Zero click searches, what are they and why are they important⁉

SEO Article

Semrush last month released a ‘Zero-Click Study’.

They took 20,000 unique users, evenly spread across desktop and mobile, and analysed multiple searches per user. In total over 600,000 unique search actions were used in the study 😲

Most searches are no longer than 4 keywords in length:

Desktop keyword distribution length 1-2 (31.6% ) and 3-4 (38.2%),
Mobile keyword distribution length 1-2 (31% ) and 3-4 (39.9%):

The fact that almost 70% of searches include a maximum of 4 keywords shows the expectation from users. They want Google to do the work and find the right answers for them.

Decisions happened quickly!

On the desktop 65% of decisions happen within the first 10 seconds, 0-5 (45.5%) 5-10 (19.5%):

Users are making decisions quickly, particularly on the Desktop. We cannot as marketers rely on them to do any of the work. It is a very small window to influence that decision, if we are slightly off the mark we are likely to miss out, resulting in competitors stealing traffic or the user refining their search.

For mobile the decision-making process is longer 0-5 (33%), 5-10 (18%), 10-15 (9%), 15-20 (9%):

This is likely a result of the mobile user experience, the scrolling behaviour being prevalent and likely affecting this. Whilst this suggests the user is willing to do more work, this could be a result of the mobile SERP features like rich results and the local 3 pack. Or simply that they are just happier to scroll more, still looking for that one answer that gives them what they want, or further refine their search.

A lot of users don't get what they need the first time around

30% of users refine or extend their search

This is a clear indicator of users wanting a better result. What it does not tell us however is how it is refined; is this because of bad results in the first place or because the initial result gave them more information that allowed for further refinement? 55% of refinements include very similar keywords from the original search. SEMrush suggests this is evidence that they were not satisfied with the original search. Conversely, it means that 45% of the users refined in a different way, perhaps suggesting that they were able to refine their search because of information gained from the original query, however, it is hard to know for certain.

There is lots of great information to drill down into, but the main point it makes around zero click is that content changes and so do user demands for content. While users of a few years ago may have been happy to click on a weather site to see the forecast, we can see from this study that today’s users prefer to get that information in a more direct manner, such as via an Answer Box on the SERP. They regularly don’t even leave the SERP at all.

Link to the Study Here: https://www.semrush.com/blog/zero-clicks-study/