Voice search is the new way of everyday searches. It has revolutionized how people look for things on google, and how they will further perform their searches. Before voice search, marketing departments all over the world were developing ways to perform Search Engine Optimization. It meant that the websites were being optimized for the purpose of relevancy with the help of certain keywords so that they appear at the top of the Google searches. Even now, companies try to hire the best SEO specialist New York to get their website ranked among top search engine results.
However, with the huge influx of search engine support for voice searches, there is one fear in all those marketers’ minds. Will this new wave make SEO obsolete? In this article, we will approach this question by performing some data analysis.
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Data Analysis
Smart speakers are becoming common in every household day by day. Research performed by Techcrunch has shown that nearly one in 6 persons own a kind of smart speaker. These include Alexa, Amazon Echo, and Google Assistant, all of which provide the ability to perform a voice search. That number is expected to only increase further in the coming years as it is expected that almost 50% of searches performed in the year 2021 will be coming from voice search.
Google’s AI has already started working on developing results optimized for conversational speech. Moreover, many mobile companies encourage their users towards it as well due to the ease of use.
It is evident from the research that voice search is here to stay. However, it does not mean that SEO needs to be completely revamped because of this. With a few key principles, it is easy to modify SEO to incorporate voice search as well.
Focus more on Intention rather than Keywords
An easy way to incorporate the voice search within the existing SEO techniques is with the use of semantics. This means that the search engines will now not only look for the keywords but also find the contextual meaning and the intent behind the searches. These include users’ search history, patterns, and location in order to provide them with the best results.
With the addition of voice search into the mix, develop a strategy that incorporates longer-tail keywords. These will help you to get the idea of conversational speech patterns and how to find the right intent within them.
Make People-Centric Websites
The end goal of your website should not just be to appear at the top spot of google searches. Focus on the greater goal of writing content that is useful to the people, you should not simply stuff in a bunch of them without any regard for relevancy. Your content should be useful, informative, and relevant to the user. If you know what people are looking for, make sure that they would find that when they click on your website.
Maintaining customer interactions is also a good strategy to figure out what they want and make them feel welcomed. This can be performed by answering their queries and paying attention to their problems.
Embrace the Hand-Held Platforms
Your developed websites should have a mobile-friendly view as well. Researchers have established that more than half of all the searches performed are via mobile. Whether they are via voice search or not, if Google fails to index your website to a mobile-friendly environment, your content will remain lost amongst the pile of ignored results.
Develop Positive Reviews on Reviewing Sites
Many times the top results for voice search queries are the top sites which consist of the reviews for different products/services. If your website is listed among them in positive words and ratings, you will definitely receive a larger audience on your website.
Final Verdict
Voice search is here to stay. In the coming years, it is only going to see a rise in popularity. But the core concepts of developing SEO strategies do not change while incorporating this change. With a few tweaks and slight modifications in how you approach this strategy, you can optimize your content for all kinds of searches coming from all kinds of platforms! While there is still time to get used to this change, do it. Get accustomed to the new environment. Then, when the time comes, you will be able to see the fruits of all the hard work you performed.
So, even if you are looking to hire local SEO services, make sure they are updated with the important role voice search plays in optimizing a website. Other than that, the company you have hired should be professional, reputable and, of course, reliable.
