Searching by voice
RICHARD CONWAY EXPLAINS HOW VOICE SEARCH IS IMPACTING E- COMMERCE NOW AND INTO THE FUTURE.
“H ey Siri, I’m hungry.”
“If you feel like pizza, the best place nearby is Dominos, a 1.8 kilometre drive. Would you like me to order your favourite?”
From Siri, to Amazon Echo, Google Now and Cortana, we’ve entered the age of voice search. It’s impacting e- commerce now, and there’s little doubt that its effect in the future will be nothing short of revolutionary. So how did we get here? It is human nature to simplify. And ultimately, that’s all voice search is – a simplification of the existing way of doing things. Instead of having to look down at your phone, type in a couple of sentences and scan through search results, technology has adapted to suit our desire for convenience. We can now simply state our desire, question or command, and our devices will obey.
It makes sense when you consider that 90 percent of human communication happens through voice. Now technology is catching up.
We know that human advancement occurs through our evolving interaction with machines; since 2010, there has been a dramatic increase in the ability of devices ‘automatic speech recognition’ (ASR) capability. This increase in ASR has meant that now, we can talk to our smartphones, and instead of them coming up with irrelevant results that frustrate us, their ability to understand and process our requests is similar to that of a human.
It’s thought that the abilities of technology will soon surpass our own in terms of accuracy too!
While this shift in technology has largely taken place over the past decade, there’s been an exponential increase over the past few years that is set to continue. Since 2008, voice searches on Google have increased by 3500 percent – meaning that now, one out of every ten Google searches are spoken, rather than typed.
It’s predicted that by 2020, 3.5 billion mobile devices will have microphones, with less than five percent equipped with keyboards, and they’ll be performing over 200 billion searches per year through voice. SO WHAT? THE IMPACT ON E-COMMERCE Although the growing trend of voice search impacts all of us, it has particular relevance to those businesses involved in any form of e-commerce.
Specifically, three key differences exist between voice searches and text searches:
1. Natural language. We’ve adapted to searching through text, and learnt to just include keywords. Doing so by voice search sounds odd however, and requests are generally much more conversational. Think about the last time you used Siri or Cortana – you probably started with a greeting, then asked some form of question, most likely in the form of a full sentence. Increasingly, searches are being performed in this type of ‘natural language’, as opposed to conventional keyword searches, which has ramifications for your website if you’re wanting to be found.
2. Local-based. Research has shown that voice searches are three times more likely to be about a local-based query than text searches. This flows directly on from voice searches’ question-oriented nature – people are asking questions through voice, and these are usually about matters close at hand. “Where’s the nearest place to buy shoes?” “What to do in Auckland?” “How long will my drive to work take me?”
3. Brevity in responses. Contrary to popular belief, voice search requests aren’t actually shorter than their text counter parts. They do, however, require shorter, or at least more concise and orderly responses. The last thing a consumer wants when they ask where the best place to get pizza is, is a cross-sectional analysis of the different pizza joints within a 100 kilometre radius and a thorough pros and cons list. Voice searches are often done on the fly, and as a result, brief, direct search results are expected.
KEEPING PACE WITH THE CHANGES
It goes without saying that any business hoping to continue its future in e-commerce would be wise to heed these differences and adapt accordingly – but how do you get started?
1. Embrace the change. The only constant about technology is that it’s always changing. It’s easy to become frustrated with the never-ending technological fads, particularly when plenty of them don’t stick around. To think that voice search is simply a trend that won’t last would be a mistake, however, it makes logical sense as a step in human development; all the big players are heavily invested, and it’s here to stay. The sooner your business gets on board with this, the better!
2. Still commit to SEO best practices. Though some aspects of your marketing and online presence will definitely have to change, the core principles of SEO remain the same: Create good, relevant content that adds value to your target market, and clearly label images. There’s still no beating a base of great content when it comes to search rankings. 3. Phrase for questions. Given that voice searches are coming in as questions, the best approach is to front-foot this and have a lot of content worded as answers to likely questions. Frequently asked question pages are great, as well as simply making sure that your content is in relevant full sentences; think “The best place to buy shoes in Auckland is…” etc. Make sure to have plenty of local-based content as well.
“In the future it's more than likely that text searches will be almost entirely redundant, overtaken by interactive voice as our way of getting answers.”
THE FUTURE: FROM VOICE SEARCH TO CONVERSATIONAL COMMERCE
We’re at a crossroads when it comes to search formats. Text search has been the bread and butter of consumers for several decades, and voice search is now growing in popularity.
In the future it’s more than likely that text searches will be almost entirely redundant, overtaken by interactive voice as our way of getting answers.
Not only that, it’s predicted that automatic assistants driven by artificial intelligence will become more and more common, to the point where ‘conversational commerce’ is the norm – conducted entirely through our mobile devices.
Who knows? Either way though, there’s a good chance we’ll be the last generation to use our keyboards for finding pizza! RICHARD CONWAY IS THE FOUNDER AND CEO OF PURE SEO.