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As the popularity of Alexa, Google Home, Siri, and other similar devices grows, voice searches are becoming more and more common, often taking the place of traditional typed searches. With this shift in user behaviors, it brings the question, “How do I optimize my website for voice search?”
When it comes to optimizing your website for voice search, it is important to understand the key point that voice searches are not entirely different than traditional typed searches. Voice searches use the same general search engines and algorithms as typed searches. So there are not specific things you need to do to “submit” your website for voice searches.
However, the general search engine optimization rules apply when trying to optimize your website for voice searches, and they are possibly even more important. Voice searches often only display the first result or first few results (depending on the device). So having a high ranking in search engine results is key to getting recognized. With that being said, the best way to optimize your site for voice searches is to ensure proper SEO best practices.
So just what can you do to optimize your website for voice search? There are some specific steps you should take to make sure your website is ready for the new era of voice searches. Read on below to learn more about these steps. For more information and help optimizing your website, contact the SEO experts at Silver Scope Design today!
This has been a common and important factor in search engine rankings for quite a while, and it does not seem to be going anywhere anytime soon. Ensuring quality content throughout your website is a key part of search engine optimization. Not only should content be well written so that it is informational and useful to visitors, it should be written and displayed using SEO best practices.
This is one area where voice searches vary somewhat from traditional typed searches. In voice searches, long tail keywords are more common and searches are more likely to be in the form of questions. With that in mind, when aiming to optimize your site for voice search, the content on your site should target long tail phrases and focus more on answering common questions. Performing keyword research is crucial to understand just what phrases and questions your customers are searching for. Then, you may need to add additional content to your site targeting these in order to see the best results in voice searches.
Page speed is the time that it takes for your page to load. In mobile and other on the go voice searches, it makes sense that speed is an important factor. Recent Google algorithm updates have also stated that page speed is an important factor in their search algorithm. In fact, for two similar pages, the one that loads faster will be ranked higher. There are a lot of ways you can keep improve your page loading speed, but you should start by analyzing your site using Google's PageSpeed Insights.
For local businesses, managing and keeping your Google My Business Page up to date is crucial. With many voice searches, the results that are displayed first are not website listings, but local business listings. While this may not seem like it is directly related to optimizing your website for voice searches, making sure your business is listed in Google and other local business listings is important to being found in the results. You should also make sure information listed is complete and current, including current hours, address, and contact info.
What this does is help you mark up specific elements on your web page so that Google and other search engines can easily understand the data on the page. Once Google understands your page data more clearly, it can be presented more attractively and in new ways in search results. For example, if you perform a voice search for a question, the answer that your phone or device reads back in reply is often information that Google has pulled directly from a webpage. They were able to find this information because of structured data. In short, adding structured data makes it more likely Google will display information from your site (and link to it!).
While voice search SEO is a little different from traditional SEO, it still follows the same basic rules and principles. If you would like to learn more about what you can do to optimize your website for voice searches, contact us online or by phone today to request a free website design quote. With the newest technological advances coming every day, voice searches are only growing in popularity. Making sure your website is ready now can make all the difference between getting found as voice searches increasingly narrow results and getting left behind.
Want to see what we can do for you, or just want more information? Call us at (877) 745-8772 or get a free website design quote to take the first step towards an amazing new website.
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