Keeping up with Google’s changes is difficult, to say the least. The company releases thousands of updates annually, and – as a gambling affiliate brand – you need to consider that you might be subjected to further restrictions with any one of these updates.
In June 2022, Google opted to remove its rich snippets for gambling products and for other sectors that are deemed to be high risk. As a result, you’re going to need to make a couple of changes to your website to adapt to these new rules.
This article will tell you everything you need to know, along with highlighting what you need to do in order to minimize the impact.
What Has Google Done Regarding Rich Results?
Toward the end of June 2022, Google announced a significant change surrounding its rich results. The changes came into effect straight away, meaning that you should consider acting soon to mitigate its impact – if you haven’t already done so.
On Google Search Central, the company says the following:
“We don’t allow content that promotes widely prohibited or regulated goods, services, or information that may facilitate serious, immediate, or long-term harm to people. This includes content related to firearms and weapons, recreational drugs, tobacco, vaping products, and gambling-related products.”
Regardless of what you do, Google will remove rich snippets from any results you feature in but to conform with SEO best-practice you should remove them.
What Is a Rich Snippet?
Rich snippets aren’t too different from ordinary search results, and you’ve probably noticed them before – even if you didn’t know what they were called. In short, rich snippets involve adding extra information alongside the meta’s found in organic search results – such as ratings or pricing.
This increases the chance of a person clicking through to your page because they can be more certain you are providing the information they are looking for.
What Impact Will It Have on Affiliates?
If you’re an iGaming affiliate that uses rich snippets, you will notice a difference when users search for your content on Google. Any starred reviews, prices, etc will no longer feature as part of your search result section.
Because of this, you will need to think of new ways to gain the trust of users – and ensure that they decide to click through to your pages. You might also need to think of alternative ways that you can market products in the SERPs.
What Should You Do Now?
Now that you know the rich snippets changes are in effect, it’s important that you think about how you can ensure that it doesn’t cause too much of a problem for your user experience. Below are some ways you can change things up.
Focus on Your Meta Information
Focusing on your meta descriptions and titles was always important, but it’s now more critical than ever. Without any other point of reference, these will be the first impression you give to most people looking for your content.
When writing your meta description, explain very clearly what people can expect from your website or that specific page. You might want to think twice about using gambling-specific terms, just in case Google decides to make further alterations in the future.
Your meta title, on the other hand, should complement what you put in your description. It should be short, succinct, and descriptive in equal measure.
Re-Optimize Your Existing Pages
Of course, you’ll need to think strongly about any extra pages you create from now on. But you’ve probably already got quite a few articles and pages on your website, some of which will have reviews for casinos and other products. As such, it’s essential that you reoptimize your content so that it continues to engage readers.
As mentioned earlier, you don’t need to do anything to remove the rich snippets. You can if you want, but Google has already removed them from the SERPs. However, you will need to ensure that all of these have engaging meta descriptions and titles – especially if you were relying on ratings/bonus info, etc to drive click-throughs beforehand.
Optimizing Your Pages for Google’s Changes Is Crucial
Google’s rich snippet result change isn’t a huge deal – at least compared to its many other changes. But at the same time, you should not ignore it. Since you can no longer rely on those extra bits of information that might have been helpful for driving conversions before, fine-tuning metas is now a must.
Allocate a good amount of time to make sure that all of these are enticing. And when users click on your website, make sure that what’s on there is equally as interesting.
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