Google Voice Search – the Google Search feature that lets you search for stuff by the power of the spoken word – is growing in popularity among searchers and importance among SEOs. It was unused for so long because most people didn’t know that it was actually there. You can even miss it, now, when you go to Google.com as it takes a few moments for the icon to load. Google offers a lot of other innovations on its search engine, but users mostly shy away from them. Amongst these; Voice Search proves to be the most valuable. There’s no need for typed words any longer – you can simply speak your query.

What Google Say

Google’s latest report claims that 55% of ‘teens’ and 40% of adults use Voice Search everyday on the Google app. Clearly, these are some impressive statistics. Perhaps the most interesting of the lot however is the fact that Google has also revealed that the most common voice searches are related to directions. A conclusion one might draw from this is that Voice Search is being utilised the most for when people are using their phone hands-free in their car, and are in need of directions somewhere. Voice Search impressively gives people the ability to get road directions on the move.

No doubt it’ll draw the attention of website owners and search engines optimisers the world over.

Lesser Use of Keywords

Leading search engine optimisation experts across the globe are claiming that voice searches will most likely come in the form of anural language. Not many searches will be made using keywords – most likely, people will be using their normal, conversational tone to conduct these searches. Before SEOs can move forward on the dawn of voice search, the first thing they will have to be comfortable with is this fact. With regards to anything in the sphere of search marketing, you need to first establish HOW the searchers are searching before you can implement any strategy to target this growing volume of voice searchers.

This growing trend will also be a challenge for Google, too. They’ll need to start thinking about (which I’m sure they will have already done) creating different and more unique algorithms to enhance their ability to return the most relevant of search results back to conversational query users. This probably entails mapping and linking long, spoken phrases to the shorter keywords we’re more familiar at the moment.

The Coming Developments

Expect these developments to come to fruition in the coming months/years:

  • As tech becomes more streamlined and voice search gains in popularity, you can expect search traffic to be limited somewhat
  • Search engine marketers will have to find ways of ranking for conversational queries
  • Because of this conversational approach to search, marketers will find keyword reports and analytical data harder to retrieve
  • Voice searches will possibly yield more follow-up questions

Major changes are coming to the world of search as we know it, and voice search will no doubt be a big part of it. The release of the Apple Watch next year will also herald a new way of searching for stuff; on the go, and using your voice. Take into consideration also the probability that, as Google are always trying to lead the way in online search, they will no doubt be pushing Voice Search onto users for their own agenda.