Are you a featured snippet? If so, Google’s testing dropping your web listing

Being a “featured snippet” had allowed sites to effectively double-dip with Google visibility, but the search engine is currently testing a change that ends this.

Usually, a site that’s selected as a featured snippet appears both at the top of Google’s search results in a special box and again as one of the 10 web search listings further below. However, it’s been spotted that Google is dropping that web listing if a site is already featured.

Google has confirmed that this is an experiment to Search Engine Land and specifically told us that it’s not a permanent move. They also sent this statement:

We’re always experimenting with ways to create the best possible experience for our users but have nothing to announce at this time.

Of course, the experiment could become permanent down the line. But at the moment, that’s not the case.

I posted screen shots of Google testing removing the featured snippets listings from the core web results. Here is what you normally would see:

Here is where the featured snippet is removed:

Again, Google confirmed they are indeed testing this but has not commented on if this will be rolling out to everyone or not.

About The Author

Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here.