How to Optimize Your Site for Voice Search?

Garter’s report highlights that over 30% of the web browsing sessions will be done without a screen by the year 2020. Or, putting it in the most straightforward form, using voice search. And why not? Imagine walking into the kitchen calling out, “Hey Google, find me best chocolate cake recipes.” and having them handy. Priceless, isn’t it?

Now imagine doing this while driving, walking, socializing, operating machinery, and almost everything. We have been longing for the added ease and convenience of extending web experience to day-to-day activities like anything.

With that, it is apparent that voice search is not merely a wave of the future. Instead, it is here to stay and transform the way we browse through the internet. Actively driven by the result-focussed community, users now seek information available at fingertips without putting in lots and lots of efforts.

Given the power of voice search in hand, this era is pretty near to its full-fledged availability. And if you are not keeping up with the trend, you might end up existing for your customers very soon. Harsh, but true.

But, there’s time, and you can upgrade your website’s SEO to meet up the voice search aptitude. Wanna know how? Follow these top recommendations and get your websites the kick of voice search SEO.

To Begin With, Let’s Define Voice Search for You…

The other day we were walking along the aisle with one of my expert mobile app developer friends. The curiosity to know how they upload their apps to app marketplaces really tickled my mind and so I ended up shooting it up in front of him. In no time, I felt like I was swimming across a sea of information clearing out everything.

That’s how voice search does for you. All you got to do is call out to your digital assistant and have entire information in front of you without having to key in anything.

Laying out the most natural definition for Voice Assistance, they are digital friends of ours who adapt themselves to recognize the voice commands. These commands are then converted to text searches which are used to explore content on the internet and present the relevant one in front of you. Once expert, they are also capable of understanding the user’s intent to track the context of questions before finding the answers.

What Is the Share of Voice Search Queries over All the Internet Searches?

Yes, knowing why to invest in a particular thing is as vital as knowing how much to spend. And here’s the answer: 60% of the searches are conducted via mobile devices.

According to Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, 20% of total searches accounts for voice search.

And, we could add more to the data, maybe in another article of ours. But clearly understanding that the stats are enough to convince you, we’ll cut the crap and jump to the point.

Finally, How to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search?

Let’s begin checking out top suggestions that you can follow while upgrading your website’s SEO to meet the voice search trends.

#1. Make Sure Website’s Loading Time is Minimal

Surveys indicate that pages that load within a period of 4 seconds are more likely to appear among the voice search results as compared to the ones with more loading time. As a user, it might be completely fine for you to wait for a second extra and let the website load completely. But that’s not how the voice assistants work. They are an impatient category that needs the website to load quickly to that they can offer required content ASAP.

#2. FAQs Are an Important Element to Your Listing on Voice Search Results

There is something to understand here. Following the conventional search method to perform Google Search, you would look for mobile app developers by typing in the same combination on the search bar. However, you would not do the same while asking top mobile app developers recommendations from your friends.

It would more be like “Who are top mobile app development companies in the USA?”

In other words, voice search queries are more likely to have a question-answer format. And the best way to incorporate the same is by getting an FAQ section up and live on your website.

As they take up the Q/A format, these pages ensure that your website has more chances of landing up among voice search results.

#3. Work to Boost Your Website’s Credibility and Authority

Well, you may not have a high domain authority, but if you manage to end up on the first page of Google, a user is more likely to find you reliable.

Alas!!! Voice assistants don’t work that way. They would find a website with higher DA and credibility to more reliable. Thus, work to increase your website’s DA and get yourself all the necessary security certificates. You might want to invest in SSL certificates or go for HTTP links rather than HTTPs. Moreover, a source with higher social shares is expected to contain more valuable and credible information as the one that does not.

#4. Use Brief Answer Snippets

Answer snippets make it a fantastic source for the voice assistants. Thus, the fourth task in hand.

A good answer snippet is to-the-point containing not more 30 words. Additionally, make sure that the vocab that makes up these snippets should be easy to pronounce. At least that’s what Google’s guidelines say.

Adding on more to it, make sure your snippets do not need a visual to elaborate itself.

#5. Weave the Website’s Content Around Questions

Do we even need to elaborate on this point? Definitely not. You have a clear view of why weaving content around questions is essential. Adding value to it, make sure you add worth to your content by increasing the word count. Average word count for voice search page to rank on Google is 3213 words.

#6. Optimize for Mobile

You felt your website’s optimization is only limited to desktops? We regret to inform you that you are wrong. (Hashtag) #MythBusted.

On a serious note, optimizing for mobile is equally essential. And why will it not be given that maximum of the voice searches is conducted via mobile? Thus, make sure you optimize your website’s content, layout, and loading time on the mobile devices as well.

#7. Use Semantics to Structure the Content

Want the search engines to crawl and understand your content quick? Semantics is the way. Keep your content up-to-the-minute. Be quick to recognize the user’s frequently asked questions and find answers quick. Implement this using structured queries and bingo, you are done.

#8. Focus on Natural Speech

There’s no rocket science to this point. Given that most of the voice search queries are according via natural speech, voice assistants are majorly designed to process natural language. Thus, your content should be implemented keeping in mind the conversational form of queries that are longer than conventional queries.

Get Set, Go…

Voice search is in its infancy and thus, is more like to evolve and grow into something better every day. Not to forget, it has already traced out a great journey reaching to the milestones of advanced digital assistants that can recognize and adapt to speech patterns, completely changing how users interact with them. Thus, marketers must make sure to stay on the digital marketing trends. Not only does it require innovative minds to brainstorm on new ways to utilize the data but to deliver accurate voice search results on multiple devices.