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Will Your Organization Benefit From Desktop Google Search Continuous Scrolling?

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We posed the above question on LinkedIn earlier this week, but didn’t get any reaction to what folks were experiencing or expected to experience now that, as of December 5th, Google offers “continuous scrolling” on desktops/laptop computers vs.just mobile devices.

What Does Continuous Scrolling Mean and What Are The Possible Implications For Your Organization?

The continuous scrolling feature now offered by Google on laptop and desktop computers means that you can scroll thru the equivalent of what used to be the first six pages of Google search results (served up for relevant search terms), without clicking at the bottom of search results to advance from one page to the next. It used to be that the first page of search results only contained about 10 – 12 listings. Depending on the competitiveness of an organization’s marketplace and how well competitors understood and implemented SEO best practices, it could have been almost impossible, without running paid search/Google Ads, to appear on page 1 of Google search results on a computer vs. a mobile device.

Now, far more organizations will appear on the first page of Google search results, because that first page has become six times as long!

Anticipated Positive and Negative Impact to SEO of Google Search Continuous Scrolling

Because the aforementioned change is so very new, there’s not much data available to understand the impact to organizations, but here’s what our intuition, as a Boston SEO company and as SEO experts is telling us:

  • For those organizations who previously didn’t appear on the first page of Google search results, i.e., rank in the first 10 – 12 spots for certain desirable search terms (known as keywords), this switch-over to continuous scrolling on desktops and laptop computers could be a very positive thing. Because they don’t have to take the action of clicking thru to an additional page, many searchers may continue to scroll down past the first 10 – 12 listings (the equivalent of the former first page of Google search results) to see what organizations are listed on the now far-longer page of search results. So, organizations that previously appeared on page 2 – 6 of search results (think roughly spots 13 – 78 in Google) will now appear on the longer first page and have a better chance of being seen by target audiences, and ultimately, causing them to visit their websites.
  • For those organizations who prior-to-the-change, continuously/regularly appeared on the far-shorter page of Google search results, you’ve got more competition! Your target audience(s) may now view far more than the approximately 9 to 11 other organizations whose listings appeared on the first page of Google search results prior to the change discussed in this blog post.

Only time will tell on all of the above. We’ll be monitoring our own site to evaluate the impact of desktop Google search continuous scrolling, but also those of our clients.

Rest assured we’ll be circling back on this topic in the new year. And, speaking of that, we hope all our readers have a wonderful 2023, full of good health and many fun adventures!