TRAFFIC
It’ s important not to just guess the questions that people are asking – look at search trends and top-performing FAQ pages and gather data.
Once you’ ve compiled a solid list of questions and statements that experienced players and newbies ask, develop a structured and prioritised plan to create content pages that focus on those longer, more conversational search phrases, questions and queries.
Figure 1: Featured snippet example
2. Prioritise snippets, schema and structured data. The rigorous approach to content creation outlined above may seem like overkill, but it’ s all to play for in the growth area of voice search – especially as not every betting brand will be ready for, and in some cases even aware of, the fight.
Voice search takes place within a wider context where there is a renewed focus from search engines on giving accurate answers and semantically understanding your website content.
In short, search engines are starting to think more like humans, so your SEO and voice search strategy must be more engaging, user-focused and human too.
Schema. org is a way of organising your web content by identifying in the source code what it is about. It’ s a shared standard used by Google, Bing, Yahoo! and others which helps to remove search engine guesswork, i. e. you can tell search engines that when you write‘ Chelsea’ you mean the football team, not the New York hotel.
The question-oriented approach outlined above must be backed up with a rigorous approach to schema and technical SEO to maximise your chances of being given as the answer to voice search queries.
As an added bonus, your chances of showing up in‘ featured snippets’ in search results also goes up( see Figure 1).
Summing up Combining a human understanding of how potential betting customers use voice search
“ Voice search takes place within a wider context where there is a renewed focus from search engines on giving accurate answers and semantically understanding your website content”
with a thorough technical understanding of code is the key to voice search.
● ●Voice search is a massive opportunity, especially for challenger brands and affiliates that want to challenge the major operators in search engine rankings. Not everyone is up for the fight.
● ●For those which make a priority of voice search, the traffic volume – and profit – is there, but you need to make a start now.
MARTIN CALVERT is marketing director at Blueclaw, a betting and gaming-focused SEO, content marketing, PPC and social PR agency. Martin heads up Blueclaw’ s internal marketing team and performs a strategic role on behalf of a number of key clients.
iGB Affiliate Issue 64 AUG / SEP 2017
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