This Week’s Industry News
Compiled by the Rocket Clicks Team
Top Stories
Google Add “Donate Now” Button to Knowledge Graph
US-based nonprofits could be seeing a boom in donations this holiday season. Nonprofits now have the option to display a donate button once they opt in to Google For Nonprofits. Users can submit donations straight from the search results as the “Donate Now” button is placed near the top of the nonprofit’s knowledge graph. The donation process is very user friendly and users have the option to donate any amount of their choosing. Source: Search Engine Journal
New Features in Google AdWords Editor
With the recent version 12.2 update for Google’s AdWords Editor, a number of new features have been introduced including full support for promotion and video extensions as well as a new budget type option for video ads: Campaign Total Budgets. In addition, Life Events has also become a category of audience targeting and ad rotation settings can now be changed at the ad group level within the Editor. Source: Search Engine Land
Google Expands Finance Search Navigation Tab
Users interested in finance and stocks can now experience and access finance information based on his or her interest. The new search tab includes performance information about followed stocks and in-depth insights about companies. The new finance feature is customizable and will populate results based on interests entered. Google will also send users notifications when there are noticeable changes in stock performance. Source: Google Blog
GMB Web Search Dashboard Asks Businesses to Create Ads
A recent change to Google My Business’ web search dashboard spotted by SEO Specialist Sergey Alakov was the addition of a new “create ad” option. When clicked, you will be taken to the Google AdWords Express local ad system. With this change, Google is likely to be enticing more small businesses into creating Google AdWords ads. Source: Search Engine Roundtable
Merge of the Mobile Packs
Local businesses displaying a knowledge panel for branded searches now have a combined local pack and knowledge panel. The new pack displays a “Locations” tab and an “About” tab. The new change takes up less valuable real estate in the mobile Search Engine Results Page (SERP). One other noticeable change is the header name in the local pack, it now features a company’s logo. The new merge of the mobile packs overall creates a better user search experience and may allow for more clicks to occur in the knowledge pack. Source: Sergey Alakov
Analysis
PPC Client Management Pro Tips
Mark Ferree of PPC Hero shares his own personal pro tips for managing a long and prosperous relationship with your PPC clients. Communicating updates at regular intervals can set the expectation that you are reliable and lets the client know you are constantly looking at performance. Ferree also suggests addressing problems directly, letting the client know what happened, why it happened, and what you are doing to address the problem. Though stepping into the fire may not have immediate benefits, it makes your client see you as more of a business partner than a vendor. In addition, agreeing on achievable, yet challenging goals with the client will give the client the tools to gauge your performance as a vendor as well as give yourself the tools you need to optimize the account. Source: Mark Ferree, PPC Hero
Optimizing Content for Featured Snippets in 2018
SEMRush and Ghergich & Co. conduct a lengthy study of over 1.6 million featured snippets and 80 million keywords and here’s what they found. Most featured snippets stem from queries with prepositions, comparisons or are questions. Preposition queries tend to populate list snippets and in optimizing for those list snippets, webmasters including lists in their content will increase their chances of ranking for the snippet. Question related queries should format a 40-60 word paragraph into their content that precisely answers the query questions. Comparison queries should include well-structured tables that lays out the information and includes end of buying cycle keywords. The reports further examines pages that rank for multiple snippets and discusses takeaways from those successful pages. Source: A.J. Ghergich, SEMrush
