In the episode of the Affiliate Buzz, James Martell talks to Duane Forrester, VP of Industry Insights for Yext, about Why Voice Search Is Eating Your Lunch and Already Shaping the Future of SEO.

Is Voice Search the Future of SEO?

Voice search is something the millennials have mastered! In the past we tried many different things to get high search engine rankings, but then came mobile - which lit a fuse overnight! Now everyone has a cell phone and mobile devices are now getting smarter and people are using them to speak their questions.

Now we can use our cell phones to "voice a question" (among other things), but how does this affect the consumer? Duane talks about speaking to Google and Amazon and how they are heavily investing in bringing us new technology. He talks about how these devices can have a personal reaction with you which is endearing to humans, but the data side is most important.

Now Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Apple, are racing to backfill all of the information that people might be looking for to make sure they have the right answers. He talks about "how to ask" questions and how these devices can remember the topic of discussion.

How Website Owners Can take Advantage of Voice

Voice search is SO convenient, rather than typing your questions into your phone. From an SEO perspective, Duane explains exactly what you need to be aware of in voice search and what factors come into play. You need to be aware of what you are feeding into the system, and does it give everything you need to answer that question. They take about the customer journey, so make sure you have the answer that is correctly formatted to be spoken outloud.

The #1 strategy for managing the entire footprint of information that is available from your business to a consumer. So you need to manage your information so it is available to the consumer when they want it.

Featured and Rich Snippits

If someone asks a question, you want your results to show up. Duane discusses what he recommends for anyone getting started with Rich snippits. He explains where 80% of the spoken answers from Google are taken directly from the featured snippit. He talks about the "trust signals" the search engines "pull out" in order to use and verify they should be spoken out loud.

Voice Search Nuts and Bolts

Duane talks about how to find clues on where to find data that voice search might use. Understanding the phrases that are converting, allows you to be that snippet that gets voiced when someone is looking for that product or service. He talks about cataloging questions and answers and how to brand yourself through trust to show up first. He also talks in detail more about how to optimize your featured snippets and what people fail on most often.

Listen to learn:

- How prevalent voice search is used today
- How website owners can take advantage of voice search
- The #1 strategy for managing the entire footprint of information
- The importance of Featured and Rich Snippits
- How to optimize your featured snippets
- What you need to know to get ranked ahead of your competition

If you are considering building a lifestyle business, where you can spend more time traveling, more time enjoying your family and more time doing all of the things that matter to you most, stay tuned to a little roadmap we are putting together which will be ready in a few weeks. We also invited you to Subscribe to the Affiliate Buzz on our website, on iTunes, and on our new YouTube Channel to be alerted to new episodes.

Resources:

- Yext - Take control of your online brand across 100+ digital services.
(https://www.yext.ca/)
- Duane Forrester on Twitter: @duaneforrester