A lot of search engine marketers expected to see many more Google vertical results showing up in the Google Universal Search Engine Results Pages then we have. In fact, the number of image, video and news results in the blended results seems to be decreasing, rather than increasing.

Google is continually improving their interpretation of search intent and delivery of the most relevant results. These all-important factors are measured in part by: click through rates (the percentage of the people who see the listing divided by the number who click into the page) and bounce back rates (the number of people who land on a page and then immediately return to the results pages).

So, when results from other verticals appear in the blended results, Google tells whether they are relevant to that query or not by whether they are clicked on and, if they are clicked on, if the searcher returned to the results quickly, after a time, or not at all. Think about your experiences with the Universal results. When was the last time you chose to view and image or video or news article after a search query?

Images and videos are naturals for travel web sites. So, how can a travel or hospitality oriented website make the most of their photos and videos in Universal Search? First, look at the results for the keyword phrases for which you would like to rank. Are there any blended results on the first page?

A recent query for Hawaii surfing, for example, shows 3 image results across the top of the page.

 

The page names for these photos are: http://www.destination360.com/north-america/us/hawaii/images/
hawaii-surfing.jpg, http://www.hawaiipictures.com/pictures/bigisland/
hawaii_surfing11024×768.jpg and http://www.jaunted.com/files/admin/
hawaii_surfing_nut.jpg . See a pattern here?

Now, take a look at result #4. It’s a YouTube video entitled Surfing Hawaii and tagged with surf, surfing and Hawaii. In addition, it’s rather popular, with a rating of 4 stars, 224 comments. more than 325,000 views. It’ll take a great video to beat this one out, but if you have one, by all means submit it, tag it and share it with your friends today.

Costa Rica cloud forest is another query that shows the first 3 photos from the Image Search results across the top of the page:

Most of the queries that bring up image or video results are fairly generic, like sailboat, ice sculpture and nascar wreck. Determine which searches that are relevant to what you do display videos and/or images on the first page. Then, come up with a plan to get yours there, too.

Remember that you don’t have to be a great photographer or videographer to make this work for you. In fact, you don’t even have to own a camera. Run a themed contest with a good prize, promote it online and through the traditional media and people will happily send them to you!

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Categories: Travel Marketing.
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