How virtual assistants are changing keyword research

On By mattroyseIn Digital Marketing, SEO

These days, Alexa and Siri are doing a great deal more. They are not just telling knock-knock jokes. They are not just ordering the paper towels your household is set to run out of next week. Virtual assistants are revolutionizing voice search functions and changing how we do keyword research.

Healthcare and financial technology (fintech) are among the industries utilizing virtual assistants. They are profiting from a new focus on voice search optimization. Other industries and even small businesses can benefit from investing effort into mastering search engine optimization (SEO) for voice search.

SEO strategies may have thrown you for a loop in the past. However, there’s a good chance you’ll find voice search optimization easy to implement. This is due to its intuitive nature. If you can ask Alexa what the weather is, then you can do a keyword research for voice search.

Optimize your content for voice search

For digital marketers aiming to stay ahead in the online space, optimizing your SEO for voice search is crucial. This area remains a largely untapped opportunity.

Through this article, you’ll understand how virtual assistants are changing keyword research across industries. You’ll also know how to start implementing voice search optimization strategies in your own business.

Only a few years ago, you would have had to take out your smartphone to do this. This was the only way to know what time the New England Patriots played on Sunday. You needed to type your query into Google physically. This was necessary to determine the calorie count of a pint of Chunky Monkey.

Today, no typing is necessary.

You ask Alexa or Siri. You might also consider one of the many other virtual assistants available for service. It’s just like asking your mom, best friend, or a knowledgeable sales associate. The world is experiencing a voice search revolution across generations.

From Gen Z to boomers, everyone is hip to the voice search trend. Several key factors have driven the rise of voice search. It provides quicker results. It is also more convenient for mobile users.

Search Engine Land contributor Kristopher Jones predicts that by 2022, 55% of Americans will have an intelligent virtual assistant. This widespread adoption highlights the growing reliance on voice-activated technology. Users appreciate the convenience of searching the internet using only their voices.

If your SEO is not optimized for voice search, you could be missing out on a large number of searches. It could be approximately a billion searches per month.

Search Engine Land

Optimizing for voice search is especially important for small businesses. Jones reports that 22% of voice inquiries are associated with local businesses, such as coffee shops and gas stations.

To gain a share in the voice search market for your business, learn how to conduct keyword research. Focus on preparing keywords for voice search specifically. It’s different from traditional keyword research.

Overall, it’s more intuitive since voice search is similar to how you converse with another person. Utilize free keyword research tools and prepare keywords for voice search queries.

SEMrush blog contributor Himanshu Rauthan suggests targeting question keywords.

Users “talk” to their virtual assistants. As a result, people utilize normal query language. It generally starts with words like “how, what, where, when and why.”

SEMrush

Along the same lines, it’s imperative to include “filler words” which might, ordinarily, be omitted in traditional keyword research. Words such as “I, the, of the, on the, to, for” make queries more conversational.

Users include those words when asking their virtual assistants questions. Therefore, it’s vital you include them when preparing your keywords for voice searches.

Latent semantic indexing (LSI) keywords include filler language. They can be found in the “search related to” section at the bottom of a Google search results page.

Industries utilizing virtual assistants

Virtual assistants do more than answer questions like:

“How tall is Mount Everest?”

“What movie won the Oscar for Best Picture last year?”

Industries are leveraging virtual assistants to streamline processes and enhance the client experience. Leading the way is the healthcare industry.

According to HIT Consultant contributor Jasmine Pennic, virtual assistant technology in the healthcare industry is improving healthcare quality. It enhances patient care and outcomes. All of this is achieved at lower costs.

To manage the increasing demand on healthcare professionals, Pennic reports that the industry has automated patient engagement tasks.

They use chatbots and virtual assistants. Speech recognition-based virtual assistants use natural language processing and machine learning models. These are the same as those used by Alexa and Siri. They help healthcare professionals communicate more effectively with patients.

Virtual nursing assistants are one of the areas of artificial intelligence seeing the most significant investment in the healthcare industry.

This is according to UIC Health Informatics. Other areas include robot-assisted surgeries and administrative workflow assistance.

The ways the healthcare industry is utilizing speech recognition-based virtual assistants can be applied to other sectors as well. From giant industries like Fintech to small local businesses, this technology can help with administrative tasks such as transcription, scheduling, and information search.

Tips for getting into the voice-search game

Your business can still utilize speech recognition-based technology through voice search optimization. This is true even if you’re not ready to hand over administrative tasks. In fact, your business probably can’t afford not to optimize for voice search.

In addition to performing keyword research for voice search, there are several other steps you can take to optimize your SEO for voice search. These tips will help you target your ideal customers.

In addition to market research, a solid SEO strategy for voice search demonstrates that you know how to meet customer needs.

First, and perhaps most importantly, use conversational language when creating content. Content creators should write like they speak to increase their chances of appearing as the featured snippet which the Google Assistant frequently reads aloud to answer queries.

Another tip that is especially helpful for small businesses is to focus on local SEO. For example, after discovering a termite infestation, a user might ask their virtual assistant to find a local pest control company.

If you own a pest control company, you want to make sure that a potential customer is able to find you. In your landing pages and meta tags, use “near me” and geo-targeted search words. Furthermore, claim your Google My Business page and keep all your information up to date.

Additionally, making your website mobile-friendly and fast are ways to impress Google and increase your chances of appearing in the voice search results.

Is your content optimized for voice search?

As voice search technology continues to improve, consumers will increasingly utilize it. Nearly every industry and business can benefit from implementing virtual assistants. You can begin by confirming that your content is optimized for voice search.

This guest blog article was written by Noah Rue, a freelance writer who is fascinated with the world of search engine optimization, marketing, and social media.