From 2018, Voice search was one of the hottest topics in the SEO community. With the vast rise of voice search on apps such as Apple’s Siri and the Amazon Alexa, your business should have an approach for voice search and SEO. By the end of 2020, 30% of all website will be handled without a screen. The voice-only search lets users browse the web, the internet and consumer information without actually having to scroll through sites on the desktops and mobile devices. This new voice search technology may be the key to prosperous brands in the future.
Let’s know first what voice search is?
What is Voice search?
A voice search essentially allows users to speak into a device as opposed to typing keywords into a search box to obtain results. Audio technology uses speech identifier to understand what users are saying with extreme precision. It then delivers results orally to the users.
Voice search digital assistants such as Google Assistant, Siri, Microsoft Cortana and Amazon Alexa all these use voice search inclinations. Even though particular devices can be optimised for voice search, brands, platforms and websites as well.
For example, Amazon Alexa can search through musical inventory or can scan Wikipedia or can shop on Amazon quickly at a user’s command. This shows how certain brands choose to optimise their interfaces to be compatible with voice search.
How does the voice search work?
The speech recognition technology in voice search receives the voice command search queries; the search engines provide direct answers based on the questions. Technologies like natural language processing, text-to-speech, and pre-programmed voice search tools combine to display results.
Why is voice search important for your businesses?
When looking at user convenience, integration of voice recognition software in multiple platforms is vital to consider, and individuals go through varied experiences via many diverse channels.
The convenience and ease of merely voicing your interests or questions are unprecedented in describing any problem. Let’s see with an example if you like to speak to the customer to explain your condition, or would you write it down? The answer is quite easy as it is in our nature to seek convenience whenever we can.
The answer obtained to the question is much quicker and faster as well, naturally reducing bounce rates and retaining the potential consumer for longer. Matching closely with user keywords in responses satisfies users, enhancing customer relations and feedback, favoring business improvement.
Here are some statistics to further emphasise the importance of voice search:
- 58% of the consumers using the voice search for finding contact details and other info for local businesses within the last year.
- When voice search is applied for marketing strategies, the future may hold even more promising prospects for voice searches.
- About 71% of individuals in the US ageing between 18-29 use virtual assistants.
- 20% of all online search queries are voice-based. By the end of 2020, this value may change to 50%.
- Voice-enabled shopping is expected to rise to $40 billion in revenue generated by 2022.
- Using smart home speakers, around 22% of consumers purchased a product.
- Voice-based smart speaker market globally is forecasted to reach $30 billion in revenue by 2024.
Evolution of voice search
Before Google announced in 2011 to implement voice search on Google.com, people rarely used voice search. The search paved the way for advancement in voice search optimisation. In the beginning, the voice search feature supported only the queries that were in English. However, today, you can use this feature about 60 languages in Google Voice Search.
How to optimise your website for voice search and the importance of voice search optimisation?
The website must have targeted keywords in a conversational tone. Also, develop a Q&A section that provides common questions and answers asked by the customers. Make sure your website is SEO friendly. Always add a structured data markup that includes rich snippets, breadcrumbs and site links. Use long-tail keywords. Rewrite the existing content in simple language with relevant to the topic. Optimising the content for personal assistants.
Experts stress the importance of optimizing voice search for SEO, as it will be widely used for most queries in the future. The voice-based assistants like Siri and Alexa are the strong voice digital assistants and are the perfect examples to prove that voice search has moved forward. It is shown that the voice will dominate all online searches in 2019.
What are the tips for converting your website for voice search?
- Always analyse the common queries that are asked by your targeted audience.
- Know your competition by searching with the common queries
- Ensure your Google Business page contains up-to-date information, including company name, phone number, business hours, email, and business description.
- Always use an only conversational tone
- Be sure that your website is mobile-friendly, secure and code optimised.
What are the factors that need to consider while optimising your website voice search to be at the top or in zeroth position?
- Long-Tail Keywords and questions: While using the voice search, people usually tend to talk as if they are talking to a human for seeking information. To use voice search effectively always use long phrases and questions rather than short and crisp queries. Using long-tail keywords can be quite beneficial when it comes to voice search optimisation as well as traditional SEO. Usually, people ask questions in long phrases. While phrasing the questions use a conversational tone to rank high on voice search. Add the questions in H2 header tag and answer the question in the body text of your website pages. To have your position in snippet or zeroth position, then you keep the content relevant and fresh by updating it regularly.
- Featured Snippet: Snippet is that appears in the box filled with relevant content at the top of the search engine. Usually, Google extracts the most relevant content and puts in the box. About 30% of 1.4 million tested Google queries have these snippets. To rank high in the voice search results, implement quality and unique data which Google can present in the featured snippet.
- Structured Data: Search engines can crawl and know your website’s content by using your website’s structured data. It is the code which is appended to HTML markup. Implementing structured data in your website can help your web pages to view in the highlighted snippet and also in voice search results. When you start developing structured data, never forget to keep it appropriate to the content that already exists in your website.
- User Intent: People will search for a specific website to buy something or get some data. User intent enables us to know why a person typed in a particular question. Searches often reveal a person’s intent when using words like buy, what is, how-to, etc.
- Local SEO: Based on some reports, 58% of the customers use voice search to find information about local search. When people are using voice search while driving or walking, for instance, people search for “the best restaurants in the UK “are those who are trying to find restaurants near them. So local businesses must include the city where their store is located while optimising keywords.
- Page Speed: Your website’s loading speed impact your place in the voice search results. For example, let’s imagine a person using a voice search. They would always prefer to get answers very fastly for their queries. So, page speed optimisation is essential for your website to seek voice search. Website should be mobile-friendly and should have the desired mobile loading speed for voice search optimisation.
How voice search affects SEO?
- The rise of mobile search: According to some researches about 55% of teenagers are using voice search every day, and 56% of adults use voice search because it makes them feel tech-savvy and they use this mainly to get the right directions. The rising popularity of voice searches, coupled with the increasing number of smartphone users, saves time and offers convenience.
- Conversational queries appearance: Voice search is more comfortable than a text request. Search will be more natural. It is harmonious and vital to our multi-tasking life. Most of us are seeming for quick ways to fix and know things. Voice search is the best and perfect tool to use.
- Chance for local SEO: Voice searches are three times more likely to be local than text as mobile users are regularly looking for information with location-enabled. This way, there is a considerable chance for businesses to rank in the local voice searches and so perform some SEO mobile optimisation to stay competitive.
Summing up
People widely use voice searches these days, and experts predict its popularity will continue to grow in the next few years. So investing in your business website’s voice search optimisation can enhance its content visibility significantly and also improves brand awareness, online purchases and revenue.
If you are planning to improve your existing digital marketing strategy or willing to create a dynamic approach, choose Krify digital marketing service provider to meet your business goals and reach top SEO ranking. Contact us for more details.
