Google Adds “Structured Snippets” To Search Results Data

Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Google Adds “Structured Snippets” To Search Results Data

Google’s search data seems to be undergoing quite the makeover recently. Now, to be fair this is not an obvious aesthetic makeover where you would notice immediately once hitting the search results page. However, if you look close enough you will see the changes that are being made. A couple of weeks ago it was reported Google seemed to be making small additions to how search results are displayed. At the time this was mostly relevant to historic people and places with small snippets of additional information being displayed below the normal search results blurb. Although at the time this only seemed to be relevant to Wiki listings.

Well, now it seems Google are rolling out these snippets of information across the search results network. According to an announcement from Google “Structured Snippets” is a feature which incorporates additional data in snippet form below the main result listing. In the example provided by Google if you search the term “nikon d7100″ then in addition to the main result blurb little snippets provide some quick-glance information on the ‘sensor resolution’, the ‘weight’ and the ‘display size/resolution’. We have tried and the results for Nikon d7100 are live now so you can see for yourself…or of course you can just checkout our images taken this morning and shown below. In the announcement by Google, the search giant also advised the new snippets had been designed to work with mobile phone interfaces too. For this example Google highlight if you search for “superman” (shown below) and in addition to the standard wiki listing the snippets provide quick-glance information such as ‘Created by’, ‘Place of Origin’ and ‘First appearance’.

It is not sure how prevalent the Structured Snippets are at the moment with Google not providing any direct information on the scope of currently available search terms only noting “Fact quality will vary across results based on page content”. However, Google does also note that four will be the maximise number of snippets provided per search term. So, the next time you are searching on Google (let’s face it, it will probably be today) keep a look out for any small additional snippets of information below the search blurbs. Let us know if you find any interesting or questionable results.