How To Rank For Featured Snippets
While I was at Affiliate Summit a couple weeks ago, I had a chance to catch up with my buddy Stephan Spencer. Stephan Spencer is an author, speaker, and internet entrepreneur.
Who's Stephan Spencer?
Stephan is an SEO authority expert, author, speaker and consultant helping some of the most prominent companies in the world.
Stephan is the author of The Art of SEO and he's one of the foremost experts in the field of search engine optimization. Stephan is also the host of two popular podcasts. The Optimized Geek and Marketing Speak. I'll tell you a little bit more about each podcast next, and you can find out everything else you need to know about Stephan at his website, stephanspencer.com
The Optimized Geek
I listened to a few episodes of The Optimized Geek when he first told me about the podcast, but it wasn't until recently that I started listening to every episode.
The Optimized geek talks about "life-hacks" for lack of a better term. Stephan interviews interesting people that have achieved high-level accomplishments and amazing personal transformations.
The podcast is about biohacking, personal transformations, I would say they're about self-optimization (is that even a real term?). Its official tagline is: Reboot and Improve your Life.
Stephan went through his own amazing transformation. If you knew him 6 years ago, you wouldn't recognize him today. I was flabbergasted when he first showed me and told me about his transformation.
I'd recommend it to anybody looking to learn how to master your body, your life, and relationships.
Marketing Speak
The other podcast, Marketing Speak is also a high-value podcast covering monologues and interviews with field and industry experts. I don't recommend it to everyone because it isn't for everybody.
If you're an entrepreneur, marketing geek like me, blogger, vlogger or business owner, then this is a must podcast to add to your subscriptions.
Both podcasts are available everywhere it matters: iTunes, Google Play, Sticher and probably other podcasting apps
So what did I ask Stephan Spencer During the Interview?
Our interview was about voice search and how it's changing the landscape of SEO.
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Imagine that in the future, actually... right now, Google will not be showing you 10 blue links to pick one you like. Instead, it will be reading the summary of the top one result.
I say reading it because we have a boom in virtual assistants being deployed in our homes. Google Home, Alexa, Cortana and others are listening to your commands and queries triggered by your voice commands.
Most of these devices take the top-most result on a search query and read it out loud. This is the featured snippet of search engines. You might have noticed these the last time you did a search online.
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Those little summaries in the search engines are called featured snippets and Stephan tells us the steps we can take to take advantage of those results so that our websites provide those results.
If you can answer a question on your website, and your answer shows up on that spot, then Google Assistant in Google Home, Alexa, Siri, Cortana and other "smart" assistants will use your answer to give people searching with their voice.
The tricky part is making your blog or website the one that provides that answer. The interview is short, but packed with useful and actionable information to help you rank for featured snippets and start integrating voice search results as part of your overall SEO strategy.
