Is voice search a part of your digital marketing strategy?

Voice technology is something that has almost gradually crept up on us. From just a few homes having this several years ago we are now in a position where its use is widespread. Alexa jokes and memes abound and today voice assistants are integrated into almost all of the devices that we buy. As a result, if voice search isn’t currently a part of your digital marketing strategy then it might be time to consider it.

Voice technology as standard

A survey by Adobe in 2019 established that almost half of respondents were using voice technology on a daily basis and 48% were using it for web searches. The convenience of searching like this has broad appeal to consumers and this has become even more acute as more of our lives have been lived online during the era of COVID-19 in the first half of 2020. We are now working, shopping, communicating and browsing even more in the virtual world and this has meant more emphasis on the already-popular voice technology.

Opportunity in times of crisis

Integrating voice search into your digital market strategy is a simple way to tap into the opportunity that exists with so many of us now living out so much of our lives online. There are three ways that you can optimise the content that you create to make it more effective where voice search is concerned.

• Remember that voice search returns one result at a time. This is quite different to a text-based search, which will provide the user with a broad range of results. Given that this is the case, users who are searching via voice technology often opt for more longtail queries so that the single result that comes back is as helpful and accurate as it can be. That makes longtail query research an important part of digital marketing strategy if you’re looking to make your content more effective for voice technology.
• There’s a big difference between how we speak and how we type. This is something that is key to bear in mind when it comes to content creation, as the search queries that are being used for voice technology are likely to follow much more natural speech patterns than those that might be more popular for text-based queries. So, when you’re creating text content – especially for titles, blog headers or videos – make sure that it’s more geared toward these natural speech patterns if you want it to be effective for voice technology.
• Is your content listen-able too? Another element of voice technology that businesses often overlook is the fact that content is going to be read out loud. If you make it to the top of the search results a voice assistant is going to vocalise whatever you’ve put onto the pages. Is your content easily read and understood and how does it sound as well as read?

Given the significant rise in voice technology, search considerations such as these now need to be a part of every digital marketing strategy.