The need for faster and easier to obtain information

[sharminakter]

Distribution of keyword lengths in second searches from the same user sessions on mobile and desktop
Keyword Length Distribution in Second Searches of Same User Sessions on Mobile and Desktop / Semrush Zero-Click Study
What does this mean for user journeys and behaviors on Google Search?
Let’s address an obvious problem first. On desktop, 25.6% of searches are what we call “zero-clicks.” This can mean a number of things in terms of user behavior, but let’s take the worst-case scenario: these “zero-clicks” mean that the user found the answer in Google’s SERP and never went to a website.

You might think this indicates some sort of imbalance on the SERP, but that’s not quite the case. Content is constantly evolving, and it’s evolving relatively quickly. What we create, how we create it, how users consume it, and what they expect from that content is changing rapidly and constantly.

Less than 100 years ago, families would sit around the radio to listen to the evening programmes, there was no television. More recently, the advent of digital music streaming has done to CDs what the digital content of news did to newspaper circulation.

The fact is that content changes, and so do user demands for it. While users a few years ago might have been happy to click through to a weather site to get the forecast, this study shows that today’s users prefer to israel telegram data get that information in a more direct way, such as through a box on the SERP. Often, they don’t even leave the SERP.

So this begs the question: Is Google providing a less "clickable" experience to divert traffic away from websites, or is it doing so because that's what users now demand?

Google’s move to offering URL-free content as direct answers in SERPs seems to be responding to a new demand for ease of access. It’s a bit like app push notifications on our phones. People want more immediate, digestible information. As a concept, direct answers on SERPs align with the evolution of content and consumer expectations.

This seems to be reflected in the desktop-mobile gap, where zero-clicks account for 17.3% of all searches. Users aren’t so much looking to avoid a click as they are looking to get information faster. Two features of today’s search are making this easier: Direct answers and an optimized, semi-infinite scrolling experience on mobile.