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BEST PRACTICES & STRATEGIES

Google simply takes over here – in most cases rightly –
the classification of the relevance according to the pre-
sumed "intent", the reason for the search query. Here,
too, the structured data, above all the entry on MyBusi-
ness and the ratings, play a very important role.

In view of the growing importance of this “navigation
tool”, Google started to market this search traffic as
well. And you do that with sponsored entries at the top
of the results list in Google Maps. This is of course ex-
citing when three Chinese restaurants in the immediate
vicinity vie for customers.

-controlled application. If the user does not have to type But the approach is just as interesting for companies
on the smartphone but can dictate them, then he will do that offer a service that matches the search intention
so in his normal language. This implies that companies but was not searched for at all. Let me give you a good
must look at their personas even more closely than be- example: If you are looking for a restaurant, you might
fore and not only understand the intention behind a need a parking space at the same time, right? And this
question, but even recognize the wording. is exactly where the parking garage operator Contipark
saw its niche, when designing a media plan together
Google can certainly assist, but a page that answers with the Berlin service providers from Uberall that is
exactly what the user asked succeeds. Therefore, it is dependent on the occupancy of parking garages.
advisable to rely on individual landing pages, for exam- Whenever there is enough space, ads are placed on
ple, for each branch of the company. Search engines Google Maps.
can then give users even more targeted answers, in-
cluding location-based answers, Rodriguez explains.
The same applies to FAQ pages, which need to get
more specific.

The structured processing is especially important when
the software tries to no longer refer to pages but to use
the included data immediately. The classic is the My-
Business entry, which is highly relevant for a search on
Google, but the same applies to reviews. Anyway, it is In short, those who copy voice today have not under-
recommended to start with the formatting according to stood that this interface is significantly changing the
Schema.org and to develop an infrastructure that can way people use smartphones. This effect is less imme-
keep this data permanently up to date, besides interact- diate and drastic than initially believed when there was
ing concerted with reviews. still hope that SmartSpeakers could become intelligent
butlers. But, other “hands-free” devices, such as the
The transaction relevance of voice search is probably
demonstrated best by the example of Google Duplex: navigation system in the car, also react to spoken input
Google started its first attempts to enable the Google from the user and they are different from what they
Assistant to make restaurant reservations and book would have been if they had to be typed.
rental cars without dedicated APIs, but simply via the The attempt by Google and Co. to take this into ac-
application on the respective website. count leads to the interpretation of the search intention
and that’s exactly what marketers must watch very
Special case ‘Near Me’
closely to be present with their offer at the crucial loca-
tion. Or how Ric Rodriguez explains it: "Voice search
The most exciting push for voice clearly arises from the
increasing importance of local search. If a user search- does not require any special SEO optimization". That's
es for a restaurant, Google will automatically show him true, but the ability to search by voice changes the
restaurants in the immediate vicinity, even if the user search. ◊
did not search for “nearby” or the city he is in.
By Daniela La Marca

14 August 2021: Omnichannel Marketing