Answers to Queries

Queries and Answers

Google prioritize short and concise answers to users' queries, no more than 30 words long.

1. Answer questions
2. Be readable
3. Provide for featured snippets
4. Implement local SEO if you are focusing on local business or or local public.
5. Use schema markup
6. Improve page speed and security.
7. Try to build your content in a conversational manner, asking and answering questions.
8. Structurize your copy in short easy-to-read paragraphs with a question form subheading.
9. Create a how-to part on your page.
10. Use different lists with numbers or bullet points, tables, steps, etc.

The most common types of featured snippets are:

• Paragraphs (WHAT questions);
• Lists/ Steps (HOW questions);
• Tables;
• Images;
• Charts.

Start with the most important information to answer the question; transit to more details beyond the direct answer and add visual support; wrap up with examples or case studies.

First of all, to think of the best answer, you have to identify a simple question that users may ask when searching for something related to your area of expertise. 

When you ask a question and understand that the answer is a matter of a simple fact, like somebody's birth date, then it is a so called factoid, and it will be shown as Knowledge Graph. Thus, your question should be more complicated and require a more substantial answer.

Once you have separated more comprehensive questions from the ones that summon factoids, check the techniques that are able to trigger the use of a featured snippet.

Why everything happens? Photo by Elena.

Ws (Who, What, When, Where, Why) + How questions

Here the Why and How questions attract snippets best of all, as they require more explanation and cannot be easily answered with factoids.

Why-questions usually produce a paragraph-like snippet, like here when I asked "Why are clouds grey?"

How-questions, as a rule, trigger some practical advice, usually showing a list. Here I asked "How to watch a solar eclipse?"

Moreover, snippets for why- and how-questions usually serve as teasers and provoke the users to explore further by clicking the link.

Implied questions

Users usually do not type in the query with a question word but they surely imply it. For example, you may just type "CTR", however, in your head the query sounds like "What is CTR?" Google will also recognize it as an implied question.

Beware, common words will trigger a dictionary entry instead of a featured snippet. So the question that you devise should ask for more specialized knowledge that cannot be reduced to a simple dictionary definition.

A good way to get more ideas on search queries is by consulting "People also ask" box in the SERP.

Now you know what kind of questions trigger featured snippets. You can efficiently build your content around them. 

An easy way to find all possible queries is to use Rank Tracker:

1. Launch Rank Tracker (if you don't have it, you can download SEO PowerSuite's free version here) and create a project for your site.
2. Go to the Keyword Research module and click Suggest Keywords .
3. Pick the Google Autocomplete suggestion method from the list.

By typing or pasting your questions with wildcards to the tool (i.e., what *seo*, how *seo*, etc.) you will receive tons of suggestions related to your keywords.

You can filter your results by the important metrics, like Number of Searches and KEI, and comprise a list of questions that cover your niche.

You can check then that long-tail keywords return the featured snippets, for example, I Googled "why SEO is important":

Research answers

Well, by now you have in mind the variety of the questions that should cover the content that you want to compete with for a featured snippet. The content optimization in this case calls for good old keyword search.

Ahrefs analyzed 2 million featured snippets and extracted top 30 frequently met words in the search queries that trigger featured snippets (stop words excluded). I compiled the most common ones in a list that you can copy right away to the Rank Tracker (Keyword Research -> Suggest Keywords -> Google Autocomplete). Take the ones that are related to your niche and replace with your actual keywords:

Top keywords list takeaway

Rank Tracker is also a good tool to get the ideas for higher volume keywords and, what's more important, long-tail keywords. By pressing the Suggest Keywords button in the Keyword Research module in the app, you will get an array of options that will allow you to highly diversify your search for keywords. You may explore:

• Keywords related to your niche of the market;
• Keywords related to your site and competitors;
• Keywords from other search engines and services;
• Keywords building via word combinations and typos.

Optimize the format

Why this is important? Great content deserves decent wrapping to let Google efficiently pick up the information for the featured snippet. By wise HTML formatting, you can guide Google to the necessary spots to retrieve the data for the answer box.

Moreover, the suitable format may help you either to steal position zero from the page with weaker formatting, or to keep your page on this position — any moment you may lose your snippet to a site coming from nowhere. In case of any of these scenarios, try to check whether everything is in order according to our guidelines below. If your snippet is stolen, try to analyze why Google considered this intruder to be better than your page is and apply the changes to your page accordingly.

Here is what you should pay attention to:

1. Type-wise format: Try to format your target page according to the major types of the featured snippets:

• Paragraphs: Think of the short summary to answer a potential query — Google has a tendency to prefer the answers that begin logically as an answer would do; This single answer paragraph should be about 40-50 words to fit in the answer box. Format this paragraph in a paragraph HTML tag <p>; Put this paragraph right under the heading for the question.
• Tables: Google loves to include tables into the featured snippets, as they are much easier to understand for computers, unlike natural language paragraphs. So when it makes sense, add the tabular data or reformat suitable paragraphs into tables. Mark up the table on your page using the <table> tag. Lists/ Steps: Use a heading tag above the list on your page; Give this list a title that matches the targeted keyword. As Google can make its own lists out of the text instead of snipping the paragraph, you can format your text with subheadings (H2) where it is logical to do so. Then Google will take your subheadings and list them chronologically. Featured snippets of a list type can be tricky in a way that by giving all the steps in the answer box, you discourage users to click the link to your page — they have already got all the necessary information!

Thus, try not to lay all the cards on the table — format the text the way to save some no less important steps from the users' view. In this case Google will give "More items" link. And that is a call to click!

Clear-cut answers

If the content on your page is too long to fit in the answer box, you can chop it up to paragraphs, lists, or tables.

In case you have quite a few target questions, you can add a Q&A Section where all the related questions will be put together with ideally formatted answers.

If your page's content updates regularly, use a "last updated" tag. In this case Google and users understand how current you post is.

Request indexing by Google

Why this is important? We recommend to use Google Search Console to re-crawl your pages. Apparently, this request almost instantly updates Google's index of the page. It means that your page can gain a featured snippet the same day you did re-indexing.

If you feel that your page is well-armed for position 0, follow the procedure:

1. Log in to Google Search Console.
2. Expand the "Crawl" menu and click "Fetch as Google."
3. Put in your page address and click "Fetch":
4. It will be added to the table. Click "Request Indexing":

Useful links:

• link-assistant.com/news/voice-search-guide.html - among other things
• https://www.link-assistant.com/rank-tracker/keyword-research-tool.html - kewword research tool.

Above all, try to stay positive. Photo by Elena: View from the Toronto CN Tower.

Crystallized Vs. Fluid Intelligence

Crystallized versus Fluid Intelligence

The brain is a sophisticated survival organ. And, according to variable selection theory, we survived because we could adapt to rapidly changing circumstances – we adapted to change itself. What cognitive gadgets in the grain best aided our ability to survive the ever-changing environment of Northeast Africa?

A model that answers this question best is an old one, first championed by researchers Raymond Cattell and John Horn in the middle years of the 20th century. The idea that you use previous knowledge to improvise solutions to present problems lies at the heart of the ideas of Cattell and Horn.

The first category is called crystallized intelligence, which is the ability to learn from experience, constructing a database retrievable on demand. You got scorched when you put your hand on an orange-colored burner on a stove. You recall this experience the next time and see a hot stove – using your crystallized intelligence – and move away.

Crystallized intelligence is that suite of gadgets that allows you to memorize and recall. Those who could remember prior experience best might have distinct survival advantages over those who could not. Crystallized intelligence skills tend to get better as you get older.

The second category is called fluid intelligence, which is roughly the ability to improvise off the database established with your crystallized talents. You got scorched on an orange-colored burner on a stove. Now you see an orange-colored fire in a fire pit. That's not a stove, but still you stay away from it.

That's improvising: coming to conclusions in reaction to situations with which you have no direct experience. You create unique combinations from the database – in this case, solving a pattern-matching problem. Such creative, inductive problem-solving ability is the hallmark of fluid intelligence. Fluid intelligence skills do not improve with age; the skills reach their maximum in your early twenties and then begin a long, slow decline. 

We obviously used both types of intelligence to survive the wild, woolly world of the meteorologically unstable Serengeti. Those people who had them working in concert, quickly absorbing the knowledge the world had to offer and then improvising off it, could adapt to changes much more quickly than those who could not.

(From Your Best Brain, Course Guidebook, by Professor John J. Medina).

Interpersonal intelligence is a social skill. It is the ability to understand and be sensitive to the emotions and feeling of others.

Understanding of Working Memory

Understanding of Working Memory

Our understanding of working memory owes much to the pioneering work of Alan Baddeley in the early 1970s. On the basis of his studies of short-term memory, he came to view the mind in terms of two kinds of cognitive systems: a set of specialized systems dedicated to specific mental tasks, and a general-purpose system utilized in all active thing processes.

Specialized systems come in two flavors. Verbal systems, like systems involved in speech comprehension, are mainly present in the human brain, whereas nonverbal systems are present in all brains. Nonverbal specialized systems are epitomized by sensory systems. Each is involved in processing unique kinds of stimuli (sights, sounds, smells, and so on). As part of their operation, the verbal and nonverbal specialized systems are able to retain what they've just processed for brief amounts of time (seconds.) This capacity aids in perception, allowing the system to compare what it is seeing or hearing now to what it saw or heard a moment ago. For example, when listening to a lecture, you have to hold the subject of each sentence in your mind until the verb appears, and sometimes you have to refer back to your memory of earlier sentences to figure out the referent of a pronoun.

The general-purpose system consists of a workspace and a set of mental operations called executive functions that are carried our on information held in the workspace. Although only a limited amount of information can be retained at any one time, the workspace can hold on to and interrelate information of different types from different specialized systems *the way something looks, sounds, and   smells can be associated with its location in external space and with its name). This ability to integrate information across systems allows for abstract representation of objects and events. It is especially well-developed in humans, and is likely to contribute to the uniqueness of human cognition.

The information in your working memory is what you are currently thing about or paying attention to. And because working memory is not a pure product of the here and now. It also depends on what we know and what kinds of experiences we've had in the past. In other words, it depends on long-term memory.

Synaptic Self. How Our Brains Become Who We Are. Joseph LeDoux (author of The Emotional Brain).

We forget too much and too often. Illustration by Elena.

The Mental Trilogy

The Mental Trilogy

Throughout much of history, the mind has been viewed as a trilogy, a tripartite amalgam that includes cognition, emotion, and motivation. For some, the trilogy was a description of different aspects of a single mental faculty, whereas for others, it represented three distinct, separate capacities. During most of the twentieth century. Both versions of the mental trilogy were out of favor. When the behaviorists reigned, psychology ignored the mind altogether, making the mental trilogy moot.

Later, the cognitive revolution brought the mind back to psychology, but thinking and related cognitive processes were (and for the most part still are) emphasized at the expense of emotion and motivation. Clearly, however, it is important to understand not just how we attend to, remember, or reason, but also why we attend to, remember or reason about some things rather than others. Thinking cannot be fully comprehended if emotions and motivations are ignored.

Mental Juggling

An idea, an image, a sensation, a feeling: each is an example of what psychologists call mental content – stuff that is in the mind. Mental content was the subject matter of experimental psychology when it first emerged as a discipline in the late nineteenth century. But John Watson and fellow behaviorists replaced this focus on subjective states with a mind-less psychology of objectively measurable events (stimuli and responses). When the cognitive revolution later made the mind fair game again, it did not do so by reviving subjective psychology. The thinking process itself, rather than the conscious content that results from thinking, became, and largely remains, the subject matter of cognitive science.

Working memory is our inherent capacity to think. Photo by Elena.

“In order for a mind to think, it has to juggle fragments of its mental states.” This simple statement by Marvin Minsky, one of the architects of the branch of cognitive science known as artificial intelligence, gets right to the heart of the matter. Imagine, as Minsky suggests, rearranging the furniture in a room familiar to you. You shift your attention back and forth between locations. Different ideas and images come into focus, and some interrupt others. You compare and contrast alternate arrangements. You may concentrate your entire mind on a small detail one moment, and on the whole room the next. How does the mind do this juggling, and how does it keep track of the imaginary changes? The answer is that the mind uses something called working memory.

How many times have you looked up a phone number and then forgotten it after being momentarily distracted? The reason for this is that you put the number into working memory, a mental workshop that accommodates one task at a time. As soon as a new task engages working memory, the content of the old task in bumped out. For that reason, unless you keep rehearsing the phone number and manage to ignore other things that compete for your attention, it will not remain in your mind.

Working memory is one of the brain's most sophisticated capacities and is involved in all aspects of thinking and problem-solving. It allows you to read a menu and keep its various options in mind while also considering the specials announced by the waiter and the return to the thought you were having before the waiter appeared. It underlies your ability to hold a conversation, play board games like chess, or direct yourself to an unfamiliar destination on the basis of having just looked at a map. In addition to being used in such routine daily activities, working memory also contributes to special human endeavors, like composing music or solving complex mathematical problems, or any other situation in which information has to be held in mind in order to complete a task.

We must explore broad aspects of mental function, that is, to begin to assemble a neurobiological view of the self. Illustration by Elena.

Synaptic Self. How Our Brains Become Who We Are. By Joseph LeDoux (author of The Emotional Brain).

How to Write a Good Text

How to Write a Good Text for a Website

People read about 20% of the words on a website. Since there’s really no telling which words they’ll read, you can’t just have a few sentences designed to act as winners. They all need to be winners. So a bit of good editing will help you create SEO-friendly content.

Editing programs, like Hemingway Editor or Grammarly, cut to the heart of grammatical and readability issues. You won’t need to read the piece with a fine-toothed comb, just fix the problem areas that the editors highlight.  You can then take it a step further and run the piece through a tool like SEMrush’s SEO Content Template for specific SEO recommendations.  

Note that polished writing doesn’t represent a single form. In fact, business blogs, comedy websites, and news articles all require different tones, levels, and styles of writing. So if you’re trying to break into a crowded space, push the boundaries of acceptable content.

Add humor, edge, intelligence, confidence, sarcasm, or charisma. Loosen up the writing and let the metaphors sing. Add soundbites in-between text for interactive content. Shorten up paragraphs and use bullets. Use loose and colorful prose. Find a unique, engaging voice that mimics the demographic lingo. Use Long-form & Short-form Content, but don't forget that with increasingly crowded web spaces and demanding searchers, Google’s algorithms have begun privileging longer and longer content.

If your goal is to satisfy the searcher’s query, and you get to pick between a 250-word article and a 3,000-word article, there’s generally a higher chance that the 3,000-word article contains something in it that satisfies the intent of the searcher.

Yet, sometimes that 250-word article delivers the bullet point answer in a beautiful featured snippet, and those other 2,750 words are no longer needed and definitely not read.

According to an aggregation of research, the ideal content length for high-ranking pages should be around 2,000 words. This is a good starting point and a great place to gauge your word count, but it isn’t the holy grail.

You need to A/B test with your specific visitors to see which kind of content they like best – short or long.

Find clear-cut answers to any question. Photo by Elena.

Originality versus Authority

On the one hand, you’ve been told to value citing sources, authoritative links, expert advice, and claims that are backed up. On the other hand, you’ve also been told to value original research and content that adds value through new claims. Basically, you need to avoid scraping content and avoid unverified claims. Go ahead and lean on the experts, but exceed them. Never overwrite your links and research, but add something new and original, something your specific audience would want.

You need the sources to back up your content, but you need to go beyond the sources to tell a new and compelling story. A few creative links and a compelling story will help your content walk the line between authority and originality.

Mobile Traffic

Mobile traffic is a big business, though keep in mind that mobile searches are generally more specific and targeted than desktop searches. Phone searches are generally more integrated into lifestyles, and things that people are already doing.

If you’ve got content that people will mostly access from a desk, focus on those long-form pieces and keep the shorter informative responses for the mobile users.

Make the Form Match the Content

When we talk about form, we’re talking about:

• Word count.
• Structure of the content.
• Tone of the piece.
• HTML tags.
• Title and meta tags.

If you understand what the content seeks to communicate and what kind of search the content satisfies, you can develop the form of the page around the content.

If its a technical article about plumbing or stock trades, get right to the point in the opening paragraph. If you’ve got a comedy listicle, your audience will be a bit more forgiving about slow starts.

Google’s advice to “make pages for users, not search engines” is still some of the best advice you can get.

Creating a good outline for your content before you begin plugging words into a page will ensure that the article maintains integrity.

The best articles don’t just read like a nice essay, they look like a crisp painting, with tags, titles, font, and headlines that create a unified piece.

Source: searchenginejournal.com/6-tips-for-creating-the-best-seo-friendly-content/314813.

Follow the guidelines for good texts and you'll be able to travel every day of your life! Photo by Elena.