (SERP), above organic position one.

Why should you want a featured snippet?

Because the click-through rate is 2x higher on a featured snippet than on an organic result. Snippets are quick answers – just what most people are looking for!

How can a dentist get a featured snippet on Google?

Google’s Neil Patel says that Google usually pulls snippets from pages that already rank on page one organically, for the search phrase. However, Getstat found that 70% of results in Google featured snippets don’t come from page-one results. In other words, no one really knows the best recipe for earning a featured snippet. We do know that Google selects snippets based on the quality of information and relevance to the query.

Some pro tips for getting your dental blog picked up on a featured snippet include:

  • use bulleted or numbered lists,
  • tables and graphs,
  • Q&As,
  • and high-quality, original copy on the subject of your page title.

Do you still need to optimize for search?

Yes! Having a featured snippet for your dental practice is awesome, but it does not replace a solid optimization strategy. You should still be:

  • researching keywords,
  • writing unique content,
  • updating your pages and images regularly,
  • and blogging weekly, at a minimum.

How will you know if your site has a featured snippet?

It takes a little digging, but you can conduct research through Google Analytics or a tool like SEM Rush to learn which of your pages or posts are featured in a Google snippet. Or, Identiwrite can find out for you!

How do you know which questions to answer on your dental blog, for the best chance at landing a featured snippet?

Again, research is necessary. There are a few ways to go about researching which questions you need to answer to get the most visibility in search results.

Here’s an example of how to use Google Search to find out what your target patients are asking online.

  1. Go to Google Search.
  2. Enter a basic question that someone looking for a dentist like you would ask, like “Which orthodontist near me is best?”
  3. In the results, you’ll see ads, maps, then an organic listing, and then you should see a collapsible set of questions and answers, titled “People also ask”. In my search, I see some great questions. Each of these questions would make a great blog post. Here’s what I found:
    1. How much do braces cost?
    2. How expensive is Invisalign?
    3. What questions should I ask my orthodontist?
    4. Will braces make my lips look bigger?
    5. Does Invisalign give you a lisp?

We know that people are actively looking for answers to these questions. Furthermore, we know that searchers were most likely in your geographical area, because of the way Google Local compiles search results. I’m in the Dallas-Fort Worth, Tx area, and the results shown above came from WebMD, a site for a dental office in Houston (5 hours away from me), and outside Texas.

If I write a great blog post with these questions as titles, and I include numbered and/or bulleted lists, related Q&As, and original, high-quality information that answers the primary question (title), my post or page has a great chance of being listed in the Q&A cards for these queries.

Are answers on FAQ pages used for Google Answer Cards?

There’s a good chance, if you tag your question as an H2 or H3, or bold it, then use regular body content font for the answer, the Q&As will be properly indexed. However, FAQ pages should be coded specifically to be picked up as actual FAQs by Google. Here are the instructions for FAQ page coding, from Google.

How to Get Your Dental Website on Google Featured Snippets

Call Identiwrite at 940-395-5115, and we’ll do the research to find out what your webpages and blogs should contain, to have a good chance at landing a featured snippet. As a dental copywriting company, our writers can also compose content for you – so you won’t have to do the research or the writing! We can’t guarantee that you’ll get a snippet, but we can promise to implement the latest tools and data to vastly improve your site’s potential to show up for multiple featured snippets. Call me, Shauna Duty, owner and managing editor of Identiwrite Creative, at 940-395-5115, or email me at shauna@identiwrite.com, to schedule time to chat by phone.

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