Google Featured Snippets Go Wrong, Consider Using data-nosnippet
On Friday, Bill Elward noticed how a featured snippet had a header above it that read “Advertisement.” Bill asked if this was a new Google Ad format from Google for featured snippet placement – the answer was no. The featured snippet simply picked up text on the page that said “Advertisement” and put that in the featured snippet.
When this happens, it can look bad for the site from who the featured snippet is coming up for and it can look bad for Google. But the site does have some control over that featured snippet. they can try to use the data-nosnippet robots meta tag to block Google from using portions of their page for snippets.
Here is what went down on Friday when Bill Elward posted about this:
Oh no, ads in the featured snippet area on Google, can it be? pic.twitter.com/145oMwU7mc
— Bill Elward (@billelward) March 10, 2023 — Google SearchLiaison (@searchliaison) March 10, 2023