Voice Search and the Impact on SEO

As technology continues to develop, so will a crucial component of digital marketing, SEO. Search Engine Optimisation is a process in marketing used to improve visibility of your site through relevant searches. Search is one of the main ways that potential customers find your business, therefore the better the visibility on the main pages of a search engine means more traction to your site. Whilst a number of searches are made by typing into an engine via laptop, desktop or phone keyboard, voice search and voice assistants are beginning to make an impact on SEO.

What is voice search?

Since the launch of smartphones, voice search is now available on a variety of devices, from to laptops to cars to home devices. Voice search enables the user to speak into the device to ask a question or make a request instead of typing or manually creating a task. It’s not uncommon to hear the words ‘Hey google’ or ‘Alexa can you?’ these days. When using voice search, the user speaks to the device in a casual, colloquial and to the point manner. According to Google, around 20% of mobile queries are through voice search, a 20% of the market that should not be missed.

Who is using voice search and for what purpose?

If you have a smartphone, there is a high possibility that you’ve spoken to your voice assistant at least once. Voice search can be used by anyone, at any time, at any age, therefore its effect on SEO for your business should not be underestimated. In a 2018 study from BrightLocal, they found that 58% of consumers used voice search to find a local business and 46% of people using voice search daily are searching for local business. This, on top of the millions of Alexa devices that have been sold, only means that the percentage will have increased.

What can i do to improve my voice search strategy?

Now you’re caught up on voice search, SEO, and the importance of implementing a voice search strategy in order to improve your visibility, here are a few tips:

• Take some time to look at the difference between typed search language and voice search. Use natural colloquial language alongside the answers to specific questions that could be asked about your company.
• Ensure that your business information is correct and up to date, more often than not customers will be asking questions about opening times and addresses.
• If your site does not already include one, consider including a FAQ page, as voice search is used predominantly for questions, an FAQ page would increase chances of landing in top results, as it’s very likely that a voice searcher would search the exact question or something very similar to it.
• Use long keytail words in SEO as they shape your content around colloquial language, creating for the best voice search results.

Voice search is being used everyday and with increase and ease in technology, its use for business search will only become greater.

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