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POINT OF VIEW

The status quo for search engine results have changed, now offering more results per search, and

incorporating more vertical site information within. In some cases this can lead to pharma brand

results appearing later in the search results stream. We recommend several tactics to address this,

and among the most critical is to partner with online publishers who can help boost content value.

Background

Search engines have always presented search

results in a list format, with 10 results per page

in order of importance, based on the user’s

search intent and backend search algorithms. In

time, most users became accustomed to seeing

this format after completing a search. More

recently, however, the display of organic search

engine results pages changed dramatically with

the addition of results from other websites’

custom search engines, leading not only to more

results, but to broader results.

These custom search engines—vertical search

engines—work like web search engines but find

content exclusively from their own websites. In

the past, vertical search results could only be

accessed using a website’s vertical search

engine. Today, these results are part of a typical

search engine result page.

With these changes in search engine behavior, it

is no longer enough to build content in just the

brand website to improve a brand’s web

presence. The brand management team now

has a bigger responsibility in making sure the

brand’s content reaches as many users as

possible – it also needs to be sharable. Brand

managers have to plan for creating content that

will be hosted in other well-known websites

that are authorities in the industry. They have

to build connections with publishers who

already host discussions about the brand. On

top of that, they would benefit from

establishing strong social media profiles so all

users can use their preferred social networks to

easily find the brand.

How to Make Ever-Changing Search Engine Results Pages Work for Your Brand

Executive Summary

“ …it is no longer enough to build content in just the brand website to improve a brand’s web presence.”

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While analyzing the search landscape, the CMI

SEO team discovered this article on Moz where

the author performed a case study for the

search term “autism speaks”, which yielded

unconventional search results, including vertical

results. We, at CMI, performed our own search

for a different term and found the following

results listed below.

What most of us are used to seeing is the

current format in every page of search results

following the first page—10 total organic search

results per search query (below).

In the current search landscape, the first page

of search results yields a significantly different

outcome.

Note: for a better view of the images within this

document, please visit Google and run similar

searches.

While reviewing the first page results, three

types of results were evident: organic, news,

and vertical. With these conditions in mind, out

of the 11 total results displayed, Google had

five standard search results for “world health

organization”.

Organic results are the traditionally optimized

pages related to a topic. The six sitelinks below

the first organic search result, which lead to

specific pages in the who.int website, are a part

of the same result. Among the five standard

search results, all five of them were organic

results.

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News results are pages from trusted news

sources, which show up based on real-time

relevance to the topic. News results are in their

own category and only cover current events.

This means that if an “in the news” result shows

up, it is not counted towards the total for

standard search results. Our search query, at

the time, produced three total news results.

Vertical results are from custom vertical search

engines within websites that contain enough

content segments to warrant their own search

feature (Amazon, Yelp, Realtor, etc.). In the case

of “world health organization”, there were three

vertical results.

When Google shows five organic results out of

eleven total search results, it means that the

remaining results are not counted as organic.

News results change on a daily basis. So, why

did Google present the last three search

results? Because those were vertical results

compiled through vertical search engines.

There is a faded line that separates the last

portion of search results, which indicates the

start of the vertical results list. Despite their

display on a separate list, vertical results are not

limited to that section. Some of the same exact

vertical results can still appear as organic results

for different keywords.

Vertical Results in Mobile Search

So, what about mobile? Yes, this certainly

applies to all mobile searches. Below is a

screenshot of a search for the word “world

health organization” on an Android phone.

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There is a search box in the #1 organic result,

“top stories” news results, and articles from The

Guardian, which are vertical results. This time,

the vertical results are not at the bottom of the

page. Among the organic results, two of them

were from social media accounts.

If a topic, such as a disease state, has enough

content written about it and enough large

publications continually writing about it, those

articles will eventually be interspersed as a part

of the search engine results pages to the

patients and HCPs—the pharma brands’ target

audience.

How This Affects Pharma Search Results

So, how can we expect the pharma search

engine results pages to change? Just like

content for the World Health Organization,

there is plenty of content for all pharma drugs’

indications, such as “HIV”.

Search Results for “HIV.”

Again, the second page of results is what all

results used to look like for a long time (below).

Note: for a better view of the

images within this document,

please visit Google and run

similar searches.

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As with “world health organization”, the search

query for “HIV” brings different results in the

first page.

Note: for a better view of the

images within this document,

please visit Google and run similar

searches.

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These search results looked different from

“world health organization”. There were 8

organic results and 3 news results, which

covered results #1 to #11. The three vertical

search results for #12 to #14 were still on the

first page of Google competing against disease

state websites.

The biggest takeaway is that search engine

optimization strategies to gain organic rankings

must expand beyond their current capabilities.

With the addition of vertical search results,

brand managers can take advantage of the

existing content about the brands in related

websites, especially those that regularly discuss

similar topics.

This meant there were 14 total search results,

which still exceeds the previous standard of 10

results. Because of the broad keyword used in

the exercise, there was no specific #1 pharma

brand result.

What Pharma Brands Can Do

Just as the case was for who.int, any brand can

also appear as the first search results with up to

6 additional sitelinks that guide the user to

more internal pages of the brand website.

However, it is not enough to maintain branded

organic rankings in the search results. Online

publications have long since grounded their

organic search presence by continually

producing new content that covers multiple

topics in order to gain a wide audience. Rather

than trying to beat them, brands can use their

vertical results space as a new opportunity.

This strategy can take the form of, but are not

limited to, any of the following:

1. Working with third party websites to

generate fresh new content with

information that could only be available

from the brand

2. Reaching out to publishers who host content

referring to the brand to link back to specific

pages in the brand’s website

3. Establishing a presence in social media

platforms (Facebook/Twitter) with regular

daily/weekly updates about the brand

CMI/Compas works with our internal Supplier

Partner Team to identify opportunities like this –

many exclusive – that can better maximize our

clients’ branding efforts.

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Written by:

David HurSenior SEO Analyst

CMI/Compas

CMI is more than happy to review these

effective strategies and more, in order to help

steadily maintain high rankings for a brand, so

the limited number of organic results does not

negatively impact the brand. Please feel free to

contact us for additional information on how

CMI can help your brand stay on top of

managing a strong organic search presence.