Brodie Clark reported that Google is now showing web stories / visual stories on the first page of the mobile results even for competitive keyword phrases. I can confirm that do see these coming up for me in New York as well.
Here is a visual stories pack showing up for me on the first page of the mobile results for a search on [seo] - which is almost as competitive as you can get:
Now, this can be an excellent way for you to get your content in the mobile search results for super competitive keyword phrases. There is not a ton of competition in the web/visual stories space right now.
I recommend you read Brodie's new piece on this if you are interested in learning more about this.
Forum discussion at Twitter.
