Google Rich Cards Add 2 New Verticals — Local Restaurants and Online Courses — for U.S. Sites

Announcement of Google Rich Cards Two New Verticals

Google, on 21st November, 2016 announced that it is expanding the mobile-optimized Rich Cards by adding two verticals in search to cover local restaurants and online courses. This will enable the local restaurants and online course providers to display their content in mobile optimized interface and a engaging way.

Initial Launch of Google Rich Cards

The initiative was launched in May, in Google’s IO Program (Innovation in the Open) for movies and recipes. The result pages for these searches displayed big, prominent images, and a horizontally navigable carousel grouping a few results for a user-friendly interface.

Interface of Google Rich Cards Two New Verticals

Now, people searching for “the best restaurants in LOCAL AREA” or “Online Courses for XXXX” will be seeing a similar layout. You can see these richer search results by searching for [best New Orleans restaurants] and [leadership courses], for example. These rich cards contain a new user interface, such as “carousels that are easy to browse by scrolling left and right, or a vertical three-pack that displays more individual courses,” Google added.

Although, the providers would have to build the rich cards format of their pages of their respective sites in order to supply this feature to their users. This feature is open to only U.S. based sites for time being. Users who tap on your rich cards, will directly be directed to that respective page, and will also be able to navigate between other pages of your site. Google updated their technical documentation around implementing these rich cards over here.

Participation in Google Rich Cards Two New Verticals

At launch, companies such as TripAdvisor, Thrillist, Time Out, Eater, and 10Best have supported the program from the food category whereas sites like Coursera, LinkedIn Learning, EdX, Harvard, Udacity, FutureLearn, Edureka, Open University, Udemy, Canvas Network, and NPTEL from the online courses category.

Encouragement via Google Rich Cards

Google has also been encouraging the companies to optimize their websites for mobile device by using their open-source AMP project. Although, Google also adds that as of now Local Restaurants and Online Courses need not necessarily have these pages. Recently, Google also revealed that it would eventually use the mobile versions of websites to rank its search results.

Expert Talk

Google has also revealed that it is actively experimenting to be able to add more categories to the Rich Cards program around the world. Let us wait and watch which new verticals are added now in this program. Till then enjoy this addition and upgrade your online marketing strategy for Restaurant Local SEO. If you don’t have one, now is the time. We can design a unique restaurant SEO strategy for you keeping in mind all these updates and the new ones too.