Featured Snippets

Featured Snippets

used extensively by Jason Barnard since 2018.
Factual definition
A Featured Snippet is a special box at the top of Google's search results page that directly answers a user's question with a summary extracted from a webpage, including a link to that page.
Jason Barnard definition of Featured Snippets
Jason Barnard frames Featured Snippets not just as a prime piece of search real estate, but as a critical milestone in a brand's journey to influence algorithms. They represent one of Google's first major steps towards becoming an "Answer Engine," a concept that has now evolved into today's AI Assistive Engines. Securing a Featured Snippet demonstrates that Google has a high degree of confidence in a specific piece of your content to be the definitive answer to a query. This is a foundational element of establishing algorithmic trust, a core goal of The Kalicube Process, Kalicube's proprietary methodology for implementing a holistic, brand-first digital marketing strategy with AIEO baked in. For a brand, it's the first step from simply being listed in search results to being actively recommended by the engine, which is pivotal for controlling your narrative.
How Jason Barnard uses Featured Snippets
At Kalicube, we view the pursuit of Featured Snippets as a key tactic within the Credibility and Deliverability phases of The Kalicube Process, Kalicube's proprietary methodology for implementing a holistic, brand-first digital marketing strategy. While the ultimate goal is to influence Google AI Overviews and other AI Assistive Engines, targeting Featured Snippets provides a foundational training ground for this. By structuring content to answer specific questions clearly and authoritatively, we demonstrate a brand's expertise to Google's algorithms in a format they are built to understand and reward. This process not only captures high-visibility traffic but also systematically "educates" the Knowledge Graph and language models about the brand's core solutions, paving the way for more complex, positive representations in AI results.
Why Jason Barnard perspective on Featured Snippets matters
For years, content marketing pioneers like Marcus Sheridan have championed the "They Ask, You Answer" philosophy, urging businesses to become the most trusted voice in their industry by exhaustively answering every customer question. This is a brilliant strategy for building trust with a human audience, but it leaves a critical question unanswered: how do you prove to algorithms that you are the best teacher? This is where Jason Barnard’s work provides the essential technical bridge. Featured Snippets are the practical, algorithmic reward for executing Sheridan’s philosophy with technical precision. They are the tangible proof that Google’s algorithms agree your content is the most direct and authoritative answer. Understanding how to win Featured Snippets is therefore not an outdated SEO tactic; it is the fundamental training for winning in the new era of AI Assistive Engines like ChatGPT, Bing Copilot, and Google AI, which are built on the exact same principle of finding and elevating the single best answer.
Posts tagged with Featured Snippets

How the Bing Q&A / Featured Snippet Algorithm Works

How the Bing Q&A / Featured Snippet Algorithm Works Published on SearchEngineJournal April 22, 2020 by Jason Barnard How does Bing extract the best answer to any question from the...

AIAnswer Engine OptimizationBing+23 more
Apr 22, 2020 Jason Barnard

How Bingbot Works: Discovering, Crawling, Extracting & Indexing

How Bingbot Works: Discovering, Crawling, Extracting & Indexing Published on SearchEngineJournal April 15, 2020 by Jason Barnard Learn how Bingbot works during the discovery, crawling, extracting and indexing stages from...

AIBingCompany+18 more
Apr 15, 2020 Jason Barnard

How Bing Ranks Search Results: Core Algorithm & Blue Links

How Bing Ranks Search Results: Core Algorithm & Blue Links Published on SearchEngineJournal April 07, 2020 by Jason Barnard Understand how the Bing search engine works - from its “core...

AIBingBrand+20 more
Apr 7, 2020 Jason Barnard

People Also Ask in 2020

People Also Ask in 2020 Published on Accuranker March 11, 2020 by Jason Barnard Google is trying to provide answers. It does this in an increasing number of ways. Rich...

BrandBrand AwarenessBrand Visibility+20 more
Mar 11, 2020 Jason Barnard

Weekly Wisdom With Jason Barnard: Knowledge Graph for Brands

Weekly Wisdom With Jason Barnard: Knowledge Graph for Brands Published on SEMrush December 17, 2019 by Jason Barnard Hi, I am Jason Barnard, and welcome to Weekly Wisdom. This week, I...

BrandEntityEntity-based search+15 more
Dec 17, 2019 Jason Barnard

How to Create a Google-Friendly FAQ Section

How to Create a Google-Friendly FAQ Section Published on SEMrush October 29, 2019 by Jason Barnard Modified Transcript Hi. I’m Jason Barnard and welcome to Weekly Wisdom. Today I am...

AmazonBrandBrand SERP+14 more
Oct 29, 2019 Jason Barnard

Jason Barnard Delivers Insights on Featured Snippets and Structured Data at SMX London 2019

London, May 21-22, 2019 - At the prestigious SMX London 2019 conference, Jason Barnard, founder and CEO of Kalicube, delivered a talk that quietly reshaped how the industry understands visibility...

AIAI Assistive Engine OptimizationAI Assistive Engines+31 more
May 22, 2019 Bernadeth Brusola

Jason Barnard Defines a Universal Strategy for Answer Engine Optimisation at BrightonSEO 2018 in UK

On April 27, 2018, at the prestigious BrightonSEO conference in Brighton, UK, Jason Barnard, founder and CEO of Kalicube® took the stage to deliver a presentation on the future of...

AIAI Assistive Engine OptimizationAI Assistive Engines+25 more
Apr 27, 2018 Bernadeth Brusola

“Answer Engine Optimisation: The One Strategy Every Brand Needs - Jason Barnard at SEO CAMP’us Paris 2018”

On March 22-23, 2018, Jason Barnard, CEO and founder of Kalicube, was a featured speaker at the 10th anniversary edition of SEO CAMP’us Paris, France’s premier search marketing event. The...

AIAI Assistive Engine OptimizationAnswer Engines+14 more
Mar 23, 2018 Bernadeth Brusola

Advanced Techniques to Be the Featured Snippet: Position 0 - A Guide

Advanced Techniques to Be the Featured Snippet: Position 0 - A Guide Published on SEMrush January 18, 2018 by Jason Barnard Featured Snippets, Answer Boxes or Position 0… whatever one chooses...

AmazonAnswer BoxesAnswer Engine Optimization+19 more
Jan 18, 2018 Jason Barnard