Voice Search & SEO - 3 Things You Can Do Now To Stay Ahead Of The Curve
By 2020, 50% of searches online will be done by voice search. This is a truly stunning stat that should have all of us working right now to get ahead of a changing digital landscape.
Did you know that 47.3 million Americans have access to some kind of voice search device in their homes? That’s a whole lot of people quickly learning to rely on voice search!
How about that Google Assistant absolutely crushes Alexa in voice shopping search? Weird, right?
Or this? As voice search continues to grow, and expand more and more into personal devices (like mobile phones...) it will no longer be enough for your business to appear in the Google 3-pack - you will need to be the number one result to register with Google users. Ie., if someone is not looking at a screen, but having a device dictate a result to them out loud, they are going to go with the result that has been dictated to them. Wouldn’t you?
Scary, right?
Thankfully, there are concrete steps you can take through your Google My Business account to combat this problem! Let’s go through three actionable steps you can take to get ahead of the curve.
Google Posts - What better way to help Google understand the specific products and services you offer than by using Google Posts ? This simple feature allows you to let your potential customers learn more about what you do while at the same time sending the right signals to Google that you are the resource in your area for holistic organic grass-fed buffalo based pet foods, for example.
Structured Data Markup - Another powerful tool to push out specifics of what you do is by fully mining the capabilities of the Knowledge Panel (you know that block of info on the right side of the search results you get when you search for your business name? That’s the Knowledge Panel!). When you use what’s known as structured data markup you can aggressively kickstart customer and Google visibility of your products/services. Done right, markup can be crucial to your SEO success.
Reviews - Reviews are one more aspect that can drive results both in traditional search and the new voice search context. More good reviews = better SEO, and this will always be the case. Executing a robust review monitoring system to encourage positive reviews and get ahead of negative reviews is and will continue to be crucial to the health of your business.
Each of these tactics can have a considerable impact on the health of your business today and in the future. Take stock of your current local SEO strategy; are you well positioned to stay ahead of the changes that are happening now and that are still to come?
If you would like to explore what you need to do and how you need to do it, please reach out for a FREE consultation or email me any time at juan.rojas@vdigitalservices.com.