The Rising Importance of Voice Search Marketing

Search marketing has long been a primary focus in the marketing strategies of many businesses. A good search engine optimization (SEO) strategy can help increase your website’s exposure and bring in more organic traffic from search engines. However, as technology has advanced, search engines have as well. Keywords are not the only way that users perform search queries anymore. Voice search is quickly becoming a priority for search engines, especially with the rising popularity of virtual assistants, such as Alexa and Siri. As such, you will need to adapt your search marketing strategy to include a voice search strategy.

Why is Voice Search Marketing So Important?

Voice search makes searching the web much more convenient for customers. It takes far less time to ask a question vocally than it does to type it into a search bar. Voice search isn’t perfect, but it has improved significantly year by year and will only continue improving. It’s estimated that 65 percent of consumers between the ages of 25 and 49 use voice search-activated devices at least once a day. It’s also estimated that roughly half of all searches will be voice searches by next year.

On top of this, mobile optimization has become a must as a result of Google’s decision to rank pages based on the mobile version of a site instead of the desktop version. While typing in search queries on a computer is relatively easy, it’s more challenging on a smartphone, which is why consumers generally use their phones for voice search more often. By optimizing for voice search, you’ll be optimizing for your mobile audience as a direct result.

Tips On Optimizing Your Strategy For Voice Search

The following are a few essential tips on how to optimize your search marketing strategy for voice search:

• Use language that sounds natural

  Voice search allows users to speak like they do in their daily lives. This means that the language being used to perform search queries is going to be more natural. When writing content, write using natural language and avoid sounding overly formal, if possible. This greatly improves your chances of being matched to their voice search query.

• Use questions throughout your content

  

  Try to incorporate questions that users might have as part of your content. Many businesses are formatting their content’s headers as questions. This will help improve the chances of your content being matched with user voice search queries. For example, if they ask, “How do I get a wine stain out of my carpet?” and you have the header, “How do you get wine stains out of your carpet?” in a blog post on stain removal methods, your post is more likely to come up.

• Consider user intent

  You can’t solely focus on keywords and hope that they will match. You have to consider the intent of the user in order to write high-quality content that’s relevant to their needs. Doing so will allow your content to be inherently optimized for voice search.

• Use long-tail keywords

  When a user types in a query on Google, they tend to type in as little as possible. For example, if they are looking for a local plumbing service, they will likely type in “plumber” or “plumber” + their location. However, when performing a voice search, they will say something like, “I need a plumber near me in Detroit.” It’s more convenient to speak longer sentences than to type them. However, this means that you should focus on long-tail keywords more than single-word or small phrase keywords.

Learn more about keywords and SEO: Are Keywords Still Required To Increase SEO Rankings?

• Make sure your site is mobile-friendly

  Because voice search is primarily used on mobile devices, you need to make sure that your website is mobile-friendly. There’s no point in attracting leads through voice search if they’re going to leave your site immediately because of a lack of responsiveness. Use responsive design to ensure that your site displays properly on small screens. Make sure your website loads quickly as well.

• Optimize local SEO

  A large number of voice searches are going to be local. Customers who are out and about will perform voice searches while they are doing other tasks as they search for a specific business in their area. By optimizing for local search, you’ll not only have a better chance at attracting such customers, but you’ll be able to provide instant results so that they don’t necessarily need to visit your site. Submit your NAP (name, address, phone number) to local listings and set up a Google My Business listing to optimize for local SEO.

It’s no secret that voice search is the future. Begin optimizing your website for voice search marketing today or you’ll find yourself falling behind the times — and your competition — as a result.