Are Rich Snippets Making You Rich?
While you may have seen that Google recently announced improvements to their Rich Snippet Testing Tool, you may find yourself wondering “What is a Rich Snippet, and how do I use them to my advantage?”
Rich Snippets are labeled elements of data such as reviews and pricing. If a product detail page in your online store uses Rich Snippets, that data can be displayed on its own line in search engine results. This in turn makes the result stand out more since it is taller. If a merchant’s store uses reviews, a 4 or 5 star rating can also capture a potential customer’s attention increasing click through rates.
Now that you have an understanding of what a Rich Snippet is, Google makes it easy to see if it understands the content of your store’s pages and its relevance. With their improvements, Google has renamed the tool the Structured Data Testing Tool and it is located here:
By simply entering the URL’s of your store’s product pages, you can see what Google understands about that page as well as see a preview of what your search result can look like. The preview will show you if Google understands your product’s price and if it has customer reviews. It is important to note that Google does not guarantee that they will list your products’ snippets in their search results, but it is still always a good idea for merchants to include that data.
Now that you know what Rich Snippets are and how Google uses this information, you can make sure that your store is providing this information. Doing so can improve the performance of your search engine listings which translate to greater sales. If you are using Nexternal’s eCommerce platform, rich snippets on product detail pages are already built in. All that you need to do is encourage your customers to review your products and the included Review Reminders makes that easy.
Craig is the VP of Sales at Nexternal and is known in the industry as an expert in eCommerce, systems integrations, and online marketing. Craig has been with Nexternal since 2000 and his passion and experience are apparent to all who work with him.
