Ankush Mahajan — January 22, 2020 Do you know 20% of mobile queries are voice searches? Traditional organic searches through typing words have taken a backseat in recent years. Voice searches have gained immense popularity mainly because of its speed.
Searching through voice instead of typing is 3.7 times faster. It has been estimated that more than half of the total queries will be voice search queries in 2020. Do you have any idea about where it all started?
Siri was the first benchmark in voice search. Back then, it was a tool to try and to some extent humorous for people who used it. Since its launch in 2011, voice search has witnessed a tremendous revolution.
Today, there are plenty of voice search tools that are tried and loved by the audience. Some of them are Amazon’s Alexa, Google Assistant, Cortana and many more. These tools have created new trends for organic searches.
In a report published by Techcrunch, voice assistants in use will increase by triple-fold. The number of these devices is expected to reach 8 billion by 2023. Looking at the growing popularity of voice searches, Partnership Head of Amazon Alexa, Albert Creixell said: “utterances are the new hashtags”.
Digital marketers are finding ways to detect the phrases that people use to search for something. Typed keywords have become an old trend. Consumers have found a new way to interact with brands. This has immensely affected the ways shoppers used to find the right buyers. So, how will you help your prospective buyers to contact you? While finding the answer to this query, the need for optimizing websites precisely for voice search arises. Before learning about the ways, let’s understand why it is important to optimize your website.
Why is it important to optimize your website for voice search?
The search engine you are targeting to rank your website has changed its way of handling search queries. Google’s voice search has impacted search trends drastically. This function of Google allows users to say what they want to see rather than typing in the search box.
Other Google products like Google Maps have also been optimized with voice search assistants. For the users, it has become an integral part of the overall experience with Google.
Hummingbird Update: With the popularity of Google voice search, the search engine had to bring changes to its core algorithms for handling search queries. The hummingbird update of Google in 2013, shifted the emphasis on semantic search.
In other words, the focus shifted to the implied meaning of searches or the intent of the users. Hence, web app developers have to crack ways to get their website in search engine’s top list as the Google algorithms to handle search queries have evolved.
Ways to optimize your website for voice search:
Keeping in mind the change of Google’s algorithms, it has become crucial to change the ways you are formulating your website. The custom software developers, writers, and entrepreneurs can try these tips to make their website optimized for voice searches:
SEO with Natural Writing: Rather than focusing on keywords, it has become important to use simple language. The content of the web page should be able to answer the intent of a users’ search. You will have to give priority to the implied meaning of a search query.
Using keywords in your content has no value when it comes to voice search. Your content should be written in the way you speak in normal life. This is because now it’s time to cater to the simple queries of people.
You will have to find out what people will say while seeking a particular option. Using the keyword embedded content will not help in ranking for voice search.
Use Long-Tail Keywords: It’s again related to understanding how a user will ask a query. While typing, we use short and concise words to convey our intent. But in voice searches, people speak a proper query to find a solution. Hence, it is important to include those long-tail keywords in your content.
With voice search, the average length of questions will increase. As an outcome, marketers have to increase the length of their keywords. To attract a user to your website, you will have to add keywords that are simple and relevant with communication.
Add frequently asked questions: As discussed above, the search intent of users has gained importance in voice search algorithms. When users seek information by speaking, they utter the complete questions.
By including those questions on your website you are answering those queries directly. This helps in bringing your website on top of search engine results. Therefore, make sure to add a FAQ section in your every web page.
Tell Google about your relevance: Are you wondering how will you make this happen? This can be done by using structured data markup. It helps in telling Google bots about your content and its relevance.
It does not have any effect on how your content will appear to users or on the ranking of your website. The metadata only allows Google to understand your content and its relevance for voice search queries. This will indirectly benefit your website ranking.
Final words:
It’s challenging as well as tempting to use new strategies to bring your website on top of a search engine result. It has changed the way we use to optimize our website content. Voice search has given a completely new way to market your brand.
You will have to focus on different voice assistants and treat them as social media channels. It’s quite interesting and the current need of the market. Hence, tighten your belts and get ready to serve your market in a brand new way.
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