How to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search

In order to successfully market your business and brand, it is important to adapt to the latest marketing trends and to give your audience the best chance of finding your website. While search engine optimization used to focus mainly on text search, you now need to start optimizing your website for voice search.
At FirstPage Marketing, we know how beneficial voice search optimization can be for helping your website rank higher in search engine results. That is why we offer a selection of digital marketing services, including search engine optimization services for creating featured voice search snippets.

Why Optimize for Voice Search?

Devoting time and resources to providing the best answers for some of the most common voice search queries that your target audience is searching for can push your website content into the featured snippet slot (also known as position zero or position V) on the first page of search engine results. Having your website content appear as a featured snippet means that it will not only be read aloud by voice search assistants like Google or Alexa but also that your website will become more popular, attracting more visitors from organic search results.

Learn all about how search engines work.

How to Optimize Your Website for Voice Search

Some SEO best practices that can help you optimize your website for voice search include:

Review Google Ads and Google Search Console

Both Google Ads and Google Search Console provide valuable reporting insights into the different types of searches that drive clicks (paid and organic) to your website. Use the search terms report feature in Google Ads to see what types of queries were used by paid visitors to clickthrough to your site.
To review the different types of search queries that drove organic clicks to your site, head to Google Search Console and navigate to the performance section and click on the queries tab.  This data can be segmented by time period and includes useful metrics such as clicks, impressions, clickthrough rate and position.
Look specifically for long-tail keywords and question-based search queries that are more common with voice search. Including these types of questions on your website along with answers will help provide value to users.

Optimize for Page Speed

While optimizing for page speed is not entirely related to voice search optimization, it is important to note that search engines like Google favour websites with faster loading times. This means that, out of two websites that are very similar, the one that loads the fastest will appear higher on the search results page and has a greater chance of appearing as a featured snippet.
Learn more about why page speed is important for SEO.

Secure Your Website with an SSL Certificate

In addition to favouring page speed, search engines also favour websites that are secured and certified by the HTTPS protocol. The HTTPS protocol ensures visitors and search engine bots that the website, no matter what type of website or industry, can be trusted and complies with good online practices. If you haven’t already, make the switch from HTTP to HTTPS and secure your website.

Claim Your Google My Business Listing

Claiming and optimizing your Google My Business listing will provide Google with more information about your business, such as the industry you work in, the company address, phone number, business hours, and more. It also allows your customers to provide you with feedback through reviews. Since many voice search queries focus on local search, claiming and keeping your Google My Business listing up to date can increase the chances of your business appearing in voice search results pertaining to your business, location, or industry.

Find out how to optimize your Google My Business listing.

Use Conversational Keywords

The days of short, 1-2 keyword search queries are over. Using long-tail keywords that mimic how real people talk and ask questions is the present and future. It is also one of the easiest ways to optimize your website for voice search. Compiling a list of questions that customers tend to ask about your business and then creating content pages that focus on those longer, more conversational search terms can help boost your website to the top of the search engine results page.

Learn how to choose the right SEO keywords when optimizing for voice search.

Create Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Page

A simple way to create content out of the list of questions that customers tend to ask is to turn them into an FAQ page that groups together common questions. Make sure to use natural-sounding questions and phrases, as well as succinct answers to increase the chances of your website appearing in the featured snippet position.

Use Structured Data Markup

Structured data markup, also known as schema markup, is a way of communicating information and context to search engines. Using structured data markup and applying the correct schemas can help provide voice search devices with more specific information about your website and content. It also helps search engines to better understand your business by building out your business knowledge graph. Structured data markup makes it much easier for search engines to accurately review your content and understand its context.
Voice search is not just the future of the search industry, it is the present. Voice search optimization is extremely important for local businesses with brick and mortar locations. If you would like to learn more about how to optimize your website for voice search, start a conversation with us today.

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