Googles Knowledge Graph Explained: How It Influences SEO

If you want your website to reach the top of search engine results pages (SERPs), it’s essential that you understand how Google’s Knowledge Graph works and how it affects SEO. With more than two trillion searches processed annually, making sure your site is optimized to appeal to search engines like Google gives you an advantage over competitors who haven’t done their homework. 

In this blog post, we'll give a complete overview of what the Knowledge Graph is, why it matters for SEO, and various strategies that can help make sense of — and optimize your content for — Google's algorithms. Read on if you're ready to learn about the power of the Knowledge Graph!

What is Google's Knowledge Graph?

Google's Knowledge Graph is a box that appears on the right side of the search engine results page (SERP). It includes all the factual information about the query. This may include information about an individual, movie, band, nutritional information about food, etc.

For example, when you search for a movie on Google, it shows a whole lot of information on the right side. This includes the release year of the film, ratings (IMDB, rotten tomato, and Metacritic), release date, director's name, and more. This also displays screening times, streaming partners, reviews, etc.

The knowledge graph of Google is a powerful tool that provides valuable information to users. Google collects this information either from the primary source or from a group of reliable sources on the internet.

Knowledge Graph Structures

Google uses schema markup to create Knowledge graphs. Schema coding is a semantic language used by search engines to identify and understand structured data. It also allows them to parse those data and display them to users.

The knowledge graph comprises a combination of nodes and edges between the nodes. Nodes include entities such as people, places, and things. Meanwhile, edges refer to the connection bridging those entities.

How Important is Google's Knowledge Graph for SEO?

Knowledge graph has been around since 2012. However, until recently, it started affecting the SEO strategy of experts.

Currently, knowledge graphs don't have much direct impact on SEO. However, in many ways, it can affect your overall traffic.

The knowledge graph is a highly crucial element for local businesses. This is because customers can find relevant information in a single search.

It helps in semantic SERPs, providing information to users without the need to click on every displayed result.

This makes schema markup coding a must-have skill for SEO.

Technically, the knowledge graph (when used correctly) could be a positive thing for users and SEOs. Users receive relevant information, and businesses may even increase traffic. Besides its positives, the knowledge graph comes with significant downsides as well.

Here are the ways how Google's Knowledge Graph influences search results

It helps Google understand the search intent of users

A search results page with only links works great, but not always. This is because people don't always search correctly. Sometimes they forget a character or a band name, etc.

That's where the knowledge graph comes into action. It allows google to display results based on the intent of the users. That means google is more than just matching keywords with links.

For example, by searching "founder of Amazon," google displays the name "Jeff Bezos" on the SERP, including the knowledge graph, rich results, and snippets.

Similarly, searching "the blue guy with the big head" displays the main character of the animated movie "Megamind." Even though you don't mention the movie name, google automatically detects the user's intent.

It helps you gain traffic from voice searches

Around one billion devices have Google assistance. Approximately seventy percent of voice searches are done in natural languages.

Google's knowledge graph can help recognize entities and attributes from queries done in natural languages.

If you get yourself in the knowledge graph, you may rank higher in SERP. This improves your visibility, domain authority, and trust of users.

It May Result in Fewer Clicks

Of all the searches done, only 50% times of these results got clicked by users. It means if 100 searches are done, the likelihood of a user clicking a link from the SERP remains 50%.

So Why is That?

Google's Knowledge Graph could be one of the reasons. By displaying more information directly on the screen, users get information on the SERP itself. That means they can skip visiting a site to get information.

For example, if a person searches for a celebrity, it also displays their spouse's name, parents' & children's names, height, recent movies, etc. As a result, users don't have anything else to visit a website for information.

From an SEO perspective, this needs to be solved. If people don't click search results, websites will lose organic traffic.

How Can Websites Solve This Problem?

Avoid keywords with low click-through rates. This includes keywords people search for but don't click and enter a website.

For example, a search for "key benefits of Google's Knowledge Graph" is likely to get more clicks. This is because the answer to the query is long, and people are likely to click a link.

Meanwhile, keywords like "Lady gaga real name" will get little to no clicks as the answer will be on the Knowledge Graph.

While knowledge graph is not a significant factor for SEO, it will soon be crucial. Websites with a knowledge graph may find a ranking on Google's first page easier.

How to Get Your Webpage in Google's Knowledge Graph?

Use Google and Wikipedia

Google collects most of its information from Wikipedia and Its own search engine. So setting up your brand in Wikipedia and Google is the first step.

Register your website in Google Search Console. It helps you check your site's traffic and performance.

If you have a business, you must sign up for Google My Business. It increases the visibility and domain authority of your site in Google. Plus, your business will be a feature on Google Maps.

Google collects its information from WikiData for its knowledge graph. To get your name or brand in Wikipedia, you need a Wikidata entry. Most importantly, Wikidata stores the most structured data of Wikipedia.

A Wikipedia article may sound odd to you. However, all articles in Wikipedia contain source links.

Use Schema Markup

Schema markup is tagging your content, allowing google to understand it better.

Besides the knowledge panel, schema markup can help you get rich snippets and appear on non-branded search queries.

Keep Yourself Updated

Updating your webpage, including posting content and regularly updating your information, can help you get in the Graph.

You can stay relevant by being active on social media profiles and organizing content for social media platforms like FB, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

Create Quality Content

Content is King, and this King is not leaving his kingdom ever. Google will always prefer content as its main aim is to provide accurate and detailed information to users. Therefore, contents optimized for users, like utilization of keywords, Meta titles, Meta descriptions, and alt tags, are more likely to get you into the Knowledge Graph.

Conclusion

Overall, Google's Knowledge Graph is an incredibly powerful and helpful tool for both SEO and overall search engine optimization. It helps to provide a more complete understanding of each web page and the subject it covers, providing more meaningful search results that are based on more accurate information than ever before. With the Knowledge Graph, SEO professionals can craft content with greater relevance and importance, helping their pages rank higher in the search engine results. Most importantly, the Knowledge Graph helps users make well-informed decisions when they are looking for information online. Whether they are researching a product or a service, people can trust that Google's big data will give them the most accurate answer as quickly as possible. In short, by utilizing the features of the Knowledge Graph when creating content for your website, you can easily improve your chances of appearing higher in SERPs.