It’s undeniable that the SERPs have changed considerably in the last year or so. Elements like featured snippets, Knowledge Graphs, local packs, and People Also Ask have really taken over the SEO world — and left some of us a bit confused.
In particular, the People Also Ask (PAA) feature caught my attention in the last few months. For many of the clients I’ve worked with, PAAs have really had an impact on their SERPs.
If you are anything like me, you might be asking yourself the same questions:
How important are these SERP features?
How many clicks do they “steal” from SEO?
And most importantly: who are these people that also ask SO MANY questions? Somehow, I always imagine the hipster-looking man from Answer the Public being the leader of such a group of people…
The first part of the post focuses on five things I’ve learned about People Also Ask, while the second part outlines some ideas on how to take advantage of such features.
Let’s get started! Here are five things you should know about PAAs.
PAA can occupy different positions on the SERP
I don’t know about you all, but I wasn’t fully aware of the above until a few months ago; I just assumed that most of the time PAAs appeared in the same location, IF and only IF it was actually triggered by Google. I didn’t really pay attention to this featured until I started digging into it.
Distinct from featured snippets (which appear always at the top of the SERP), PAAs can be located in several different parts of the page.
Let’s look at some examples:
Keyword example: [dj software]
Example of SERP where PAA is at the top of the page
For the keyword [dj software], this is what the SERP looks like:
· 3 PPC ads
· Related videos
· 4 PAA listings at the top of the page
· 10 organic results
Keyword example: [cocktail dresses under 50 pounds]
Example of SERP where PAA is in the middle of the page
For the keyword [cocktail dresses under 50 pounds], this is what the SERP looks like:
· Shopping ads
· 1 PPC ad
· Image carousel
· 3 organic results
· 4 PAA listings in the middle of the page
Keyword example: [tv unit]
Example of SERP where PAA is at the bottom of the page
For the keyword [tv unit], this is what the SERP looks like:
· Shopping ads
· 1 PPC ad
· 10 organic results
· 3 PAA listings at the bottom of the page
Why does this matter to you?
Understanding the implications of the different positions of PAA in the SERPs impacts organic results’ CTR, especially on mobile, where space is very precious.
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