Three data providers have confirmed with Search Engine Land that the people also ask feature is a lot less likely to show in the desktop Google Search results today, compared to previous weeks. RankRanger, Semrush and seoClarity all confirmed a significant drop for the people also ask box last week in Google Search.
People also ask use to show up for about 60% of all queries those tools tracked but now they show up for about 30% of all queries, that is a 30 point drop and a huge reduction in the people also ask box feature.
What is people also ask. People also ask is a search feature in Google that shows other queries or questions people enter into Google Search. Those questions can be expanded to show more questions and answers to those questions.
Here is what it looks like:
The data. Here are charts from these data providers showing the 30 point drop in the people also ask feature.
RankRanger data:
Semrush data:
seoClarity did not provide a chart but the company told us they saw a 50% drop in SERPs showing PAAs since July 5, 2022.
Why we care. Not only is the people also ask box a useful search refinements and expansion tool for searchers, but SEOs and SEMs love it.
SEOs and SEMs use the people also ask feature for content and keyword generation ideas. It helps marketers come up with new content that they can potentially rank for and show up in the featured snippets section of Google for.
It is unclear if this the reduction of people also ask results is a Google bug or feature, we have reached out to Google and will update this story when we hear back.
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About The Author
Barry Schwartz a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on Twitter here.
