Today, around 40% of Americans have switched to voice search. Moreover, 71% of people say they prefer voice searches over typing.
It appears that voice search is not slowing down anytime soon. It’s everywhere, from smartphones and smart TVs to smart speakers and watches.
This means that if you, as a brand, want to stay on top of the game, you should optimize your website for showing up in voice search results. Following are the top ways that you can use to optimize your Voice SEO in 2022.
Let’s dig in.
Why Is Voice Search Important for SEO?
Voice search seems to be on the rise in 2022. The number of smart speakers in U.S. homes is predicted to rise to 55 percent, and 65 percent of 25-to-49-year-olds use voice-enabled devices daily.
This means that people are changing how they search (from typing to voice-searching) and thus how businesses do SEO.
Thus, to increase organic traffic in 2022, you’ll have to implement voice search optimization. To attain the first-mover advantage, your business must move into this space quickly with a solid strategy to get found above your competitors.
Here are some of the ways voice search is transforming brand SEO and why you should invest in it:
- In addition to dictating user language, it defines the context of inquiry.
- Allows you to find a specific answer using long-tail keywords.
- Rewards websites with higher SERP results.
- Promotes local businesses by making them more accessible.
- Enables e-commerce and helps local businesses thrive.
Differences Between Voice Search and Typed Search
The search habits for voice queries differ from those for typed queries. This impacts the way optimization is done for each of them.
To improve your content for voice search, let’s look at how it differs from typing:
- Voice Search Is Localized: While websites are available globally, voice searches appear to target a local audience. The words people use in voice searches are typically more specific than those used for text searches, especially for finding locations and local businesses.
- It’s All About Mobile: Most people still use their mobile phones to conduct voice searches, even though intelligent home devices are becoming more popular. Location-based searches influence mobile searches, so optimizing your business for location-based searches is crucial to driving the right traffic.
- It occurs in natural language: The way keywords appear in voice searches differs significantly from traditional searches. Instead of typing the keyword LED bulb light pros, they ask, “what are the advantages and disadvantages of LED Bulb lights? Thus the keywords for voice search have natural language.
- Target Long-Tail Keywords: An average text search consists of 1-3 words. Comparatively, voice search uses longer-tail keywords (7+ words) in most cases.
How to Optimize for Voice Search?
The following factors will help you optimize your website for Voice Search in 2022:
Improve the loading speed of your website
Loading speed is an essential factor for appearing on the SERP page. As more digital content is added online daily, your website must load quickly to rank for voice searches.
An SEO study by Backlinko shows that websites with simple, easily understandable content rank higher in the SERPs.
Likewise, the same study found that websites with a quick loading time are favored by Google chrome and other search platforms.
If you want to check the loading time of your website, you can use tools like PageSpeed Insights, Mobile Website Speed Testing Tool, or GTMetrix.
These tools also give you the reason for slow loading times and suggestions of how you can improve it.
Rank videos in search results
The video appears to be an essential part of Google’s strategy for responding to voice queries.
Typically, they seem more for natural language keywords. Keywords that use natural language. Google also shows the text from the video description in the featured snippet section.
To appear on the SERP page, make more optimized videos. The best way you can achieve it is by improving your video titles and using natural language keywords (long-tail, high-intent) in your video descriptions.
Create a mobile-friendly site
Now that Google has released its Mobile-First Indexing, your site’s mobile-friendliness is a huge factor in ranking.
Mobile-friendly websites have a greater chance of appearing in the featured snippet since more people use their phones for voice searches than other devices.
To check if your website is mobile-friendly, browse Google for Mobile-Friendliness Test. The results of your test will appear along with suggestions for improving them.
Add Long-tail Keywords
A voice query is a speech query. They have a natural tone, are informal, and can be extended. They are often made up of complete sentences.
Include long-tail phrases, questions, and answers in your texts to make your website voice search-friendly. Search for the high intent that sounds natural has a good search volume and is not difficult to rank.
You must also fulfill your readers’ intent by providing them with highly relevant content. Give your users the correct answer instead of misleading titles. The only thing this will do is annoy your readers and increase your bounce rates.
Build An FAQ Section
Undoubtedly, having an FAQ page on your site benefits voice search results. Using conversational language requires asking and answering questions.
The best way to create relevant content is to fulfill the users’ needs, which is why users are often interested in FAQs.
Start by listing the questions on one of your site’s pages, and then provide answers.
Ensure your responses are detailed but not too long. Add bullet points to make them simple yet effective.
Aim for a 9th-grade reading level (or below)
A good writing guideline is to write clearly and concisely. According to Brian Dean’s study, voice results appear more often if the content is written at or below a 9th-grade reading level.
Many applications tell you the readability status of your text. The tools like Hemingway editor and readable.io shows you the readability grade of your writing.
Some other apps, such as Grammarly and SEO Yoast, are other apps that help you improve your readability.
Improve Domain Authority
Voice search results tend to favor sites with high domains. Therefore, implement a link-building strategy and boost your backlink profile to increase your site’s domain and link authority.
When developing a link-building strategy, you should look at your brand’s strengths.
How can you make your content compelling enough for people to write about you on their blogs, social media accounts, or in news articles or editorials?
- In such instances, customer data stories with stats are a great way to get backlinks.
- You can also create unique, insightful content using expert insights from customers or influencers so they will be more likely to share it.
- If you are a thought leader in the industry, you can use Cision’s HARO (Help a Reporter Out) service to source other thought leaders or answer queries.
- You can also do simple link buildings by participating in the community, collaborating with partners, or doing things worthy of news.
Optimize Content for Featured Snippets
A featured snippet is a recommended answer from Google. They appear in the search results directly on “position 0,” i.e., the position with the direct answer.
Because of the limited number of visits, it does not generate unusual traffic (although it increases brand recognition). Users typically spend more time at the search engine level, where the answers they need can be found.
Review your keyword research before developing your content for featured snippets.
In general, featured snippets are found for long-tail keywords (they are also less competitive). Consider questions that begin with “Who is…”, “What is…”, and “How do I…”. Provide step-by-step instructions if possible.
You can improve your chances of a voice search result by optimizing your content for featured snippets and visibility in traditional search results.
Publish Blog Posts Suitable for Mobile Devices
Nielsen Norman Group finds that online users prefer browsing, scanning, and watching content instead of reading it.
Hence, to maximize your voice search visibility, create infographics, checklists, and summaries to accompany your content. Create content on your website that instantly answers the questions asked.
Also, make sure your content has the following points to increase your visibility:
- Transparent and understandable writing.
- An easy-to-understand header structure.
- Bold text indicating important content.
- Graphics to mark quotes.
Not many people will likely read your whole post (or even a brief description of the product). Rather than reading the entire text, they scan it for the most important information.
However, this does not mean that you shouldn’t write longer posts. Everybody is looking for something different. To gain the reader’s trust, the text must be high-quality and easily readable.
Optimize Your Google Business Listing
Local queries make up a large part of voice searches. There are sometimes constructed search terms like “bakery near me,” “flower shop in California,” or queries such as “Where to have the best breakfast in New York?”
Your Google Business Profile listing should be optimized to appear as answers to these queries.
Give your location and contact information to users. Make sure you respond to reviews, add your location and service pictures and use relevant categories to target your audience.
Also, add focused keywords in your business title so that your page appears on the top as a result of voice search.
Include a Call-to-Action in the Meta Description
Even if you don’t appear in the top spot of voice search results, you can still attract users with a compelling call to action in your meta description.
Meta descriptions should explain a page’s contents and why a specific search result is essential.
You can include the following CTAs in your meta description to engage your target audience:
- Learn More
- See More
- Find Out
- Check it Out
- Click here
- Swipe Up
- Get Started
- Sign Up
- Subscribe
- Join Now
Develop compelling content based on personas
To appear in search results, you must keep your message short, in context, and relevant. However, you will need to pay special attention in addition to your usual SEO strategy when optimizing for voice search:
- Answering common questions in detail.
- Communicating clearly and concisely when answering simple questions.
- Answering your users’ most frequently asked questions and solving their pain points with rich, compelling content.
The following content strategy can help you improve your voice search ranking by fulfilling the above points:
- Ask a common question in your content or webpage.
- Provide a concise answer or definition to the question immediately following the headline.
- Continue elaborating on the topic throughout the page.
An essential aspect of this strategy is that it appeals to Google’s ranking algorithm. Additionally, the short information at the top of the page appears as a featured snippet in voice search.
Take a multilingual approach
Most audiences speak more than one language, so your website will likely attract a diverse pool of visitors.
This requires creating content they can easily find and use. To achieve success with voice search, the translation of your content must be very accurate.
Ensure your content sounds trustworthy and authoritative when Siri reads it. You must have your copy proofread and translated by a native speaker.
In addition, make sure you consult Google’s guidelines for managing multilingual websites.
Use Schema Markup to provide context.
On average, Milestone Marketing found significant gains of +20-30% based on 9,400 schema deployments. Thus, ensure your content is schema marked, so search engines know what it is all about.
Search engines get a better understanding of the context of your content when you use this HTML add-on, so you rank higher in general searches and more relevant to specific voice search queries.
Schema Markups also help Google understand language and are a great way to increase the amount of information on your website.
Find a Professional SEO Consultant
Our way of searching is changing. We want clear, concise answers as soon as possible.
For your existing desktop audience, long-form content might seem significant. In order to attract new customers in voice search, make sure you optimize and adapt your SEO strategy.
In addition to the tips above, a professional SEO consultant can help you with on-page and technical SEO.
Key Takeaway
Are you looking forward to growing your brand digitally in 2022? If yes, then you should include voice search optimization in 2022.
With more technology taking over, voice search will soon replace typing for everyone. So make sure you optimize your website for voice SEO if you want to become the brand everyone talks about.
Here are some articles that you might like:
![Do 301 Redirects Hurt SEO? [The Right Guide]](https://outburstmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Untitled-1024-×-647-px-1024-×-647-px-6.jpg)
![Best Dallas SEO Training Courses [2023 Guide]](https://outburstmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/ssssssss.jpg)
![Best Denver SEO Courses [What You Need to Know]](https://outburstmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/Untitled-1024-×-647-px-1024-×-647-px-4-2.jpg)
![Should You Buy Backlinks in 2023 [Everything You Need to Know]](https://outburstmarketing.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/backlinks1.png)
10 Tips for SEO Copywriting for 2022 – Outburst Marketing
[…] Best SEO Practices To Optimize for Voice Search in 2022 […]
Essential tips about On-page SEO – Outburst Marketing
[…] Best SEO Practices To Optimize for Voice Search in 2022 […]