Study of 500+ Searchers to Find out How They Search and What Impacts Their Decision to Click

Folks from Ignite Visibility recently surveyed over 500 respondents, aged 25-60, to find the answers to these questions: What do searchers look for in the search results, and how accurately do those results reflect search intent?

Key Findings:

1. The majority of respondents are not receptive to ads in the search results. Most (85.2%) preferred to click on organic results, and 66.7% responded that if Google added more ads to the results, they would want to use the search engine less.
2. Written content is still king. Despite the growing emphasis on video and image production, 55% still prefer to see written content in the search results.
3. Web privacy continues to be a concern for users. In the case of ad targeting, 62.1% had no idea why Google was targeting them for certain ads.
4. Ranking #1 isn’t everything. Yes, ranking higher is better, but most respondents looked at more than three search results before deciding to click.
5. Brand awareness matters, but it’s not a deal-breaker. The slight majority, 55%, said that they would only click on a brand they knew in the search results, while 44.9% would still click regardless of they knew the brand.
6. Meta descriptions remain a crucial SEO element. When asked which factor has the most significant impact on their decision to click a result, 62.9% responded it was the description.
7. Good news for Google: most searchers are satisfied with the search results. When asked, 72% replied that the search engine was mostly accurate at matching their queries will search results.

You can download the full study from their post (direct download, no email required)