What is voice search?

Voice searching is the ability to find information using your voice as the input for a query online. For example, “Hey, Alexa, how do I optimize my website for voice SEO?” As it relates to websites, voice search is positioned where mobile technology was 5 years ago—a fast-growing tech that leading digital marketers are optimizing for today in order to reap the initial benefits from as early adopters. And that return is expected to be exponential; recent studies have found that, as early as 2020, half of all online searches will be handled by voice assistants. (Source: ComScore).

Key terms and concepts

• Algorithm: a set of rules to be followed in calculating the most relevant results of an online search.

• Schema: a type of microdata that provides Google bots with more detailed information, helping them understand your site content in relation to a person’s query. A detailed guide of how to use schema is provided on schema.org.

• Search Engines: Any of several web tools that accepts queries and returns relevant results. Google, the leading search engine in the world, dictates many of the rules by which SEO is conducted, and changes their algorithms hundreds of times per year. 

• Search Engine Optimization (SEO): The method(s) by which we increase a website’s discoverability on search engines like Google. SEO refers only to organic, unpaid search results and does not include paid results like PPC campaigns. 

• Site Map: a list of pages in a web site within a domain, used by search engines to index a website.

• Voice Technology: Refers to a user’s ability to submit their queries to a voice assistant like Alexa or Siri and have a search engine provide them with the most relevant result for their query, through audio exchange on their device.

For more Squarespace SEO basics, visit the help guide.

How to optimize your site for voice technology

1. Incorporate search queries into your overall content plan. 

Consider what questions your target audience is asking, and answer those questions thoroughly in blog posts and succinctly in landing pages. Remember to apply keyword changes to your page description, SEO description, and URL (if applicable) to maintain consistency.

2. Have a well-structured site map (submitted to Google via the Search Console).

A clean site map ensures that Google can index all parts of your site accurately which increases your chances of having a page served as a voice query result. Remove unused and outdated pages, clean up any broken links, and thoughtfully name your URLs to update your Squarespace site map automatically. Then re-submit your map to Google.

3. Incorporate schema where applicable.

Schema is typically how sites are able to appear first in search engine result pages (SERPs), though you can’t control this placement, only optimize for it.

Types of schema markup include business information, events, FAQs, people, products, recipes, videos, and reviews. So if you have any of these on your site, schema is a good thing to incorporate.

The easiest way to provide schema to Google is completing all of the fields in a product, event, or video description when you’re setting it up. However, you may find schema errors in Google Search Console. If that’s the case, there are multiple methods to fix or fill in missing schema on your Squarespace site. Your best bet is to speak to an SEO specialist for your specific schema type requirements.

4. Ensure the site is mobile friendly

The days of mobile-first indexing are here. Google now crawls and indexes the mobile version of websites first, meaning that your mobile is paramount to the success of your website’s objectives. Because Google hasn't published information on how they identify voice-optimized web content yet, we can assume that a mobile-friendly site will be the most optimized for voice as well.

While all Squarespace templates are inherently built to be mobile-friendly, you also have to put thought into how a mobile user would browse the site. Take the time to test your site on a mobile device. Look for things like usability and readability of menus and body text and overall speed and load time.

5. Keep an eye on the news

When you see articles relating to Google and voice technology, don’t skip over it. Read it and keep up to date on the latest so you can incorporate any changes into your sites. We recommend setting up Google alerts for keywords like “SEO,” “search engine,” and “Google algorithm” to ensure you don’t miss the latest industry updates.

Special thanks to Veronica for sharing her expertise.
Find out more about Veronica’s work on her website.

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