Google News Carousell

[DaddySmurf]

Hi Guys,

Just watched Randi's last White Board Friday. He was talking about Google shake0ups and the fact that Google is more often returning results where there is a news carousel at the top of page one.

Has anyone seen any research to show if people who are looking for a product / solution are actively clicking on these news items or not? And should this news carousel be considered the number one spot, or is the number one spot still the fist true SERP result shown below it?

Many thanks

Si

[DaddySmurf]

Hi Adam,

Thank you for your answer, it tells me what i wanted to know. Now i have another voice in my head telling me to generate more news stories. Just what i needed lol.

Kind regards,

Si

[Adam_Cochran]

That all kind of depends on what your vertical is, and what you mean by the number one spot.

The News Carousel show up first, when it shows up. That being said it is pulling information in a different manner than the organic results so being #1 organically wouldn't include you in that system automatically. Imagine it like when Youtube results or Google maps results show up in the search. They are an additional search element that is run separately than the organic system.

As far as if these are going to see more clicks - quite naturally they will. Just like Google Rich Snippets profiles see an increase in CTR beyond the normal results listing. People are more apt to click these results for three reasons:

1. You've presented them with additional information which in the long run is what they are trying to access
2. The majority people fall into a visual learning type. When you show them a picture they will pick it over text every time
3. It's new, and people have a natural curiosity with that which is new and will click on it simply to explore.

When you understand the background process that leads to the click decisions these people make it's not a huge leap to think that they'll be plenty click happy on the news carousel!