5 Things You Should Know About
‘People Also Ask’
& How To Take Advantage
Samuel Mangialavori
Consultant

It’s undeniable that the SERPs have changed considerably in the last year or so. Elements like featured snippets, Knowledge Graphs, local packs, and People Also Ask have really taken over the SEO world — and left some of us a bit confused.

Especially People also ask (PAA) caught my attention in the last few months, given for how many of the clients I have worked on, PAA have really had an impact on their SERPs. 

If you are anything like me, you might be asking yourself the same questions: 

  • How important are these SERP features? 
  • How many clicks do they “STEAL” from SEO?
  • And most importantly: who are these people that also ask SO MANY questions? Somehow, I always imagine the hipster-looking man from Answer the Public being the leader of such a group of people… 

The first part of the post focuses on five things I’ve learned about People Also Ask, while the second part outlines some ideas on how to take advantage of such features.

Let’s get started! Here are five things you should know about PAAs.

1. PAA can occupy different positions on the SERP

I don’t know about you all, but I wasn’t fully aware of the above until a few months ago; I just assumed that most of the time PAAs appeared in the same location, IF and only IF it was actually triggered by Google. I didn’t really pay attention to this featured until I started digging into it.

Distinct from featured snippets (which appear always at the top of the SERP), PAAs can be located in several different parts of the page.

Let’s look at some examples:

Keyword example: [dj software]

*Example of SERP where PAA is at the top of the page

For the keyword [dj software], this is what the SERP looks like:

    • 3 PPC ads
    • Related videos
    • 4 PAA listings at the top of the page
    • 10 organic results
Keyword example: [cocktail dresses under 50 pounds]

*Example of SERP where PAA is in the middle of the page

For the keyword [cocktail dresses under 50 pounds], this is what the SERP looks like:

    • Shopping ads
    • 1 PPC ad
    • Image carousel
    • 3 organic results
    • 4 PAA listings in the middle of the page
Keyword example: [tv unit]

*Example of SERP where PAA is at the bottom of the page

For the keyword [tv unit], this is what the SERP looks like:

    • Shopping ads
    • 1 PPC ad
    • 10 organic results
    • 3 PAA listings at the bottom of the page
Why does this matter to you?

Understanding the implications of the different positions of PAA in the SERPs impacts organic results’ CTR, especially on mobile, where space is very precious.

2. Do PAAs have a limit?

I’m just giving away the answer now: No-ish.

This feature has the ability to trigger a potentially infinite number of questions on the topic of interest. As Britney Muller researched in this Moz post, the initial 3–4 listing could continue into the hundreds once clicked on, in some cases. 

With one simple click, the 4 PAA questions can trigger three more listings, and so on and so forth. 

Has the situation changed at all since the original 2016 Moz article?

Yes, it has! What I’m seeing now is actually very mixed: PAAs can vary extensively, from a fixed number of 3–4 listings to a plethora of results.

Let’s look at an example of a query that’s showing a large number of PAAs:

Keyword example: [featured snippets]

*Example of SERP where the number of PAA expands when clicked upon, and is not fixed

For the query [featured snippets], the PAA listings can be expanded if clicked on, which process generates a large number of new PAA listings that appear at the bottom of such SERP feature.

For other queries, Google will only show you 4 PAA listings and such number will not change even if the listings get clicked on:

Keyword example: [best italian wine]

*Example of SERP where the number of PAA listings is fixed and does not expand

For the query [best italian wine], the PAA listings cannot be expanded, no matter how many times you hover or click on them.

Interestingly, it also appears that Google does not keep this feature consistent: a few days after I took the above screenshots, the fixed number of PAAs was gone. On the other hand, I’ve recently seen instances where the keywords have a fixed amount of only 3 PAAs instead of 4.

Now, the real question for Google would be: 

“What methodology are they using to decide which keywords trigger an infinite amount of PAAs and which keywords cannot?”

As you might have guessed by now, I don’t have an answer today. I’ll continue to work on uncovering it and keep you folks posted when/if I get an answer from Google or discover further insights. 

My two cents on the above: 

The number of PAAs does not relate to particular verticals or keywords patterns at the moment, though this may change in the future (e.g. comparative keywords more or less inclined to a fixed amount of PAAs.)

Google’s experiments will continue, and they may change PAAs quite a bit in the next one to two years. I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw questions being answered in different ways. Read the next point to know more!

Why does this matter to you?

From an opportunity standpoint, the number of questions you can scrape to take advantage of will vary.

From a user standpoint, it impacts your search journey and offers a different number of answers to your questions.

3. PAAs can trigger video results

I came across this by reading an article on Search Engine Roundtable.

*Example PAA with video results

I wasn’t able to replicate the above result myself in London — but that doesn’t matter, as we’re used to seeing Google experimenting with new features in the US first.

Answering a PAA listing with a video makes a lot of sense, especially if you consider the nature of many of the queries listed:

  • What is.. 
  • How to..
  • Why is/are..

And so on.

I expect this to be tested more and more by Google, to a point where most of the keywords that are currently showing video results in the SERPs will trigger video results in the PAA listings, too.

Keyword example: [how to clean suede shoes diy]

*Example of SERP for keywords that often trigger video results

Video results will matter more and more in the near future. Why is that? 

Just examine how hard Google is working on the interpretation and simplification of video results. Google has added key moments for videos in search results (read this article to know more). This new feature allows us to jump to the portion of the video that answers our specific query. 

Why does this matter to you?

From an opportunity standpoint, you can optimize your YouTube and video results to be eligible to appear in PAAs.

From a user standpoint, it enriches your search journey for PAA queries that are better answered with videos.

4. PAA questions are frequently repeated for the same search topic and also trigger featured snippets

This might be obvious, but it’s important to understand these three points: 

  1. Most PAA questions also trigger featured snippets
  2. The same PAA question (& answer) can be triggered for different keywords
  3. The same answer/listing that appears for a certain question in a PAA can also appear for different questions triggered by PAAs 

Let’s look at some examples to better visualize what I mean:

PAA questions also trigger Featured Snippets

Keyword 1: [business card ideas] 

Keyword 2: [what is on a good business card?]