Optimising Your Website For Voice Search In 2022
We all know someone that has recently purchased the latest Amazon or Google speaker, or who is obnoxiously asking Siri questions while sitting on the train. And as annoying as these people may be, voice search continues to grow coming into 2022 which means if you have a website or business you should start to care about it or at least be thinking of it. The good thing is, optimising for voice doesn’t actually differ too much from a traditional content rich SEO strategy.
Why is voice search important?
There is one key difference between voice search and traditional search which makes it wildly important. If you search on a phone or laptop you get given multiple options and ads which you then get to choose is the most relevant option to your needs. In voice search, you get given one option or piece of information which Google or Amazon chooses for you. Therefore if you have a customer, you want to fight for that spot and be at the top of Google and Amazon’s algorithm when it is making such choices on behalf of a customer.
Voice is primarily mobile
Searches made on mobile now equate to close to 59% of all searches on Google. Certain business categories like restaurants and fast food outlets have a much higher rate, close to 70%, and other categories such as law firms and corporate businesses are considerably lower. Mobile browsing continues to grow yearly and that trend is expected to continue well beyond 2022. Voice search primarily happens on mobile, and therefore you’d expect it to grow alongside if not faster than the rate that mobile web browsing continues to trend.
Google My Business
The number one application people use voice search for is directions and specific information on a business. This is someone looking for a particular company or brand. Keeping your Google My Business unto date and accurate will aid user experience if they are looking for you, as this is where the majority of information will be pulled from to find you. If you don’t have one, get one. And if you have one, regularly check it is up to date.
Make your content FAQ based
The way people interact with a speaker is much different than how they interact with a search engine. When people are on a phone or desktop, they write with text, what this means is they write less and focus on certain keywords which generate a list of results that they can then choose their preferred website from. With voice search however, users use language so ask the speaker questions. Because of this, FAQ content is necessary for voice search. You need to anticipate common questions that you believe are related to your business and that you think users will ask, and answer them.
So how do you find out what people are asking?
This goes back to SEO 101 and content marketing basics. Research keywords, themes and develop a strategy based around this. If you already have content on your site that is FAQ based, check it and make sure it is rich content. If you don’t, consider changing this for both traditional SEO purposes as well as optimising for voice search.
Summary
In Summary the best strategy for the future of Voice based search is much the same as a traditional SEO strategy. Strong FAQ based content, a strong Google My Business and good on-page SEO will win in the voice game.
