Top Tips on the Best Voice Search Optimizations

Why Bother With Voice Search Optimization? 

Are you prepared for the paradigm shift in SEO with the shift towards voice search? According to market statistics, by 2020, half of all internet searches will be via voice. Currently, it isn’t such a massive SEO strategy, but it is still useful. Although big brand mobile software and hardware manufacturers have managed to include this capability on their phones, people haven’t got used to issuing search commands via voice. The fundamental aim of a website is to accumulate enough traffic to their site so that they can assure clients find and purchase their products. So, even if the proliferation of voice search among consumers is gradual, including such strategies in your internet marketing campaign would make sense.

What is Voice Search?

It utilizes speech recognition software to allow searchers to give voice commands and queries. The hardware is usually a phone or home assistant (e.g. Amazon Echo smart speaker). Based on the voice command, the search engine, just as a routine search, will show a full list of results. The search engine operates by matching your query with millions of possible answers utilizing its unique algorithm based on history and behaviour. Users are interested in direct answers instead of links that direct them to more information that is normal in text searches.

Let’s put it this way: You are having a conversation with your device and the replies ought to be satisfactory. That’s mainly the central concept behind voice recognition capabilities – creating a conversation environment. Voice searches are different than the conventional text-based searches. Since most are questions, they tend to be longer and more detailed. Considering the difference, the result concentrates on content and context.

Important Considerations

As voice search continues to gain global recognition among consumers, brands need to have a strategy that aims at optimizing voice search. The following are some unique strategies that you can include in your marketing strategy:

• Optimize local sources as the majority of searches are related to “near me” queries.
• Since voice searches are mainly associated with conversational nature, ensure that you incorporate relevant keywords that abide by these standards.
• Come up with questions and replies including those of your website’s Q&A section.
• Remember to incorporate a customized experience that is very popular with voice search software.
• Make sure that you have a mobile-friendly website.

How Do You Optimize Your Website for Voice Search?

Aim at maximizing your opportunity to rank at position zero. So, what is position zero? This is just another term utilized to means the snippets that appear at Google’s answer box that are on top of other organic search results. When searching for something on the internet using google, you are sure to spot this result. The objective of internet marketing is to own position zero, but if your website doesn’t rank well for the target term, there is a minimal possibility of holding this spot. It all starts with ensuring that you have fully optimized your website according to the latest SEO practices.

A vital concept to grasp when optimizing is that modifiers play a critical role. What, who, how, when and where are common modifiers that provide context.

Research Keywords

Sit down with your marketing team and generate a list of possible queries and see how they rank on the search engine. Utilize voice searches which means that the keyword length is going to increase. Instead of saying “latest movie,” we may say, “What are the latest movies in theatres today?” This process can be cumbersome and utilizing a suitable tool can save you a lot of time.

Come Up With an FAQ Page on Your Website

This page allows you to find appropriate keywords related to your content. From the queries that your website visitors ask, you’ll learn of the possible questions that people will have.

After your tool has generated enough results, it is now time to develop rich content based on your questions. The effort is twofold – you rank well in voice and text searches. As you progress with your content creation, don’t forget to optimize for mobile devices.

How Can You Measure Your Voice Search’s Impact?

Since voice search is exceptionally personalized, measuring the effectiveness of your strategy is very difficult. You can utilize keyword ranking tools, but they aren’t sufficient enough at offering you the most suitable insight as there is a lot yet to be learned on long-tail search rankings.

Better measurement tools are sure to come considering the increased awareness and development into voice search. In the meantime you can use Google Search Console to identify long-tail search terms that you currently rank poorly on but where there is significant search volume. This is a free tool that Google will in time adjust to reflect the growth in voice search activity.

Voice search is going through exponential growth, and you should figure out strategic ways to embrace it. Today, voice search devices aren’t expensive and are available on different platforms. As a business owner, you ought to create your current and future content to be in line with voice search commands. If you currently have a suitable SEO strategy and you rank well, this wouldn’t be difficult to implement. There will be a further requirement to optimize for a long-tail keyword in future to facilitate better voice searches.

Conclusion

Voice search optimization requires you to consider SEO from a different perspective. People using voice search are more likely to be interested in information relating to where they are physically located and ask questions rather than entering short phrases. This means building content that aligns with questions and responds to long-tail keywords. Well executed keyword research is especially important for optimization. It will inform your content creation and allows you to respond to new trends in search behaviour which will increasingly be influenced by voice activated devices.