Ebay.co.uk is the online retail site most likely to feature in shopping results displayed within Google’s UK search engine listings according to a study by search analytics software firm Searchmetrics.
Amazon.co.uk, play.com and johnlewis.com are among the other retail sites that are highly visible.
Top ten sites with greatest visibility in shopping results within Google UK universal search listings
1. ebay.co.uk
2. google.co.uk
3. amazon.co.uk
4. play.com
5. johnlewis.com
6. tesco.com
7. argos.com
8. overstock.com
9. asos.com
10. debenhams.com
“For a few years now Google has been bringing in specific shopping, news, image, video, blog and map based results into the general search listings it presents to searchers as part of what has been termed its ‘universal search’ strategy – it’s intended to help searchers find what they’re looking for more easily,” said Dr Horst Joepen, CEO of Searchmetrics. “When it comes to the shopping results category, we found that certain sites seem to be enjoying greater visibility in universal search – perhaps due to their search engine optimisation (SEO) efforts.”
The study suggests that marketers can further improve their sites’ online visibility within Google UK by focusing SEO strategies around video and image content – which now very frequently appears and is highly positioned in Google UK searches.
When the study examined the various categories of universal search content, video was found to be displayed most often in searches (video results appeared in over 70 per cent of all searches where universal search results are included in the top 100 listings). Second came image (over 30 per cent), followed by shopping (close to 20 per cent) and news (see chart underneath)
“Our findings indicate that online sites that want to increase their visibility in Google should consider creating video and image content and focusing SEO strategies on optimising it to appear in universal search results. Given that many retail sites already produce a large volume of video and image content, we think this could be an obvious step for them,” added Joepen.
The Searchmetrics study was based on an analysis of the top 100 UK search engine results displayed by Google for a database of approximately 28 million search terms over a period of four months.
In the news results category, the study revealed that dailymail.co.uk is the UK online news site that is most visible. Guardian.co.uk, bbc.co.uk and telegraph.co.uk are also in the top ten:
Top ten sites with greatest visibility in News Results within Google UK universal search listings
1. dailymail.co.uk
2. guardian.co.uk
3. bbc.co.uk
4. telegraph.co.uk
5. wsj.com
6. reuters.com
7. indiatimes.com
8. google.com
9. independent.co.uk
10. Bloomberg.com
About the study
The Searchmetrics study was based on an analysis of the universal search results that appear in the top 100 listings in Google’s UK index. It reviewed searches carried out using a database of approximately 28 million global keywords between February and May 2011.
Universal search results are defined in this study as the listings in the Google UK search engine results that are presented as “News for…”, “Shopping for” , “Places for” or “Images for” etc for the various universal search result categories.
www.searchmetrics.com
