{"id":14471,"date":"2019-03-06T18:26:17","date_gmt":"2019-03-06T17:26:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/names.co.uk\/blog\/?p=14471"},"modified":"2019-03-06T18:26:28","modified_gmt":"2019-03-06T17:26:28","slug":"put-that-tablet-away-optimise-your-website-for-voice-search","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.names.co.uk\/blog\/put-that-tablet-away-optimise-your-website-for-voice-search\/","title":{"rendered":"Put that tablet away – optimise your website for voice search"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a 2018 study, PwC found that 77% of consumers prefer to use a voice assistant when searching for something online [1] Over three-quarters of consumers think that using a voice search tool such as Google Assistant, Amazon Alexa or Apple Siri is the smarter way to find information and shop online.<\/p>\n

Successful businesses are already well aware of the need to optimise their websites for voice search. Here we look briefly at Google featured snippets – the key to winning voice traffic – and give some SEO tips for optimising a web site for voice search.<\/p>\n

Google featured snippets<\/strong><\/h2>\n

When someone asks a question in Google, it shows key results in a block at the top of the results page. This is called a featured snippet and contains a summary of the answer, a hyperlink to the webpage, its title and URL.<\/p>\n

Clearly, this is important for users looking at results on a screen, but it\u2019s critical when they are using an assistant such as the Amazon Echo as the device will then read the summary answer out loud. Once a web page has \u201cwon\u201d the featured snippet for that question, it will continue to \u201cown\u201d it until a competitor provides a better answer or a better-phrased question.<\/p>\n

Do I have to re-think my website for voice search?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Not necessarily. Pages that already rank in Google\u2019s top 10 for a search can win a featured snippet with only small changes. Low-ranking pages can also be promoted by optimising them for voice search. It\u2019s worth putting in the effort too, a high-performing page can own many featured snippets.<\/p>\n

What are the SEO tips for voice search?<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Think about the kinds of questions people could ask that a page on your website would answer. You might design a new page by starting with a question, perhaps as a sub-heading, and following it with a single paragraph answer. You can then expand on the answer by giving more detail. For an existing site, you might consider an FAQ section, which provides well-phrased questions and good concise answers<\/p>\n

Anticipate questions that are spoken, rather than typed. Speakers tend to use longer questions containing at least three words (called long-tail keywords).<\/p>\n

If your business has a local presence, think about the people in your area and what they would be searching for. Add your business on Google My Business<\/p>\n

Make your website responsive and mobile-friendly. Many people use voice search on a smartphone so it\u2019s essential that they can see your pages without resizing. Your pages also need to load quickly.<\/p>\n

Voice search results will also include social media posts so it\u2019s important to keep your Facebook, Twitter and other social profiles up to date and to post regularly.<\/p>\n

In order to \u201cwin\u201d and maintain featured snippet ownership, it\u2019s important to:<\/p>\n